Post #801 - In Which I Discuss The Future!

I've been quiet lately mostly because I've been busy. I've discovered that those who are doing usually aren't blogging about doing it. And I've been doing lots of stuff. Though, really, I have very little to show you just yet.

I had a few milestones in 2011. The high point, surely, was seeing my friend Russ get married to the girl of his dreams. That was a great moment and I was honored to be there. A close second was watching my first play being produced and shown. Had it been really good, it probably would have been the high point. ;) But we live and learn and will produce a much better and more streamlined version in 2012.

The biggest thing I will take away from 2011 though will be a paradigm shift in my thinking vis a vis my creative work. Sometime early in the year it occurred to me that I had better put up or shut up, because I had been talking a good game for a long time with little results. I was like Mike Singletary of 49er's fame. I talked a good game, but at the end of the day, I was still in last place with Alex Smith as my Quarterback.

So, 2011 has really been the year where I've been working towards project completion. It's been an ambitious year, but I think the results will speak for themselves in 2012.

In the last six months of 2011, I've shot two films, begun editing a DVD, written about half a novel, and restarted my website. All of these things have been trickling out there not for the sake of secrecy but, because, quite frankly I didn't want to raise any expectations until I knew I could deliver.

Sometime in 2012, these projects will be completed.

First will be my Kenya DVD. This is the DVD that I've been trying to put together for two years taking footage that I shot and that a colleague shot in Kenya last year to tell the story of our project in Kenya and the partners that we work with there. I've edited about a third of it so far and it's really good.

Second will be my Super Secret Sucky Project, or, as it's safe to call it now, The Amazing Mole 2. This is the most ambitious project I've ever worked on - so it's bound to suck (nobody, except maybe Amadeus, gets it right on the first try). It basically involves a reality contest that I shot in Disney World earlier this month with animated characters both competing in the contest and calling the shots behind the scenes. Test animation looks good. Audience reaction to the tests has been encouraging. But I need a lot of effort before I can pull this one off. Expect a preview pretty soon.

Third will be my untitled Folk Music documentary. My Dad has been singing off and on with the same group of folk singers since the earliest days of the Folk Music revival in the early 1960's. They meet every year in a reunion and have a hootenany. Since the San Francisco crowd was hosting the event this year, I decided that someone really ought to tell their fantastic tale - punctuated with taped performances. So in October I recorded their entire Hootenany and conducted interviews. I shot more footage in that weekend than I did during my three weeks in Africa. But I'm still only about half way there. I need to form a storyline in my mind before I finish the documentary with a second round of interviews and other footage. This one has a special deadline - next year's hoot. So I expect to be busy completing this during the summer of 2012.

And finally, I shall be a writing up a storm. In addition to the revised streamlined Last Supper play that I'll be working on here in the next couple of weeks, I shall also get back to my novel, continue writing for my website, and shall begin editing my sister's novel (I finally have an idea of how to unpack her dense, but fun, story). And, if there's time, I want to produce my next play - Next Year's Christmas pageant - as I think I have a unique take on it.

I'm going to be a busy guy in 2012 - so don't be surprised if I'm not around here a lot. I'll try to keep you up to speed, but I'm only going to mention things if I think they're up to snuff from here on out.

Have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and I'll see you all on the flipside of 2012!

A Holiday Message From The 99%...

With profound apologies to Dr. Suess...
And Thurl Ravenscroft...

A Holiday Message To The One Percent

You're a mean one, One Percent.
You're really a heel.
You're cuddly as a cactus,
You're as charming as an eel.
One Percent.

You're a bad banana
With a greasy black peel.

You're a monster, One Percent.
Your heart's an empty hole.
Your brain is full of spiders,
You've got garlic in your soul.
One Percent.

I wouldn't touch you, with a
thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole.

You're a vile one, One Percent.
You have termites in your smile.
You have all the tender sweetness
Of a seasick crocodile.
One Percent.

Given the choice between the two of you
I'd take the seasick crocodile.

You're a foul one, One Percent.
You're a nasty, wasty skunk.
Your heart is full of unwashed socks
Your soul is full of gunk.
One Percent.

The three words that best describe you, are as follows, and I quote:
Stink, Stank, Stunk

You're a rotter, One Percent.
You're the king of sinful sots.
Your heart's a dead tomato splotched
With moldy purple spots,
One Percent.

Your soul is an apalling dump heap overflowing
with the most disgraceful assortment of deplorable
rubbish imaginable,
Mangled up in tangled up knots.

You nauseate me, One Percent.
With a nauseaus super-naus.
You're a crooked jerky jockey
And you drive a crooked horse.
One Percent.

You're a three decker saurkraut and toadstool sandwich
With arsenic sauce!

(Sorry, I heard this song today and I thought, "This is exactly the message the Occupy Protesters have been preaching for the last three months." ;)

The Honorable Sacrifice

My dear friends, as a Veteran of the Armed Forces of the United States of America - a fact that I proudly display - I think Veteran's Day is a sham. Now, don't get me wrong. I am not trying to disparage the sacrifices paid nor the honor we owe to all our veterans out there for the hardships they endured. We owe them our respect and thanks. But what exactly are we honoring?

A soldiers life is tough. They work hard to defend the country from all harm - foreign and domestic. But the method in which many are forced to defend the country, while necessary, is hardly honorable. Killing to protect your fellow citizens isn't nearly as honorable as laying down your life to do so. Nobody walks up to a Veteran and says, "Thank you for all the people you killed overseas so that I can speak my mind here freely." And yet, that's usually part of the job requirement - or at least it is for anyone involved in a war.

Now, I don't wish to dwell on this particularly gruesome fact. Military people do many wonderful things... and they also drop bombs, shoot people, and project force. Its a job. Its a horrible, terrible, but unfortunately, necessary job. We owe our thanks to our veterans for doing these horrible terrible things that need to be done for us.

This is all a round about way of saying what we should be honoring are the peace makers - the ones who go equally into harm's way, sacrificing everything they have, to bring food, knowledge, and health care to people that are sometimes resistant to their very existence. They go into war zones, famine areas, health crises, without any thought or regard to their own safety, and do the beautiful, wonderful necessary things that need to be done. All pay some, and some pay all to do these things. But rarely do these people cause harm while they are doing these things. They don't need to blow up a village in order to save it first. They don't need to shoot brothers, sisters, parents, and friends in order to save everyone else. They do their work with kind words, loving hearts, and generous spirits.

War is evil and we shouldn't continue to honor it in any way, shape, or form. We should acknowledge the sacrifice of those who fought in the wars, but we shouldn't continue to heap honor on these horrible acts.

I appreciate the thanks. I appreciate the remembrances for those that have fallen. But I don't wish to be reminded or applauded for the necessary evils I was called upon to perpetrate on other people. There seems to be something wrong in that very notion.

As for me, I spent my minute of silence at 11:11:11 thanking God for the sacrifices that have been made by both soldiers and peacekeepers, and longing for a world where soldiers were no longer necessary. A Day Without Veterans would be a holiday I would truly enjoy celebrating.

5 Steps To Knowing Christ

1) Be introduced to him via word of mouth or book - someone mentions Christ and you are curious as to who he is.

2) You go to Christ's house to meet him and discover that He's not home and nobody seems to know where to find him. Further, although everyone there claims to know Christ, nobody has ever met him, and every description of him is conflicting. Still, you are curious, so...

3) You read his book. This is rather confusing. Like claiming you know Steinbeck because you read The Grapes of Wrath. This leads you to read other books from the experts, which contradict each other as well. You start to get a better picture of who everyone thinks Christ is. You know what he's done. But you still can't get to know him just yet. What you really need is to walk in his footsteps for a while...

4) You do things that Christ did. This brings you REALLY close to knowing him. You begin to suspect that the best way to know Christ is to be really really good to everyone - to love them as much as possible. BUUUUUTTTTTT... after many years of this, you still don't really know him. Which brings you to the final step...

5) You accept that Christ is unknowable. And surprisingly, when you stop trying to capture Christ into some definable picture, you finally get to know Him.

No Stupid Idea Left Behind

I was hard on the Bush Admin. for No Child Left Behind because it was a stupid law. I need to be equally hard with the current executives running our schools for their equally stupid left wing insanity.

Considering that schools are low on money, SFUSD recently hired Health Coordinators to make sure that schools remain healthy. In addition to cutting off all sweets on campus (including those that the teachers might bring in their own lunches or might buy for celebrations or parties - like a retirement cake, for instance) they have recently begun to institute a mandatory exercise period for teachers. After school, of course. For the good health of the teacher, of course.

Never mind the fact that most teachers work 80+ hours a week - many of these hours unpaid and overstressed - but now they have to add 1 hour a week of monitored exercise to their workload.

Only, it gets worse. Because in addition to the one hour of mandatory exercise each week that these teachers are required to do, they are also required to fill out paperwork on their exercise and submit the paperwork to the school district. Because we need to be able to verify these things, don't we?

But, you know, these teacher's salaries are bankrupting the country, so I guess they deserve everything they get. ;)

It Doesn't Get Any Better... A Square Peg Into A Round Hole Conclusion

I don't remember a single word ever said to me by a bully, but I can clearly recall their faces and every single one of their names and the feeling of dread that I got every time one approached me and the anger I still feel at the thought of each and every single one of them. I have no doubt they don't remember me at all. It's been 30 years. They thought only barely enough of me back then to ridicule me and ride me for three years of Jr. High, after which I'm sure they went home, did their homework, played with their friends, and never once thought about the consequences of their actions. Guilt is reserved for those who know they're doing something wrong. If you're taught that you are superior to others, you can't have guilt when you put those others in their place.

This, ultimately, is my point. The words and the taunts and the bullying behavior ends, but the effects of that bullying live on forever. Once a person has been told that they are worthless and those words are followed up with actions and the world does nothing to counter those claims, the victim will take those words to heart and will own them. There is no amount of self-esteem that can be taught that will overcome that kind of painful belief system. It becomes part of a person's psyche.

I don't think I ever saw it before - or at least not this clearly - and I don't mean to look at it as an excuse for my life. As I pointed out in the first part of this story, the seeds of my bullying were set in grade school. I was already well on my own path to confrontation with the "normal" world before I ever became bullied. But after being bullied, I can see how my psyche changed and how my decisions became flavored by that.

I loved to write in grade school. In Jr. High, I began to tell stories in other ways. In High School, I wrote again with a renewed passion - some prompted by teachers and friends reading my work, and some prompted by embracing a skill that I thought would take me places. But here is where that flavoring kicked in... I was certain that in some cosmic way, I was destined to be great. It was like I just expected a realignment of the world that would put me on top of all those that had ever put me down. I was waiting for cosmic retribution.

It wasn't that I expected I would win the proverbial lottery. I wrote. I worked hard at my craft. But I just assumed that sooner or later my talent would be discovered and that I would naturally assume my place as a great writer and a person beloved in all the world. That would show them.

That was the gist of it. That would show them! At my core, I was driven by a desire to prove that I wasn't that worthless person, that utter failure that everyone claimed to see when they looked at me in Jr. High. I was consumed by this desire. I threw everything good I ever had onto its altar and set the flames rocking.

Success wasn't going to be enough for me. I needed MEGA-SUCCESS! I needed Spielberg, Lucas, Disney success! Anything short of that was failure.

At some level, I still feel that way. Its something I struggle with even now. I can't enjoy even a minor victory because it only proves that I got lucky or that I managed to achieve something, but so what... there are others that do it so much better.

I don't want their wealth. I don't want their power. I want them to know that I have made something of myself and that I am not a loser. But I know that nothing I ever do or say will ever be enough to rid myself of these inferior feelings. I will be driven like this for the rest of my life.

So there is no BETTER for people that have been bullied. They have been taught that they are inferior and they have taken that feeling to heart. The only way forward in peace is to accept that feeling and somehow set it aside.

If there is any hope in this, it is this. I would never have put this together in my mind had I not a) made a horrible movie, and b) gone to Kenya. The movie made me question whether I really was talented and Kenya made me question whether anything I did or said really mattered in the grand scheme of things. My suffering is infinitesimal compared to the suffering in Kenya. That sort of perspective made me reevaluate my entire world view, starting with, as Michael Jackson once said, The Man in The Mirror. Maybe now that I know at least some of the wounds that I harbor deep inside, I can finally start to heal them.

It Doesn't Get Any Better... A Square Peg Into A Round Hole Part Three

I'd like to say that my high school years were vastly different, that I was well liked, and that I excelled, but that wasn't entirely the case. While I did excel in some things and I did have a lot of friends and acquaintances, in hindsight I can clearly see how the bullying of Jr. High kept me from developing even more. In fact, had it not been for one event, its safe to say that I might not ever have pulled out of the tailspin of Jr. High.

When I think back on those high school years, I like to remember my Senior Year where I knew everyone in school and everyone liked me - but that would be glossing over somethings to the point of rewriting history. While it was true that I went to Lincoln High School primarily because all of the kids I hated in Jr. High were going to a different high school that doesn't mean the bullying stopped immediately.

In my Freshman year, I was still a freshman. And Freshman get hazed. I was no different. But seen from the lens of Jr. High it really felt as if it was more of the same. I was really depressed because I thought that I was going to face another four years of misery and I was prepared to go it alone again. I can clearly remember starting to disappear into that fantasy world yet again, but three things radically altered my life in somewhat quick succession.

First, and most importantly, I discovered that my Grandmother had terminal cancer. Unfortunately, because I wasn't supposed to know and my Grandmother wanted to go out on her own terms, I wasn't allowed to share this information with anyone. I had to bear the knowledge of her impending death on my own. I'm not saying that I would have suddenly become chatty about it, but at least I could have shared my grief with my siblings had they known as well. This furthered my depression and not being a particularly motivated student before, I became an even worse student as a result.

Second, having come from an honor's program in Jr. High, I was slotted into advanced algebra in high school. My depression combined with never being a really huge fan of math (its a left brain / right brain kind of thing) meant that I fell extremely far behind the rest of the students. My brain was just not getting into gear. Then, I went to a doctor and discovered that I needed glasses. The day after I got my glasses, I went into class and suddenly everything clicked into place. I hadn't realized that I was squinting and not making out the math problems on the board before. I ACED the mid-term, but ultimately it wasn't enough to save my grade and I flunked out at the end of the semester.

Third, in the midst of my depression, I came to English class unprepared for anything and my teacher asked us to turn in our writing assignments. In desperation, I flipped through my notebook and found a story I had written over the summer. I handed it in to my teacher feeling that I had just saved my grade for the time being, but not really thinking any more about it. A few weeks later, my grades having slipped even further, my teacher approached me and said, "Why don't you try writing my stories like the one you turned in a few weeks ago?" I was stunned. My teacher had not only read but remembered something I wrote. Truth be told, this was the true start of my writing career.

A month or so later my Grandmother died. I was devastated. I flunked out of my first semester of high school. I had to drop out of the swim team. And I was dumped into remedial math. (How you can go from Advanced Algebra to Remedial Math, I have never understood) But rather than becoming even more depressed, I became angry with myself. I knew that I had let myself down. I decided then and there to turn my life around.

By the following semester I was on the honor roll. I excelled in every class. I retook and aced advanced algebra. I became an editor on the school paper. I ran cross country and won the most improved award. And so on, and so forth. I had switched from being a Them to being an Us.

But lest you think that I became a member of the bullying Us, I still remembered the lessons I had learned in Jr. High and from that point forward, I made it a point to try and include everyone equally in everything I did. This, more than anything else I did to improve my image, was the reason I had so many friends in High School. I saw no point in elevating myself at the expense of others.

While that trait served me well in High School, it would have serious ramifications for the rest of my life. But that's a story for the conclusion tomorrow...

It Doesn't Get Any Better... A Square Peg Into A Round Hole Part Two

I really hated Jr. High. I attended a school far outside my "price range" starting in 1980. This was the time when fashion began to make an appearance in a child's dialog and I was never going to afford being one of the cool kids. But besides appearance as a dividing factor, social skills became increasingly important, and I didn't have the kind of cutthroat social skill set that makes all those cliche teenage TV shows so popular. I was the loner kid and after getting a taste of the "in-crowd" I discovered that I wanted nothing to do with them.

Its funny because Jr. High was such a productive time for me almost precisely because I wasn't part of any social group. I was able to develop my own unique story telling ability and voice because I wasn't being influenced by pop culture nor by peer pressure. But despite these productive gains in creativity, those three years were the years that I was tormented and bullied.

For the most part I was left alone, but that was because I preferred it that way. However, every time I was forced to interact with the rest of the class or with the teaching staff, I was mocked and ridiculed. I maintained my aloofness mostly because being part of the crowd was the fastest way to social destruction.

Three instances really stand out for me.

I was at lunch once bouncing my baseball into my Dad's baseball glove on the wall - a perfectly normal activity that can be done by oneself. Some kids came over and started messing with me and once they'd drawn me away from my baseball glove, they filled it with mustard. The next day, I found the same kids playing handball. I waited until the ball got loose, ran after it, picked it up and chucked it as far as I possibly could out of the school grounds. Instead of gaining respect, I got sent to detention.

Another time, we had a substitute teacher in English class and this guy saw that the other students didn't like me, so he started mocking me at the board. I didn't take this lying down either - I mocked him right back. Of course, the students wouldn't back me up, but I think I got in some pretty good licks on the "substitute teacher". Needless to say, I ended up in trouble.

On the final day of Jr. High, my teacher took the entire class to a local pizza parlor. Everyone was supposed to have a partner to split the cost of the pizza. None of my classmates wanted to be my partner. The teacher allowed them to form groups of three or four or five just to avoid being partners with me. SO, I went to the pizza parlor, ordered the extra large with everything on it, and ate the entire thing in front of my class. My Dad wasn't pleased when I didn't bring home any change, but it was so worth it to get my just desserts. I should add that I was skinny as a rail back then, so no, I wasn't being irresponsible with my diet.

I, of course, focus on the bullying moments where I fought back - but there were many moments where I either couldn't fight back nor where I had the energy to fight back. I couldn't stay out of the crosshairs of an entire student body for too long. I felt their bullying constantly and there was nothing I could do to change it.

The main effect of all this is that if ever there had been a moment where I could have come out of my awkward inner phase and become one of the Us's of the World, I would have had to join those very people that were making my life a living hell. Those kids were all the driven world beaters whose parents could afford to give them whatever the hell they wanted to have. Though I was every bit their intellectual and creative equals, I could never match their lifestyle and, as a result, I was never going to be accepted into their world.

I ended up coming out of Jr. High not only hating every single student that had tormented me, but also the entire system of education that had allowed such bullying to occur. The only thing I had learned for the three years of Jr. High that I had been forced to attend was how to endure and survive on my own. While useful as a skill, as a social building exercise, this tended to make my default setting - retreat to the bunker of my mind. I had been forced to live in my own mind for so long, I preferred it to real life.

But then, I got to High School and something dramatically changed all that... in Part Three.

It Doesn't Get Any Better... A Square Peg Into A Round Hole Part One

Earlier this week I finally realized what it was that drove me nuts about all these YouTube videos proclaiming that life gets better for the victims of bullies - they're not true. It doesn't get any better. Or, at least, it might not get better for you.

Most of the reason that this is true is because people tend to fall into one of two categories throughout most of their lives - Us and Them. Depending on whether you're an Us or a Them at any particular point in your personal journey is the determining factor of whether you'll be bullied. Us's like people that belong to their category and are generally intolerant of Them's. Them's can't figure out why the Us's hate them and wouldn't know how to change to become an Us even if it were possible. Us's bully Them's. As pretty much everyone in their life goes through a Them cycle, you probably know what bullying is all about. But as you discover that you don't like being one of Them, you join Us, and the bullying stops. But not everyone joins Us. Some people remain Them no matter what. For Them, there is no end to the bullying they endure.

I have almost always been one of Them - you know, the weird kid that marches to his own set of drums. I remember in Kindergarten quickly surmising that I was pretty darn smart. I was easily ahead of the rest of the class on the learning curve - so much so that I pulled back, lest I get too far ahead. I enjoyed having friends and being the smart kid meant that I didn't have friends. But there wasn't a whole lot that I couldn't figure out on my own.

Throughout grade school I was able to associate with the smart kids in school. But unlike them, I didn't excel in my education. In turning away from education and learning as a goal in and of itself, my mind found the world of fantasy and make-believe to play around in. I often tell of the creation of my first story. We were supposed to write a paragraph about Halloween. I spent four hours and wrote ten pages. I had to be forced outside to join the rest of the kids in the Halloween parade, and I asked to take the story home so that I could finish it.

I loved to spend time in that fantasy world battling aliens and monsters, ghosts, spies, etc... But, as you can imagine, this made me the weird kid. I was aware of other kids at the school, but after third grade when all of my friends moved on to private schools, I was stuck in a classroom with nothing to interest me and no friends to keep me grounded in what was cool. I went off on tangents and became less and less connected to education and the things that all other grade school kids were interested in.

I wasn't quite bullied yet, unless you count loneliness as a form of bullying. I had "friends" but I didn't really have anyone to talk to. They were all going off into things like cars or girls or comics and I was lost in my fantasy world. I began to run not only as a form of exercise but also because it was the one sport I could do where I got to spend all of this time just thinking up things.

Of course, that all changed when I got to Jr. High... but that's up for discussion next time.

Thoughts in search of a well-thought out essay...

I am not a crackpot, but this is definitely a crackpot idea... unless, I'm on to something here.

These thoughts were prompted by two things. 1) During an excellent 9/11 sermon given at my church by First Responder Chaplain, Toby Nelson, who worked at Ground Zero, Katrina, and other places, he mentioned one thing that I'd never put my finger on but that definitely had the ring of truth about it. He said, "While I watched the planes crashing into the buildings again and again and again, I found that I was getting more agitated every time I watched." And 2) I just saw a headline for a "News" video that said, "WATCH: A man gets naked before breaking into a store." And I really had to wonder, "Who would want to watch something like that?"

So, here, in a nutshell, is my crackpot idea...

Is the Internet, Satan?

I offer these points of comparison. 1) Both lie. Incessantly. Or tell the truth in such a shade of lie as to mislead and misrepresent. 2) Both show us things we want to have and want to believe and makes it easy for us to obtain these things - none of which bring us happiness. 3) Both, by their very existence, stir up trouble. 4) Both tempt us to do and say things we'd never have done before. 5) The world is definitely more agitated because of their existence.

Now, normally I'd argue that the same could be said about any form of mass-communication. But can it? Certainly books, when they were introduced, caused a stir - but not nearly to the level that the internet has and in such a quick and dangerous way.

Would you agree that since the internet first appeared on the scene back in the early 90's, that the world has gotten steadily worse?

Anyway, I will leave this thought at this stage of its development. If any wish to take up my lance and attack this particular windmill, I shall be happy to join your quest.

The Eighth Samurai

We join our story halfway through the first act...

We have just seen the seven samurai graduating from samurai college. They are a happy bunch - before the inevitable downfalls that will lead them to the beginning of the story that we know as Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. But in this blockbuster prequel with the explosions and heavy special effects all shot in 3-D and tons of extra bonus features on the Blu Ray DVD (plus don't forget the teaser for the sequel to be found at the end of the 30 minute long credits) our master director has decided to add an edgy twist - Chris Tucker is The Eighth Samurai.

And it doesn't matter that he's black... and that he's spouting off stupid American ghetto hip-hop slang... this is 18th century Thailand (it was cheaper to film the prequel there, so they changed the story too) and anything goes in 18th Century Thailand. So as our 8 samurai warriors prepare the school for battle with environmentally unfriendly and immigration hating corporate Thai bad guys with thick Russian accents who all look like rejects from the WWE for some reason, we get to hear the montage accompanied by the latest Rap Star combo pack - P-Nut Enima and Slo-Slice.

But here is where it gets bad... the director couldn't leave well-enough alone. No, he had to dub in a few words that completely changed the meaning of the scene. And he had the samurai fire first. Stupid bad director.

I'm going to complain about this, but to be a completist, I will have to pre-order my DVD/BluRay combo pack with the extra toy inside.

I just wish that Hollywood knew how to run their business. They're going to go bankrupt at this rate.

Mammon

Why does money and power always corrupt? I find that even if you try to have a perfectly sane and normal conversation about money or power, eventually the worst nature of all human beings comes out - on either side of the debate.

I have said things here in the past two posts that I truly believe. But in saying these things, I may have hurt a fellow brother in Christ. I don't know why its hard to have a debate without it devolving into pain and recrimination, but I do know that that was never my intent.

Still, I find it hard to drop the subject. I don't know what part of my ego insists that I am right and that others are wrong, but if that part of my ego is causing pain in others, I need to shut it down. It should have no place in my life.

I recently took over as the Head of the Stewardship Committee at my Church with the one personal caveat that I would be certain this committee did not engage in Church politics. I have seen the corrupting influence it can have on Church committee's even when everyone on the committee is well-intentioned. I suppose I should add that such a mixture of politics and finances in my own life can also have a corrupting influence.

Therefore, I am hereby declaring an end to the discussion of politics and money from now on here at this blog. Neither right wing nor left wing - I shall remain flightless from here on out.

Rebuttal

Why Taxing the Rich Is Good for America

By Loren Berlin Posted 10:30AM 08/24/11 Columns, Economy, People, Taxes

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Last week, Warren Buffett wrote an incredible opinion piece in The New York Times asking the federal government to raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans, himself included. "My friends and I have been coddled long enough by a billionaire-friendly Congress," he argued. "It's time for our government to get serious about shared sacrifice."

Buffett's editorial sent economists and politicians into a frenzy as they debated the merits and implications of his request. Underlying the chatter is an important question: Does our country benefit, financially, from taxing our wealthiest citizens?

According to Bruce Bartlett, who's held senior policy roles in both Ronald Reagan's and George H. W. Bush's administrations, as well as on the staffs of Reps. Ron Paul and Jack Kemp, "in 2008, those in the top 1 percent of the income distribution, with incomes over $380,000, had an effective tax rate of 23.3 percent. In 1986, a year when the real gross domestic product grew a healthy 3.5 percent, their effective tax rate was 33.1 percent. It has been much lower every year since."

Bartlett, who culled Internal Revenue Service data for his analysis, which appears this week in his New York Times column, goes on to say: "If this group were still paying 33.1 percent, federal revenue would have been more than $166 billion higher in 2008 alone. That would be enough to reduce the budget deficit by about 10 percent this year. If the top 1 percent of taxpayers had continued to pay the same effective tax rate they paid in 1986 every year from 1987 to 2008, the federal debt today would be $1.7 trillion lower."

While Bartlett acknowledges the assumptions implicit in his calculations, the bottom line is clear. America has lost boatloads of money thanks to our willingness to cut taxes on those who can most easily afford to pay them. This despite our country's history of successfully taxing the rich. Under Reagan, for example, the richest 1% of Americans paid one-third of their income to the federal government.

Between High European Taxes and Low U.S. Rates, a Happy Medium

Those who argue against higher taxes often fear that an increase will slow economic growth. But history dispels that myth. As William G. Gale, an expert on tax policy at the nonpartisan Brookings Institution, wrote on CNN.com, "Even the massive tax increases during and after World War II -- amounting to a permanent rise of 10% to 15% of gross domestic product -- and the much smaller tax increases in 1990 and 1993 did no discernible damage to U.S. economic growth."

The debate over whether and how much to tax the rich isn't new. But it's extremely important in the current economy. The debt ceiling deal reached earlier this month includes spending cuts, but does nothing to increase revenues. Additionally, the spending cuts come primarily from programs that support low- and middle-income households. The richest Americans? They're virtually exempt from chipping in to resolve the nation's budget problems.

Which is why Buffett is publicly asking to pay more in taxes -- and why he's right. After all, "households in the top 1% of the distribution can afford to contribute," argues Gale. "They have done enormously well during the past 30-plus years. In 1979, their income accounted for 10% of total income. According to the most recent data (from 2008), their share of total household income more than doubled to 21%. In contrast, real income for middle-class workers has remained roughly constant over the same time frame."

In his opinion piece, Gale outlines a variety of options for raising taxes. In all cases, he's advocating for moderation. "None of this means that the U.S. needs to move to European taxation levels," he writes. "But between the depleted tax revenues we raise now -- the lowest share of the economy in six decades -- and the high taxes experienced in European countries, there is plenty of room to raise revenues in an economically sound manner to support a reasonable level of government."

Or, to put it more bluntly, our country is in the throes of a debt crisis. We're delusional to think that we can continue with the current tax rates. So let's stop asking whether or not we should raise taxes on the rich and instead turn our attention to how we can most effectively do so.

Loren Berlin is a reporter with the AOL Huffington Post Media Group. She can be reached at loren.berlin@teamaol.com, on Twitter at @LorenBerlin, and on Facebook.

See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/nWl920

If I Was President... (completely disregarding the way politics actually works)

I had some good ideas over the weekend, and I thought I'd pass them along to whoever is listening out there. Hopefully, someone will listen and together we can solve all of our countries problems PDQ! So, here goes...

1) Solving the Immigration/Afghanistan/Economic Problems In One Fell Swoop - First, you grant amnesty to all of the illegal immigrants in this country. Deadline: April 1st, 2012. All illegals in this nation have to apply with weight granted to those who have been here the longest (wait for it...) In addition to place of birth, etc, we collect information on how they've been surviving here in this country (I.E. Who's been paying them and keeping them employed). On April 2nd, we close the borders. Anyone caught sneaking into the United States after that will be dealt with thusly - they will be sent to a detention camp, they will be treated nicely, then they will be loaded on to a plane and flown to Afghanistan. Not to fight, mind you, but just to be deported. Since Afghanistan doesn't share a border with the US, they will not return to this country. AND, as a bonus, an influx of illegal immigrants into Afghanistan will likely overwhelm the country and drive the Taliban out as that country implodes from all the extra mouths to feed. End of war. Two problems solved.

On May 1st, the IRS will be handed all of the information collected from the formerly illegal immigrants and asked to collect back taxes from not only the new citizens, but also from all the people that employed them. Fines for late fees, unfiled tax forms, and lying on official paperwork will be assessed, but jail time will not be required. That should fill our coffers and also replenish all the money we spent on 50 million non-tax paying freeloaders. Two more problems solved.

2) Dealing with my Republican Counterparts and Compromising On Fiscal Philosophy - I don't agree with the Republicans that rich people shouldn't pay their fair share of taxes because they need that money to create jobs, but I'm willing to compromise a solution.

First, we set the new tax standards on all corporations to a REALLY high percentage (like say close to 50%). Then, and this is the important part, we allow for the taxes to be lowered permanently based upon the current US jobless rate. We tie the lower amount to an attainable goal (say 5% jobless rate) and so long as the jobless rate remains that amount, the corporate taxes shall be at their lowest rate. Incentive: Create Jobs to Get Good Tax Rates. And if they try to just pocket the money, or ship jobs overseas, the tax rate soars and the government then has the funds to make sure the safety nets remain funded. Two More Problems Solved.

3) It's time we abolish WHOM from the English language. Nobody can darn well remember whether its whom or who that they're supposed to say. And really, in what other context is whom even a word? Its like someone added that letter M just to confuse people, or, dare I say it, its a conspiracy amongst English Teachers to keep their jobs!

(As an addendum... Obama shouldn't receive any credit for Libya if Democrats aren't also going to hand Bush credit for Iraq. In both cases, the President got us involved in a conflict that we really didn't need to be involved in and in both cases neither President really did anything substantial to bring about the end of the conflict. Kudos to Obama for at least keeping our ground troops out of the fight.)

There are some things you don't jinx...

So, in a nutshell, here's what happened.

My Dad went in for a routine check-up, which prompted some tests, which lead to an angioplasty, which revealed the need for a bypass operation. This all literally happened over the course of a couple of weeks. Now, my Dad is generally very healthy. He wasn't really having too many symptoms and he wasn't really in much danger - except of course that he could have a coronary at any moment. So, it was decided to do the operation.

Now my Dad tends to be extremely private when it comes to things like this. He didn't really want the news getting out far and wide. So, I didn't spread the news. I kept it to myself. But there was a second reason I didn't pass it on. I was extremely confident that he was going to be okay.

Don't get me wrong. I didn't leave you all out of the loop because I didn't feel like you needed to know. On the contrary, I really wanted to tell someone. But combined with this "knowledge" that he was going to be okay, was this real fear that I didn't want to jinx it. Something told me to keep my mouth shut. So I did. And he's all right. So... there's that.

Its easy to say that its childish to be superstitious about things, but I never said I knew exactly how the universe works. If a butterfly can cause a hurricane, who knows what an errant comment can change? Loose lips sink ships, why can't they also reverse the outcome of surgery?

Anyway, my Dad is recovering. I am extremely grateful for all the prayers that found their way here. Please don't feel that I left you out of anything on purpose. I really just didn't want to jinx the outcome. And I'm glad my Dad is fine.

Marvin Mudpie Will Return

I used to love sitting through the end of a James Bond movie credits just to see those words at the end, "James Bond Will Return". To me it meant continuity but also made me excited for further adventures.

Now, my own ne'er-do-well spy, Marvin Mudpie, hasn't had quite as much luck. Started as a collaboration with Ian Thriters, Marvin Mudpie's first book, "Dunebreaker" was completed in 1984. His second adventure, "Stilleto," was completed the following year. Since then there have been about four short stories written and one mini-series that explored his origins. He also was a co-star in the Bimbotech saga, but we'll ignore that for now. Mudpie has been largely absent around these parts for 11 years.

This points out the answer to the question about how do I get my ideas. For some stories, I can force an answer. If the story needs a mundane solution to a mundane problem, I just think one up. But for other characters or stories, there is never anything mundane about them, and you have to wait for a story idea to pop into your head.

Well, POP! I had a DOOZY of an idea on Sunday on my way to church. It still makes me chuckle even now. It came out of the clear blue and let's just say that it will finally answer all of your questions about our debt crisis and who is behind the last few years of economic unrest - while presenting our hero, Marvin Mudpie, with his greatest villain yet!

But the thing is, I don't ever plan for a Mudpie story. I had probably written him off as a hero a while back. 11 years is a long time to go between stories. And yet, there are some story ideas that can only be handled by this master spy. As soon as the idea occurred to me, I KNEW it was a Mudpie story.

So, now I have to cram yet another story idea onto my very full plate. Don't expect it anytime soon. You won't see the first chapter of this story until the middle of September on the newly revised TAC website. Until then, remember that old spies never die, they just become plumbers.

Health

I fleetly flee, I fly
on fantastical feet
no more defeat, repleat
with life, my legs cry

no more with pain
I embrace my joy
like a spinning toy
the world to gain

I walk, gambol
dance with passion
toes - try not to mash on
liberty for my soul

When its gone
and all that
leg is fat
like a cat
chair I sat
the world flat
full of chat
SCAT!
I weigh a ton.

It's come back
my knee healed
my heart revealed
a lack, I lack

Soaring
no longer snoring
forget boring
on the dance flooring!

I'M FREE!

So now this curse
is set in verse
And it is time
To end this rhyme.

There's A New Blog A'Comin...

I can't believe it took me THIS long to figure out what to do with all this vast and completely useless Disney Knowledge in my head. Seriously, I've been trying to figure out the best use for all this stuff for years now. It's probably the one thing that I study more seriously than film or writing or anything else and I've never had an outlet for all this knowledge. Most of the cool Disney info is out there already and I didn't want to be just another ME TOO! But the somewhat obvious answer hit me over the weekend.

You see, I've been pestering my family for years. Before every WDW trip I've done a countdown leading up to the day of travel. I would write a little blurb about some aspect of our trip - a paragraph or two about a hotel, attraction, restaurant, etc... - and then I would e-mail it to my family. I've kept these past countdowns with the idea that for my next trip, I wouldn't have to write them all from scratch. So, as I was thinking about starting up the new Countdown for my next trip in December, it occurred to me that what I had was the start of a really good idea for a blog - A Daily Disney reminder.

So that's what I'm going to do - a Disney Blog that, quite frankly, is designed to make me happy. I get to expound my Disney knowledge and if people read it, even better. I need a little time to get this up and running, so don't expect anything for a week or two. But I'll let you all know when it's ready.

Playing with the big boys

Dear Congress Person:

My new E-Bay business has fallen on hard times and I need your help to secure TARP money to continue forward. So far, I have managed one sale. But of my four other bids, all are failing. Prior to 2008, I didn't have a single E-Bay sale failure. This is a new thing for me.

Recently, I voted to give myself a one million dollar bonus. As you can see, with the economy stuck in the toilet like it is, I probably won't be able to afford that bonus and continue to operate my business. But I need myself to keep this business running and since I'd probably end up leaving this company if I don't receive the bonus, it is imperative that this bonus be honored and that there still be enough capital funds to keep my business afloat.

Therefore, I am asking for a loan of $2,000,000 of TARP money to keep my E-Bay business afloat and to still be able to give my employee the bonus that he deserves. Since this amount is just a drop in the bucket for the TARP money, I suspect that approval should be forthcoming in a timely manner. I await your funding and your response.

Sincerely,

Will Robison
A Tax Paying American Citizen That Is Too Big To Fail

Tea Party For One

Do not feel sorry for me. I am broke.

As of Friday, I discovered that I had maxed out one of my two remaining credit cards. (One, unfortunately, was shut down on me as a result of economic downturn. I had plenty of credit on that card and was easily making my payments, but the company just decided to shut down my account - mostly because I think they were close to bankruptcy at the time). Now, I've never maxed out a credit card before. Suddenly realizing that one half of your credit is gone shines a light on the fact that the party is over. And now that the booze are gone, it's time to tell the freeloading guests to go home. When I get into this situation where belt-tightening is called for, my radical brainless side comes out and I start my own little slash and burn tea party for one.

What does that mean? I'm going cold turkey. No more spending. Period. End of story. No donations. No dutch treats. No treats. No movies. No books. No nothing. If it ain't free, it ain't me.

Oh sure, some bills I don't have any option over. I still need gas and car payments and insurance and stuff. And those pesky credit cards still need to get paid. But don't ask me out for dinner any time soon (unless you want to pay) and don't expect me to be knowledgeable on current movies after this weekend. Cold Turkey! It's not just for the day after Thanksgiving anymore...

I could give you 100 different reasons for being in this situation, but the truth of the matter is, I saw this iceberg coming a long ways off and I didn't turn from it. I kept hoping that it would shrink or the current would push it aside, but that iceberg kept coming. Well, it finally hit me. And I'm finally taking on water faster than I can bail it out. I'm not ready to man the lifeboats just yet, but I am starting to sink.

Nope. I have no money. Reality has not just settled in, it's foreclosed on me. I have no choice but to stop spending money.

Of course, if there's a silver lining to all this (one that's not easily removed and sold on E-Bay that is) its that now I have a lot of time to spend getting projects done. My novel will no longer languish from a lack of attention and other projects will get the time they deserve as well. So... good timing, I guess.

Reasons for my absence

I thought I'd end my month long silence here by detailing all the profound thoughts I've had over the last month. So here goes...

(Chirp... chirp... cricket... cricket...)

It's hard to write a blog when you don't really have anything to say. That's been an ongoing trend in my life of late - a move to silence. It's as if I've already thought all the profound things I'm ever going to think. I'm the new target demographic for the Boob Tube... emphasis on Boob. I've simply run out of things to say.

Now, I might be tempted to just call it quits, to hang up the old pen and go quietly into that good night. But I don't have any good ideas about how I might do that, so instead I think I'll just fade away - like an after-image on a black holes event horizon. I'm already gone, crushed, and turned into so many exotic particles, but you still see me here - a comfortable presence - and wonder as I slowly shift red in my old age how I can linger without taking the final plunge.

Or maybe I'm just waiting until I get older and can start writing blog entries about how kids these days don't know the first darn thing about music, or respecting their elders, or life in general. They're disrespectful and rude and they ought to be seen and not heard - like it was when I was their age and I had to walk uphill both ways through the snow to get to school, barefoot, and then work 20 hours straight at the mill afterwords... God, I hope I never get that old.

Or perhaps, I'm just not cool enough to have blog entries. I don't get to go on these great hiking adventures every other day and take tons of pictures.

Or maybe I'm just lazy. I may not be taxing myself enough. Perhaps I feel as if I've been taxed enough and that, for once, maybe the rich people should have the burden of being taxed.

Yeah, that's it... I'm just waiting for a rich person to take over and start writing my blog for me. It's time they pulled their weight around here.

WHAT... EVAH!

I'm out...

until I think of something else to write.

A Strong-Arming Saint of The Lord

There is a little old lady at my church who is neither little, nor old, despite her diminutive size and 80 plus years of age. She still tap dances. She still runs an annual show to raise funds for veterans and she sells poppies on both Memorial Day and Veteran's Day. She is also a great supporter of my step-mom's school, helping out with a program there called The Graham Cracker Fairy. But beyond all that, this church saint is also a master at strong-arming people into doing the Lord's work.

Case in point.

This weekend, my step-mom received a call from this saint. She had been in a darling boutique where they sold children's clothing and was so enamored of the wonderful outfits that she asked the owner if she had any clothes they were giving away - for the children at my step-mom's school. She had arranged for one or two bags of clothes to be picked up on Sunday and all my step-mom had to do was show up and pick them up.

Now school gets out this week, so my step-mom was a bit hesitant, but our dear church saint wouldn't take no for an answer. So my step-mom made arrangements to pick up the clothes.

On Sunday, she shows up at the little boutique and finds a half dozen people standing outside waiting for her to arrive. They are each carrying two or three bags full of children's clothes. My step-mom is shocked. She was expecting a couple of bags at most. She gets out of the car and asks the first person where she can find the church lady. The guy gives her a blank look, "Who?" "The woman who gave you the clothes?" "Oh... she's over in the parking lot."

So my step-mom goes over to the parking lot and discovers that this little old lady has figured out a way to block all of the cars in the parking lot from leaving. She has then asked each driver to help her carry the clothes over to my step-mom's car before being allowed to drive away. Six perfect strangers help my step-mom load more than a dozen bags of children's clothes into her car - just so they'll be allowed to drive away.

I'd like to say that this is one-time only behavior, but I'm afraid not. If this wonderful saint of our church asked a mountain if it could please help her by moving ten feet to the right, the mountain would get up and move ten feet to the right and would feel good about doing it. Some saints are just like that.

And deliver us from evil...

I am of two opinions about the death of Osama Bin Laden. My first opinion is very much along the same lines as the one expressed by Andy Lie over at A Mile From The Beach. This is no time to gloat. We killed Osama and we should be humbled at his death and not boastful. My second opinion, however, is a little more in keeping with what we're seeing on the news. I think both of my opinions are justified - one by faith and the other by unfortunate reality.

My second opinion was earned through that toughest of schools - life experience - and it speaks to what is probably the most human and base interests inside me. I am a pacifist at heart. I believe that some of the most profound words ever spoken were those of the poet and prophet Rodney King, "Can't we all get along?!" But during my time in the Navy and particularly during my years in Naval Intelligence I learned that the unfortunate answer to that question is, "No. Not yet."

You see, there are bad people out there. Evil really does exist. And these people will not accept any other fate than their own destruction. I don't hate them. I pity them. But at the same time, I accept their demise and rejoice when it happens. Why? Because we will never have peace on this world while evil of that sort is allowed to continue. It must be stamped out, hard, and quickly in every case for peace to reign.

After 9/11 I waited for the other shoe to drop. I knew that a man like Osama Bin Laden would not stop until he had achieved his goal of as many American deaths as possible. And so I waited for bad things to happen - more 9/11 attacks, more USS Cole's, more embassy bombings, and maybe worse things - dirty bombs, back pack Nukes, biological or chemical attacks. Bin Laden's only restraints, it seemed, were money and access to weapons of mass destruction.

Truth be told, I was terrified of what a mad man like Osama was capable of doing and that was why I was so terribly upset with "W" and his stupid attack on Iraq. Saddam was a putz. It was like Batman decided to go after a jaywalker while the Joker was running loose in Gotham. The guy we really needed to run to ground was Osama. We needed to stomp on him and end his threat sooner, not later - which was a lesson I think we learned in the aftermath of the Mission: Accomplished speech. We might have toppled Saddam, but the real threat was still Al Qaeda and Bin Laden.

And so, in the end, we have finally killed Bin Laden and while I know that the threat isn't completely gone, it has lost a lot of its heart. Killing Bin Laden will not end the War on Terror, but the War on Terror could not end while he was still alive. I will rejoice in the man's death because I can breath a little easier now. There is a little less evil in the world - there is one less threat to my survival and to the survival of the human race.

So while I sat at home last night visibly upset at all the posturing and shouts of USA USA, deep down inside of me I could distinctly hear myself saying in a low voice, "WE GOT THAT C***S***ER! Thank God!" And those are my two opinions on this matter.

Blow'd Up!

Once again, I was trying to repair myself through long lists of things to do. And it was working. I was eating right (sort of). Exercising correctly (sort of). I was watching my dollars and getting my tasks done (sort of). I was flying high... or so I thought.

In the back of my mind, there were doubts. While I had started the list of foods that I was eating so that I could start eating better foods, I discovered that 1000 calories of salad was the same as 1000 calories of Big Mac - and who wouldn't rather eat a Big Mac? And the same with hiking. 5 hours of hiking over tough mountains and rocks was the same as 5 hours walking through a mall. And it was easy to justify a few bucks for a book when I hadn't spent hardly any money in a week and if I broke down my jobs into the smallest increments, I could check a job off my list after a mere five minutes work and then reschedule the rest of the job for the next day. Yeah... I was using my lists to slack off.

Not too ironically, if you've paid any attention whatsoever to the way God works, I was doing EXACTLY what the Israelites were doing for hundreds of years in Judea and Israel. God laid out a list of laws and tasks and said, "Follow these and you'll be just fine." And the Israelites followed the laws, sort of, and did all the tasks, kind of, that God laid out for them. What God wanted them to do was to embrace the laws and embrace the tasks and to do things whole heartedly for God and for themselves - what they did was the minimum whenever possible, and even less more often than not. They changed the laws and tasks to the point where they no longer came anywhere close to the ones that God had given them - and then they ignored the new laws and tasks anyway.

So what did God do? He blewed up the laws and tasks! Blewed dem Sky High!

In my case, God sent an infection to my leg. What happened? All of my lists and tasks and everything were completely thrown out the window. My schedule, my diet, everything... just completely thrown out. I found myself lying in bed and back at square one - wondering whether to start over with lists and schedules and things, or whether I should just embrace the spirit behind the lists and schedules and things and get my life changed without all the written checklists.

But for the Israelites, God did something even more devious and completely awesome. He sent Jesus. And Jesus threw out all the schedules and laws and tasks. He fulfilled them. He told the Israelites that if they really wanted to be closer to God like they'd been trying to do with all the laws and prophets, then they needed to become close to Him. Simple. Follow me and I will be the way for you. There is no law to follow, no prophet to listen to, no test, no record keeping, no lawyer that will keep you safe - just do as I've done, and you will find yourself close to God.

You know it's funny... the more things change, the more they stay the same. Time to move on and start over again. Only this time, I'm going to do it right.

The Long Roller Coaster

It feels like I've been down this road before. I am weary and tired and ready to just kick my feet up and relax until I realize that I've only just started.

I finished my synopsis for my novel... again... last night. This is a process that I began on my first novel that never saw the light of day. The story was entirely too complicated to keep it all in my head, so I began by writing down a synopsis of each and every chapter - working through the novel in such a way that I knew I wouldn't encounter any roadblocks while writing it. It took me two drafts of that before I was able to start writing my novel - a process that lasted nearly five years before I gave up the whole enterprise as being flawed from the outset.

Live and learn.

Or did I? No, for my second novel I finally decided to start working on my magnum opus time travel saga. Lanz Franco, to me, was going to be a story where I crammed in every time travel idea I'd ever had and yet somehow managed to make it fun and thrilling - like Indiana Jones with time travel. The somehow managed part was the bit that made me realize I needed to write a synopsis first. Doing all those mental gymnastics of cause and effect and effect and cause that only time travel stories can really play with and still trying to keep the story about a character who is in love with his wife... well, that kept me up at nights - plugging away on a synopsis.

After nearly a year of working on the time travel story I finally figured out how to make it work - but the story was so complex that I realized I would have to spread out the complexity over three books. So, as soon as I finished one synopsis I went to work writing the next two synopsees. And finally, after a year and a half, I had all three books in synopsis form and was ready to start.

For nearly a year I toiled on the novel and it was coming along just fine... until I reached the half way point. And then, casually, I realized that I needed to figure out this character's origin story so that I knew his background a little more. So I started thinking about this character's origin and... well... I realized that his origin was WAY better than the story I was writing and that it really illuminated the entire time travel saga. SOOO, painfully, I decided to scrap the story I was working on and go back and write this character's origin story as my first book.

Of course, this meant coming up with another synopsis. And then to add complexity to my madness, I realized during the writing of this synopsis that I needed two more books to bridge the gap between the origin story and the trilogy of stories that I already had synopsized. Six books in all.

Ugh! BUT the good news is that I am finally done with the first synopsis of the first book and it doesn't need to be rewritten and it only took me about two and half months to complete.

So tomorrow, I begin writing my first novel... again... and hopefully, this time, it sticks!

P.S. I should have learned guitar and written a number one Country Song, "Mama, Don't Let Your Baby Grow Up To Be A Science Fiction Writer."

Did I get my money's worth?

I was just watching the amazing footage from Kenya that I received from the Kenya Mission Group's latest journey. They returned to Kenya in February and resumed their relationships with our partners in Meru. Going along for the ride vicariously, I sent along my video camera to capture more footage so that we might continue telling our story through film. But after watching the footage, I couldn't help but start to think about the amazing investment this camera has been. Below is just a partial list of all the places and events where this camera has taken video...

Chicago (twice), Detroit, Toronto, Montreal, Cooperstown, Rochester, Cleveland, the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics (2002 Games), Philadelphia, Gettysburg, Washington D.C., New York, Boston, Goffstown, Salem, Orlando (twice), Boise and Challis, ID (three times), Las Vegas, Anaheim, Juneau, Sitka, Ketchikan, Vancouver, Victoria, Marysville, Brookville, Nairobi and Meru (twice)... and countless hikes (Yosemite, Big Basin, Castle Rock, Dipsea, Boot Jack, Mt. Diablo, Pinnacles) and other events (Sister's graduation from law school, etc...)

I guess it's safe to say that I did get my money's worth... and for a Scot, that's all I can ask.

No one is watching...

I am by myself at work. There is a big tray of chocolate right across from my desk and absolutely nobody is watching. I could dash over there and have one... or two... of four. Nobody can stop me and nobody would be the wiser.

That ultimately is the problem with will-power. It is a struggle against invisible forces. The only restriction that occurs is the one in my head. I can justify that short walk a million different ways. I know. I have. And I've forgotten the number of times I've broken down and given in to those few steps of invisible restraint. It doesn't make me a better person for going over there, it doesn't make me a worse. It just means that it takes me longer to get to where I want to go. A stumble. A detour around a large rock - a large invisible rock that I just made for myself. My path becomes rockier and rockier the more failures I have. I am being bled to death by paper cuts.

So, no chocolate for me. Not now anyway. My path remains straight, my walk steady. But I see a lot of stumbling blocks in the road ahead. If only I had a lamp to light my way.

Why I do what I do

The Oscars are my Super Bowl. For years, growing up, while other kids would stare in rapt awe at the World Series or Super Bowl and imagine themselves hitting that game winning home run or catching that all important touchdown, I practiced and practiced and practiced my acceptance speech for my Oscar. I was so convinced that I was going to be up there on that stage one day accepting my award that I never bothered to ask the question of what it was that I hoped I would actually receive. Accolades? Acceptance? Large monetary rewards? Self-esteem? I so accepted the knowledge that I would be there, that it was somehow a fait d'accompli, that I never actually paused and asked myself why it was so important to me.

There have been a few setbacks along the way. For one thing, I'm not nearly as talented as I once thought. Somehow I've fallen off the peak that rested above Shakespeare, Walt Disney, and George Lucas and below God as the ultimate human author and I've tumbled past most of the great writers, film makers, and story tellers to a much more attainable plateau. Reality has played a large part in my new found humbleness. But the larger part has come about because of the inevitable delay in reaching these heights - somewhere along the way, when I thought I was lost, I discovered that I was really looking for something other than the summit of human achievement. The time spent NOT winning Oscars made me realize that I never really wanted an Oscar in the first place.

I think we all want our lives to have some significance. We want to do something that changes the world for the better. And, of course, we want to be acknowledged for the things we do. This was at the core of my wanting to win an Oscar - because in telling stories I found my true calling and there was no better way of being signified as a master storyteller in this American society than in winning an Oscar, being a best-selling writer, and then opening your own theme park. Yes, I wanted all three. I wanted to be such a good writer that people would run out of words to describe how good I was. A million Oscars weren't going to be enough. No. I pretty much wanted them to retire the award when I was done.

But wishes aren't enough. Dreams aren't enough. Talent isn't even enough. There is also desire. And desire is fueled by accomplishment. I could never quite get my stories up to the level where I knew they needed to be in order to be the Greatest EVER! My desire started to flag. My talent stopped developing. My dreams remained dreams. My wishes changed into more attainable common place things.

But I never gave up. Honestly, I couldn't. I never chose to be a writer. Writing chose me. It just happened to match the way that I see the world. Like a musician can never stop hearing the world as music and the artist can never stop seeing the world as art, the writer can never stop describing the world in words and stories. And so, here I was, writing and writing and writing without any hope of ever achieving impossible goals that I'd set for myself. And that was when I started asking the big question - why, exactly, am I doing this?

Though writing is one of the most solitary art forms, it requires participation to make it complete. A writer is nothing without a reader. This symbiotic relationship forms the basis for all writing decisions - will the story I tell be met with approval? Can I entertain another human being? Can I make them laugh? Cry? Shout for joy? Think? Change the world? While I had initially hoped for accolades, what I realized was that the true thing that I was hoping to do was simply tell good stories and have people enjoy them. Period. End of sentence. Nothing so mundane as making a good product that people enjoy and embrace and that hopefully moves them or helps them or teaches them or simply makes them forget their problems for a moment. Once I realized this, my focus changed and I started working on projects where the outcome was simply to produce something that someone else could enjoy. In this change of direction, I found success.

And yes, I even had my Oscar moment. It was sitting in a church social hall with about forty other people while my movie played on a screen for them to enjoy. My words made them laugh. My words kept them enthralled. My acting drove them to reach for the barf bags - or laugh as hard as I did when I first saw something so horribly awful. That was my Oscar moment. That was my highest accolade.

I will achieve another milestone this year. I wrote a play. Somewhat. It is a dramatic retelling of the Last Supper. My church will be performing it on Palm Sunday. We start rehearsals in a week. I am like a kid in a candy store waiting to hear others perform my words. I don't care how they do it (that's why I'd be a terrible director). I just want to hear my words move others. If it's good, so much the better. But just hearing the words spoken out load will be all the accolade I ask for. That is why I do what I do.

Notes from the Road - Day Two - Karibu Nairobi

Back in the day we flew Lufthansa to Europe and back and I got used to a type of air travel that I’ve not experienced since. I’m crammed into my window seat next to a nice German couple no doubt heading off to Safari. Good for them. Africa needs tourism. Sitting in the row in front of me is a young man heading off on a six month stint with Doctors Without Borders. Outstanding. Half of the 400+ people on this plane are missionaries of one sort or the other. Are the do-gooders descending en mass? The plane is full. The service is excellent. I don’t think it’s providence. KLM restores my faith in flying.

Shortly after take off we were handed pretzels and I was not impressed until I realized that they were earphones for our personal seat units. These wonderful devices allow 400+ passengers to watch 400+ individual programs. I saw The Hangover and about 3/4^ths of Star Trek. What I really wanted to see was Europe, The Med, and Africa from my window seat, but the glare from the window kept the German couple from seeing their TV screens – so a once in a lifetime view was replaced with mindless Hollywood entertainment.

We were served dinner. It was a salad and cheese and crackers and a dinner roll with butter and a crème puff pastry dessert with some sort of penne pasta dish as the main course. Wine was served with the meal at no extra charge.

And then the long hours of the flight. I was able to look down over Libya as they served the meal. At last, Africa from the air. Vast empty stretches of desert with long straight caravan lines running from one oasis to the next. Little puffy clouds hovered over it all giving the countryside the look of a Cheetah’s skin. But the window closed, and I tried to close my eyes as I passed the 24 hour point of the journey. I wasn’t able to find a comfortable position, even to shut my eyes. My legs were cramping up and I just wanted off that plane.

Thankfully the ice cream arrived just after that. It was just enough. I put on Star Trek then to distract me for the last three hours of the flight. Right before it ended, they served some sort of breakfast thingy and I decided that I wasn’t hungry. I’d had enough for now.

We landed and taxied to the terminal and there at the end of the jetway was Silas Muriuki and his “bodyguard”, Martin. Martin lead us through customs and into baggage claim. As soon as I was through customs he gave me a hug and said, “Jambo! Karibu Nairobi,” which means, Hello, Welcome to Nairobi. Martin is one of those nice guys, flash of a smile, that would look good equally on the dance floor or in the middle of a riot. About three months before our arrival, Silas and Martin drove into the middle of just such a riot – between enraged taxi drivers and embattled police. I can see Silas’s fearlessness. He is a true believer. And with Martin at his side, he might be invincible.

After getting most of our luggage and managing to cram it into two or three vehicles, we finally left the airport and took a bewildering tour through the nighttime streets of Nairobi. Picture the traffic of New York in a quaint New England town. It was bedlam at 10pm.

Two things of note here. The police carry fully automatic machine guns. I saw at least one AK-47. Second, their word is law. They pulled us over at one of the many neighborhood checkpoints and I was sure that bribes were going to be asked. But once again, Martin to the rescue, and we took off without so much as a hiccup. This is an unfortunate truth about this country and it helps to keep everything else in perspective.

At last, the Methodist Guest House and a rather nice, if spartan, room. It’s stifling hot. We go to a late dinner. A really delicious soup and potatoes and various Nyomi Choma meats – lots of chicken and beef. Rice. My appetite has returned and I nosh. But then its off to bed – finally – after 30+ hours awake.

Notes From The Road - One Year Ago Today

Who flies first class to Minneapolis? No, really. I started this journey with a somewhat facetious question. Our flight from SFO to Minn. Departs at 6:25am. It is half full. And yet, as we board, we walk right past an entirely full first class section. In this day and age of so many economic challenges, first class travel seems like such a wasteful luxury. These people have not only thrown away the extra money on first class, they’ve done so on first class tickets to Minneapolis. Nothing against this great Minnesota city, but that’s a little like taking the Rolls Royce to go buy groceries. It is a fitting indictment of everything I find wrong with America right now.

That’s America – with a Capital A – as in the country, the culture, and not its people or its spirit or its way. America is lost. We have been seduced by greed and wealth and ignorance. We have come to accept propaganda as truth. We have bought into the notion that we are deserving of our place in history as the World’s masters. Such hubris has always lead to destruction. The blood of patriots will have to be spilled again, I think, to refresh this tree of liberty.

But I think there is nothing wrong with America that Americans can’t fix. We’ve been in some pretty tough scrapes before but our love for truth, equity, and decency has always won out in the end. We will recover. We always do.

Staring out over a field of vast clouds, 36,000 feet in the air, and I can’t help but thinking that could be Africa down there. It hits me then. I’m going to Africa.

Africa – the legendary place of so much adventure. It’s very thought conjures up images of crocodile infested waters, strange and wondrous creatures, vast untamed wilderness, cultures ancient and exotic. It looks different and smells different and sounds different. It is half way around the world from me in every way imaginable. And I’m going there. I’m walking there. I’m sleeping there. I’m eating there. This isn’t a snippet of Africa like something out of Animal Kingdom. This is the full fledged experience.

In Minnesota, it is snowing and 30 degrees out. I manage to find an Arby’s for lunch and have a Bleu Cheese and Roast Beef sandwich. I don’t know when I’ll get another American meal. Before I know it, we’re boarding our flight to Amsterdam. There is a large group of college kids from Saskatchewan here heading to Nairobi. They take up the three rows in front of me. But sparingly, I’m once again next to no one. Breathing room is so necessary. For dinner, they serve some sort of veggie pasta dish. It is filling if not exactly thrilling.

Our individual TV sets go out, but that’s fine. My brain is starting to fog over with fatigue. I try to read one of the books I brought with me. But I don’t get very far. As the flight nears its end they serve us some sort of breakfast croissant thingy. It’s barely edible, but it does keep the hunger pangs away.

Tomorrow

Just to let you all know, tomorrow marks the one year anniversary of the day I left for Kenya. So in honor of this auspicious event and as a tribute to the group that flies out of here tomorrow to return to Kenya this year, I will be posting my journal entries from my Trip Journal during the course of the next three weeks. Of course, I never finished writing everything. I think I managed about seven or eight days of journal. But so many things happened in those first eight days, you'll have to forgive me if I ran out of time to write them all. I was too busy living them.

Anyway, come back tomorrow and relive the experience... starting with a 25+ hour plane trip.

Broken

So what sort of radical revelation is it this time, you wonder. How about something that startled me way more than it will startle you. I'm broken.

No, not in a dysfunctional way - though aren't we all dysfunctional in some way - but in the way that is to be expected. I've come to realize that the hardest part I've had in embracing the gospel and the good news is the part that tells me to be perfect and yet expects me to fail. How can sin be allowed? Its wrong. It's evil. And yet, it's so human. We do it every single day. And then we try to pretend that we don't even knowing that God already knows us and can see us. We are that classic cartoon character who breaks the china lamp and then puts the pieces back on the mantle in the hopes that nobody will notice. It's funny because it's true. We are all broken in a society that tells us that we shouldn't be. I am broken.

That was the big revelation. The true sin, the true stumbling block in my relationship with God and with everyone else, was trying to be something I wasn't. I was trying to say that I was fixed, that I was whole, that I had... maybe not all the answers, but certainly some of them. I'm together. I'm hip. I'm with it. I may not be perfect, but I'm certainly better off than most. If you could see my swiss cheese soul you'd realize how laughable that is. I really do Con No One! They can all see my holes. But I've got some bad news for you sunshine, I can see your holes too. We are ALL broken. And I'm one of us - broken like the rest.

So, shaking your head right now, you're thinking, "Duh!" You knew that. You knew you weren't perfect. You knew you weren't flawless. But maybe, perhaps, you thought you were still better off than others. Ah... there's the rub. There is No Better Off. We are all broken and there is No Way to fix ourselves. Think about it... Jesus didn't come here to fix the one's who weren't broken. He came here to heal the sick, the impure, the desperate, the lonely, the fallen, the broken. He didn't even talk to those people who thought they were doing just fine, thanks. Those people, the one's who thought they were fixed, were just blind to their own nature. You can't be put back together again if you're not willing to see that you're broken in the first place. Paul called himself the Worst Of All Sinners. He embraced his brokenness. He understood what power it gave him, what true vision of the world.

I've realized that from my lofty heights as one of the unbroken I was seeing the world as a place that I could fix or try to help. This was the LOG in my eye. It made me blind to my own shortcomings. Even as I went to Kenya, I think I went there with the idea that I was going to help them. I didn't know how or what I'd do, but I was certain that God was sending me there to help those people in their brokenness. They were poor, destitute, miserable, etc... Except that I was completely 100% wrong. Their living conditions were poor, destitute, miserable to be certain. But the people were anything but. They were joyful and full of God's love. They weren't any more or less broken than anyone else, but they understood that and embraced it and embraced God because of it. I went there to help them, but instead I found myself being helped. It was I who was transformed. Them... not so much.

My vision of the world and of my place in it has changed dramatically. I am broken. I am unable to do anything without God's help. I can kid myself into thinking otherwise, but there is no point in arguing it. I have accomplished nothing that God did not want me to accomplish. And I have failed to accomplish much that He wished I had. Now that I finally see the log in my eye, perhaps I will accomplish more in the future - God-willing.

I'm sure that in the future I will speak to this more. My communication skills aren't up to the task of trying to convey the depth of thought and feeling that I've been experiencing lately. Its far better to just keep my mouth shut and my fingers silent and just enjoy the truth for what it is than to try to convey that truth and failing miserably. Someday I hope you'll all reach the point of your journey where you encounter this same truth. It's not far ahead, just a little higher up the mountain. Keep climbing.