Medium Rare Please

One of my favorite Red Meat comic strips. Red Meat is Copyright 2003 Max Cannon.

Some of you may wonder why I posted this particular comic strip given my professed Christian beliefs. Some of you may look at this and think that I’m not a Christian at all, or that I am poking fun at people who profess to be Christian. Nothing could be further from the truth.

I believe that my faith has to bear criticism, skewering, and taunting from all angles. It has to withstand scrutiny and testing. In other words, I have to be able to read this strip, then laugh at myself sometimes in order to be a stronger Christian. This comic strip lets me do that.

In all honesty, do you think that you could handle seeing the world the way that God sees it? I know I certainly couldn’t.

Open your mind while staying true to your beliefs. You will appreciate what you believe in all the more. If it doesn’t add up, it probably because you don’t have all the facts yet. (Hint: That’s where faith comes in.)

Enjoy.

-C-

New Photos

I’m in the process of adding some new photo albums. One is updating the existing Christmas photos, and the other is a small series of photos taken around the house recently.

Enjoy!

-C-

Observations on Inconsistencies

I remember…

I would lay awake until the wee hours of the morning. Sometimes I would hear my parent’s conversations and their laughter as they worked. Eventually I would drift off to sleep and dream the fitful dreams of an excited child awaiting Christmas morning.

Eventually I would wake and then it would be time for Mom to get the camera and Dad to start handing out the gifts to each person. Achingly slow he was. He did it on purpose to make me even more excited.

One year I received an Atari 2600. Another year a Lego Master Builder set. Yet other years would net me Spaceships. Undersea labs. G.I. Joes. Racetracks, Hot Wheels, and myriad other items.

As I sit here and relive the ghosts of Christmas past, I hear my little girl sleeping in the next room. Four months old she is now.

A few minutes ago I was reading articles on cnn.com about Terrorists planning on hijacking planes from France to do even more damage to our already fragile collective psyche.

How can two such polar opposites coexist on the same night?

On a night when NORAD is tracking Santa moving across the northern hemisphere, they are also tracking every single flight entering and leaving the USA.

Does anyone else see the subtle madness of this?

You Are A Child of Mine

You Are a Child of Mine
by Mark Schultz and Chris Eaton

I’ve been hearing voices
Telling me that I could
Never be what I wanna be.
They’re binding me with lies,
Haunting me at night,
And saying there’s nothing to believe.
Somewhere in the quietness,
When I’m overcome with loneliness,
I hear You call my name.
And like a father You are near
And as I listen I can hear You say

You are a child of Mine
Born of My own design
And you bear the heart of life.
No matter where you go,
Oh, you will always know
You have been made free in Christ.
You are a child of Mine

And so I listen as You tell me who I am
And who it is I’m gonna be.
And I hang on every word,
Knowing I have heard
I am Yours and I am free
But when I am alone at night
That is when I hear the lie
You’ll never be enough
And though I’m giving into fear
If I listen I can hear You say

You are a child of Mine
Born of My own design
And you bear the heart of life.
No matter where you go,
Oh, you will always know
You have been made free in Christ.
You are a child of Mine

I am calling…
I am calling…
I am calling…

You are a child of Mine
Born of My own design
And you bear the heart of life.
No matter where you go,
Oh, you will always know
You have been made free in Christ.
You are a child of Mine

You are a child of Mine
Born of My own design
And you bear the heart of life.
No matter where you go,
Oh, you will always know
You have been made free in Christ.
You are a child of Mine

Schools Out!

Home

Thankfully, school is out for the next couple of weeks, so I get a bit of a respite. Today is “Christmas Eve Eve” if you want to call it that, and things at work are rather slow. So slow in fact I brought in the laptop and have been watching Fellowship of the Ring and Akira.

It’s nice to be able to relax. I almost forgot what it was like.

This week is the Christmas Eve service at the church. Jenny gave me the order of service and it seems pretty straightforward. Thankfully, it shouldn’t have me doing too much in PowerPoint, just making sure some of the hymns and songs display on the screen. Last year I spent quite a bit of time putting together a special Christmas PowerPoint that worked some Mannheim Steamroller in. Getting the timing down perfectly was the trickiest part.

Christmas Day we will be home with Dad. He is going to come in and have breakfast with us (after opening our gifts of course.) Then, after that is out of the way we will be heading to the Great White North to spend the rest of the day with Cheryl’s family. The day after Christmas, commonly known as Boxing Day in Canada. We will be traveling even further to spend time with the rest of her family. This will be the first time she has seen some family members in six years. It will be the first time I have met most of them. That’s a strange bit of pressure to be under, especially since Cheryl and I have been together so long.

It will be nice to take Emma as well. There will be many firsts before the end of the week is out. I will try and catch as many photos as I can, then post them here.

Man, I’m such a geek.

SSX 3 has been consuming what little free time I have left. It’s one of the deepest games I have played in awhile. The gameplay is like GTA: Vice City, only without the hookers, killing, and carjacking. (Which is always good.) For those of you out of the know, it is an extreme sports game where you basically snowboard all over the place, shredding and really performing insane stunts and tricks. From what I’ve read in the reviews, you can snowboard straight down the mountain from the summit to the base once you’ve completed many of the challenges and unlocked all three peaks. I have only thus far managed to unlock peak 2 (peak 1 is given to you at the start) and have been steadily working my way up to peak 3.

To quote Martha, “It’s a good thing.”

---

Work

Work has been going well. I’m still looking to move on though. I touched base with Jeremy the other day to see if he had any openings, or any coming up. “Nothing yet – soon” was the word. I sure hope so. I feel like I’m jumping right into a concrete ceiling around here.

Cheryl says I am ambitious, and that sometimes she wishes she had half my ambition to move up.

The only reason I want to keep moving up is to provide for my family. If it weren’t for that, I would be pretty happy to stay where I am. Where I am though doesn’t meet all the needs that we need met.

I am ambitious, but it is for different reasons. I’m not a career oriented person although my actions might state otherwise.

My main goal is to provide for my family. That’s not such a bad thing. I think I am keeping a semi-decent balance between work and family. Cheryl may tend to feel otherwise.

I don’t have much choice though. Given our current situation, I am the one that has to be completing school and working to keep things afloat. I’m not doing anything different than anyone else.

Oh well.

More photos of Emma soon. I promise.

No Rest For the Wicked

I find that lately my life is a series of repetitive actions. Driving to work, driving to school, doing homework, doing my job. A cog in an endless machine that ceaselessly turns yet moves nowhere. Actions have no conscious thought, just merely learned responses to external stimuli. If A, then B, otherwise C.

I am preoccupied constantly. Things that have been finished, things yet to complete, yet more things waiting to start. Life is becoming less my own, and more something else. Less action, more reaction.

In my life and my interactions with others I seem to shuttle back and forth between personas that are relevant to the situation, yet all while not knowing truly who I am. I wear masks that present the face that needs to be shown, and all the while I get this subliminal message from people that there seems to be this mystical point that I just don’t get.

Everyone has this look on their face that says to me “You just don’t seem to have gotten it yet.”

Maybe the point is I don’t need to wear a mask. Maybe the point is I just don’t have a clue. Maybe the point is I should give up and be like all the other people. Maybe it’s that I don’t know who I am.

So who am I?

Good question.

I enjoy playing video games and tearing computers apart only to put them back together again. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t.

I leave my socks on the floor which aggravates my wife to no end.

I enjoy reading, but yet I haven’t read a book in months.

I like listening to all kinds of music. Especially Bluegrass and Classical.

I like learning arcane and useless bits of knowledge and quoting movies.

I detest intolerance and cruelty.

I detest juvenile behavior and betrayal and cynicism.

I am cynical. I am sarcastic. I am juvenile.

I am a bag of inconsistencies wrapped up in a body that is doomed by genetic heritage to diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, heart disease, and male pattern baldness.

*sigh*

Did you ever press the button on your trip odometer and watch all the numbers reset to zero? I wish I could do that sometimes. Just push the button and watch all the numbers rotate slowly up or down and go back to zero zero zero zero. I wish that I could go back to my childhood and find that frizzy haired kid who was happy and smiling and learn something from him. But most importantly, I’d like to learn where the smile went.

I’d like to examine his life and see why the smile went away. Who may have taken it, or where he may have hidden it. I’d like to take away all the responsibilities and cares for just one day. Just one. I’d like to be able to say the right thing at the right time, not suffer from l’esprit d’escalier.

When I was growing up, I had a lot of people around me telling me that I was worthless or no good. Telling me that I would never be smart enough or fast enough or strong enough. For a long time I bought into those lies. I hear those tapes playing over and over again in my mind to this day. As a result, I find that I must do everything to perfection. I must make sure every task is completed just so because if it isn’t then it won’t be good enough, and someone will say something to me.

Because of this, I am often out of balance during social gatherings. I keep to myself. When spoken to I stammer and stutter for things to say. This in turn leads to the “You keep missing the point” look from everyone, and the cycle continues. Onward I go, deeper down the spiral.

What does this have to do with my life and feeling like I’m reacting and not acting?

Because of this behavior, I have set up familiar behavior patterns that let me live my life in safe circles of responses. If I venture outside of these safe zones, I begin feeling uncomfortable, or find ways to incorporate these new behavior patterns into my lifestyle once I get “control” of them and feel safe once again.

This is why I hate going someplace new to eat, or taking a way I don’t know, or venturing outside of my comfort zone. All because I am petrified of making mistakes and drawing attention to myself. Because attention draws evaluation, then criticism or ridicule.

I need to break out of this cycle.

New Photo Albums

I have published some new photo albums. These are classic family photos that I have scanned in over the years. I have one for my father’s family, and one for my mother’s. I’ll soon post one of my family, but not today

Enjoy.

How To Install Love

By: Author Unknown

Customer Service (CS) Rep. : “Yes, Ma’am, how may I help you today?”

Customer: “Well, after much consideration, I’ve decided to install LOVE. Can you guide me through the process?”

CS Rep. : “Yes, I can help you. Are you ready to proceed?”

Customer: “Well, I’m not very technical, but I think I’m ready to install now. What do I do first?”

CS Rep. : “The first step is to open your HEART. Have you located your HEART ma’am?”

Customer: “Yes I have, but there are several other programs running right now. Is it okay to install while they are running?”

CS Rep. : “What programs are running ma’am?”

Customer: “Let’s see, I have PAST-HURT.EXE, LOW ESTEEM.EXE, GRUDGE.EXE, and RESENTMENT.COM running right now.”

CS Rep. : “No problem. LOVE will gradually erase PAST-HURT.EXE from your current operating system. It may remain in your permanent memory, but it will no longer disrupt other programs.
LOVE will eventually overwrite LOW-ESTEEM.EXE with a module of its own called HIGH-ESTEEM.EXE. However, you have to completely turn off GRUDGE.EXE and RESENTMENT.COM. Those programs prevent LOVE from being properly installed. Can you turn those off ma’am?”

Customer: “I don’t know how to turn them off. Can you tell me how?”

CS Rep. : “My pleasure. Go to your Start menu and invoke FORGIVENESS.EXE. Do this as many times as necessary until GRUDGE.EXE and RESENTMENT.COM have been completely erased.”

Customer: “Okay, done. LOVE has started installing itself automatically. Is that normal?”

Cs Rep. : “Yes. You should receive a message that says it will reinstall for the life of your HEART. Do you see that message?”

Customer: “Yes I do. Is it completely installed?”

Cs Rep. : “Yes, but remember that you have only the base program. You need to begin connecting to other HEARTS in order to get the upgrades.”

Customer: “Got it. Hey! My HEART is filling up with new files. SMILE.MPG is playing on my monitor right now and it shows that PEACE.EXE, and CONTENTMENT.COM are copying themselves all over my HEART. Is this normal?”

Cs Rep. : “LOVE is freeware. Be sure to give it and its various modules to everybody you meet. They will share it with other people and then return some similarly sacred modules back to you.”

Customer: “I will. Thanks for your help. By the way, what’s your name?”

Cs Rep. : ” You may call me the Divine Cardiologist, also known as The Great Physician, but most call me God. Many people feel all they need is an annual checkup to stay heart-healthy, but the Manufacturer suggests a schedule of daily maintenance for maximum efficiency. Put another way, keep in touch . . .”

Christmas Angel

New photos have been published of Emma. These are her first Christmas Photos, and we hope that you enjoy them. I’ll beg for your patience up front, as some of the images are large and may take a little bit of time to load. They are worth the wait though.

Memories

Tonight we went to the viewing at the funeral home for my Aunt Jean. It brought back some of the memories from my Mom’s funeral.

My mother died from extremely aggressive skin cancer. Malignant melanoma.

I remember…

- Coming home and seeing the tumor on my Mother’s leg. Angry red streaks flew out from it like flames.

- Dad mouthing the words “Oncologist… Chemotherapy… Surgery…”

- Weekly trips to the medical center so Mom could get her chemo.

- My Aunts rotating in and out of the house so Mom could get the help she needed because Dad and I worked.

- Late night trips where Dad would take Mom to the ER.

- Sickness.

- Sadness.

- Aching Bitterness.

- Her first heart attack.

- Her subsequent heart attacks.

- Going to work to keep busy, then not being able to function, only to walk out two hours later and take a leave of absence.

- My cousin calling me at work and telling me that I needed to come to Columbus so I could be with my mother in the ER.

- Going to the ER and seeing her arms restrained and gloves on her hands so she wouldn’t rip out her own IV’s.

I remember walking into the room and hearing the hush of the oxygen machine and the incessantly rhythmic beeping of the monitors.

I walked up to the side of the bed and looked at the woman who at one point in the past was my Mother. She was covered in tubes and strapped down like some sort of animal.

When she arrived via MedFlight at the hospital, they had strapped a pump to her leg that was doing the work her fatally damaged heart should have done.

One of the Doctors told my Father that “she has had as much damage done to the human heart as it can stand, yet she is still alive, but only because of the heart pump.”

I remember seeing the pump on her leg.

I remember standing at the side of the bed and saying “Mama.”

Her arms immediately raised up and were harshly stopped by the restraints. Her eyes rolled back into her head as she tried to focus on me.

She couldn’t.

Needless to say I began to cry.

All I could do was watch while my Mother lay strapped in a bed, straining against her restraints, her eyes rolling back in her head.

This is an image that haunts me to this day.

Before I left, I kissed her on her forehead and told her that I loved her, and that Jesus loved her too.

I wouldn’t eat much or talk much over the next few days. It would be three or four days later that she would pass away.

Ironically it was while no one was around. I was at home with two Aunts and one Uncle. Dad was on his way home from the hospital.

I was the one that had to tell Dad when he came in the door that Mom had passed away.

Two of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do in my life happened on the same day. My mother passing on, then having to tell my Father, because he was completely unaware.

He fell to his knees in the kitchen when I told him. I had to support him and help him to his chair in the living room.

And tonight, I found myself being support again.

My cousins came up to me and gave me long hugs. I did the only thing I could do. I just kept my mouth shut.

Because of the effects of the cancer and the treatments, the viewing was closed casket. There was an open casket viewing for immediate family members this afternoon which I did not get the chance to attend.

Dad said that the mortician had “fixed her up nice.” Apparently she looked like she was sleeping.

I always found it odd that people say things like “She looks good” or “She looks peaceful” at funerals.

Perhaps it’s like talking about the weather with a stranger or when there is nothing else to talk about.

Even when staring into the face of death, we still try to cope with it by ignoring it, misdirecting the topic, or putting a sheen on it so it is more palatable.

We can’t help it, we are only human I suppose.

The one thing that they did do which I found almost comforting was to place several posterboards around the funeral parlor. Each one had an assortment of family photos.

There were many smiles in the photos.

Shots of Jean as a young girl. Shots of her on her wedding day, and Don with a smile.

Their children. Grandchildren. Family. Reunions. Graduations. Proms. Quilting bees. Cookouts. Card parties. Dinners. Friends. Family. Loved ones.

It was good to see that even in the face of death, some people could still smile.

As I looked around the room, I saw many smiles as people looked at the photos. Many tears too.

*sigh*

Goodbye Jean. We’ll miss you.

Say hi to Mom for me.