Turning Aside

It is interesting that the world’s three major monotheistic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – share a common holy book, the Old Testament. At the heart of this book is a history. Abraham, for all three religions, is a father of the faith. He left his country, then dominant Babylon, to live in tents in another land. God made a covenant or compact or contract, and promises.

Year later, the descendants of Abraham were ill treated slaves in the then-great empire of Egypt. Most of us know the story in Exodus of how a man named Moses led the people of Israel out of Egypt and to “the promised land.” The Exodus, the giving of the Ten Commandments, the wandering in the wilderness are all part of our cultural history.

The story begins, however, with a failure. Moses saw an Egyptian beating an Israelite, and after looking about to make sure the coast was clear, Moses killed the guy. A bad decision. The next day the word on the street was that Moses had done this thing. And Moses knew someone saw, so he fled to the backside of the desert.

Decades later, seemingly in the middle of nowhere, Moses had an encounter that changed the direction of his life.

Exodus 3
1Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.
2And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.
3And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.
4And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.

It’s the story of the burning bush. Moses was going about his business, taking care of his father-in-law’s flock, a stranger in a strange land, when he saw something that caught his attention. Instead of continuing on his way, he turned aside and went over to this bush which burned with fire but was never consumed by the fire.

I bring all this up because our pastor last Sunday preached on this passage, drawing particular attention to Moses’ turning aside. It was a defining moment for this man Moses. And it became a defining moment in world history as the great Egyptian empire was brought to its knees.

My question is, what will it take to bring about world peace today? Here are three religions with common roots, yet at each others’ throats it seems. The past hundred years or more has seen a development of increasingly cruel weaponry. Horrors have been committed and still more will be committed, and so many innocents suffer as a consequence. In other words, history is heading down a path toward an end that seems inevitable... more of the same. What will it take for the nations of this world to turn aside?

What will it take for the world to stop this mad pursuit of self-destruction and violence?

Our pastor Sunday proposed that the bush was still burning. To see it we must turn aside from our various busy paths and check it out.

As for conflicts in the Middle East, isn’t it obvious that as long as we keep arming everyone to the teeth, we will continue to reap a harvest of blood and tears? What will it take for the nations of this world to “turn aside” from this path of violence we are on?

I really don’t know.

Hitchhiking Across Antarctica

"Loneliness is the leprosy of our era." ~ Mother Teresa

I keep a scrap book of quotes from my readings. It's a useful tool for organizing pithy insights from various sources. I don't recall where this one came from, but it stuck me with enough force to record it in my book.

The observation, comparing loneliness to what is now called Hansen's disease, is quite interesting. Leprosy is not like the plague which wiped out a third to half of Europe in the first millennium. Though two to three million people have the disease worldwide, I know of no serious scientist who is concerned about a worldwide epidemic. The media is not stirring up a panic about this unfortunate malady as they have about bird flu which has now killed just over one hundred worldwide.

So the comparison to leprosy has a different meaning from just a communicable disease. One photo of a leper tells why this is. Lepers are shunned. They are ugly. They are outcasts. They're pushed outside the cheerful social exchanges that make up community.

A Google search on loneliness unveils millions of web pages on this theme. How ironic. The world has too many people, yet so many so lonely.

Many books and poems have been written on the theme. Maybe knowing that we are not the only ones who have ever felt this way is helpful. So the lonely share their painfully lovely, lonely self-expressions.

I'm reminded of Billy Joel's observation in Piano Man, "They're sharing a drink they call loneliness, but it's better than drinking alone."

Whole books on the theme have been written. Perhaps some of the great music we appreciate was squeezed from a lonely heart. For sure you hear it in Tschaikovski. Certainly most creative artists reach into deep spaces of the soul to draw on something there akin to inner isolation. Maybe what makes this experience painful is when we get trapped there, unable to connect to others, and unhappy with our selves. Like the leper, we may feel ugly... unable to see our true beauty; or desperately unaffirmed, unloved and incomplete.

There is a difference between loneliness and solitude. We are all, to a lesser or greater extent, travelling a solitary path. As the old Negro spiritual puts it, "Nobody knows the trouble I seen, nobody knows my sorrow..." To the extent we are able to forget ourselves and notice those around us who also have need of being affirmed, loved, valued, appreciated, to that extent we can make this world a better place and escape the prisons we've made for ourselves within our selves.

The following is a poem I wrote describing something of what loneliness has at times meant to me.

Hitchhiking Across Antarctica

So desolate here. So desolate and cold.

You grit your teeth to keep them from chattering.
By the time this is over you'll be lucky to have any teeth at all.

If only you can stop this shivering.

Standing alone, waiting for someone to come along.

So desolate here. Unbelievably cold. It doesn't seem possible.

Is this where it's all going to end?

"What was the meaning of it all? Why am I here?" you ask yourself.

You lean forward into the fierce wind.

Oh for but one spark of human kindness to re-kindle

the cold dark embers of your heart.

You stare out across the virgin snow, fingers numb with cold

under your worn mittens. You've lost all sense of touch.

It hardly matters because there is no one there.

Your arms are so stiff with cold you can no longer reach out.

"Where is everyone? How long, oh Lord?"

You have only the load on your back,

but it is more than you can carry.

And even this you can't take with you when you go,

if it comes to that.
You keep waiting, but no one comes along.

It's a frost cold chill, this loneliness.

It's like hitchhiking across Antarctica.

Shooting An Elephant

“As for the job I was doing, I hated it more bitterly than I can perhaps make clear. In a job like that you see the dirty work of Empire at close quarters. The wretched prisoners huddling in the stinking cages of the lock-ups, the grey, cowed faces of the long-term convicts, the scarred buttocks of the men who had been flogged with bamboos – all these oppressed me with an intolerable sense of guilt.” ~ George Orwell

The past few weeks I’ve been reading Simon Schama’s A History of Britain, Volume 3: The Fate of Empire 1776 – 2000. It has been quite fascinating. To some extent our nation’s history is inextricably bound to that of Britain, from conception to destiny, much like a child reflects its parent. While unique, we are still offspring.

It was once said “the sun never sets on the British Empire.” Indeed, at one time the power of Britain ruled the high seas and its territories spanned the globe. How long ago this was.

Schama’s book is a three part epic. I’ve only tackled Volume 3. The breaking away of the New World to form first the Colonies, then these United States, is but the beginning. The moral challenges, the dark justifications of maintaining power over unwilling subjects, the internal erosion of confidence in its own national mandate… so many fragments of this story resonate with aspects of our own national experience.

Descartes did not trust history as a basis for truth because no historical situation is identical. This does not mean, however, that nothing can be gained from studying history.

George Orwell’s essay “Shooting an Elephant” is not only first rate writing, it is a deeply moving account of the problems Britain had to wrestle with while controlling foreign territories with strangely different peoples and cultures. It is Orwell’s first job away from home, a police officer in Burma. The story describes an incident that occurs during that period abroad as a young man. More than just what happens, the young Eric Blair (Orwell was his chosen pen name) reveals the personal angst he experiences.

The essay begins thus: “In Moulmein, in lower Burma, I was hated by large numbers of people – the only time in my life that I have been important enough for this to happen to me.”

Essentially, there is an elephant that has broken loose and is causing trouble. The elephant’s owner, due to misinformation, is hours away and the damage has been escalating. Orwell, as a representative of the law, must deal with it.

“The Burmese sub-inspector and some Indian constables were waiting for me in the quarter where the elephant had been seen. It was a very poor quarter, a labyrinth of squalid bamboo huts, thatched with palmleaf, winding all over a steep hillside,” Orwell writes. Anyone who has seen Third World squalor can picture the scene. Orwell is a stranger in a strange land.

It turns out the elephant now has killed a man. It’s a hideous sight for the young officer. Worse, it starts to become inevitable that he will have to do something about it. The following crowd has been growing, and there is an escalating anticipation.

“But I did not want to shoot the elephant. I watched him beating his bunch of grass against his knees, with that preoccupied grandmotherly air that elephants have. It seemed to me that it would be murder to shoot him. At that age I was not squeamish about killing animals, but I had never shot an elephant and never wanted to. (Somehow it always seems worse to kill a large animal.)”

As Orwell reveals his deepest motivations, we understand that on the pedestal of world opinion, it is not always "right" and "wisdom" that is the driving force behind nations' behaviors. Too often, they simply don't want to play the fool.

“For at that moment, with the crowd watching me, I was not afraid in the ordinary sense, as I would have been if I had been alone. A white man mustn't be frightened in front of "natives"; and so, in general, he isn't frightened. The sole thought in my mind was that if anything went wrong those two thousand Burmans would see me pursued, caught, trampled on and reduced to a grinning corpse like that Indian up the hill. And if that happened it was quite probable that some of them would laugh. That would never do.”

These were the kinds of motivations that led to France invading Mexico during our American Civil War. And perhaps the real motivations behind the nations who engaged in that bitter, futile blood bath called World War I. Perhaps, to some extent, it was a driver for the Pentagon's escalation in Viet Nam? And what was that Somalia maneuver all about? And then, even if you win, what do we get? Orwell seems to be saying that you get forced into shooting elephants that you really don't want, or need, to shoot.

A Four Letter Word

It is a much hated four letter word that begins with the letter F. Many people try to say that this word is not part of their vocabulary. It is usually synonymous with pain and no one likes to experience it. Yet it is a part of life and we all have to deal with it. The word is Fail.

Failure is one of life’s most challenging experiences, and how we react afterwards has a large bearing on what we will become.

Failure can run along a wide range of lines. For many reasons kids fail in school, some because of inadequate preparation, and other times perhaps due to personal handicaps that cause them to get behind and not have the support they need. They are lost in the shuffle, possibly shy, not a fighter for the teacher’s ear, blaming themselves instead of understanding that it could be circumstances set against them.

I knew a girl in college for whom a biology degree was out of reach because she failed chemistry class twice. Her dream went up in smoke, though maybe down the road something good came of it later. The experience was hard, and disheartening.

Failure in the job scene comes in a range of guises. Failure to get the job, failure to succeed in the job and that ultimate indignity of being dismissed from a job, these are just a few painfully harsh experiences. And such failures do an inner work on us that can distort our vision of ourselves. When we most need affirmation, that sting of rejection has an especially harsh edge.

I had a friend, an old man, who used to sell real estate in the late sixties. He was the sole breadwinner in his family and the economy had taken a downturn. Selling houses was not easy, so he was under a lot of pressure. Ralph said that women were entering the field who were not breadwinners, who were doing it for social reasons as well as income, but as a second income. The selling situation for them was free and easy, light and breezy. Buyers preferred doing business with these women because of the atmosphere created, as opposed to the repressed anxiety he tried to conceal. This new variable ultimately resulted in his becoming a failure in real estate sales and he had to change careers.

An article called "Failure", Ode magazine October 2007, details how J.K.Rowling’s early failures became a springboard for her future success. Many other other high profile failures are cited, such as Henry Ford who went bankrupt numerous times before his car company found traction.

Good relationships, whether with friends, lovers or everything in between, can be one of the most rewarding things in life… and also the most painful when things turn. Finding a way to deal with the pain once a relationship falls apart is hard. First off, we do not have a clear picture of what is going on within us at the time. Second, the rejection is such a personal assault on our self esteem.

In my own personal life, it was my inability to know how to deal with a broken relationship and rejection by friends that led me to cry out to God. This did not solve all my life problems, but it put me on a better path than the self-destructive one I had been traveling along for a time.

Later, after Bible school, my wife Susie and I made a three year commitment to serve at an orphanage in Mexico early in our marriage. At the end of a year we had to call it quits. We believed our decision the right thing to do, but many looked on our return as a sign of having failed. We ourselves felt confused and did a lot of soul searching. Life goes on, either with you or without you, and eventually we found the next step for us. Ultimately, it was this failure that led to my becoming a writer, which resulted in the career success I have experienced, being able to provide for my family these past twenty-five years.

Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes takes place in a small town where a travelling circus arrives, and its evil is palpable. In one scene the father of one of the main characters goes into the House of Mirrors late in the story and is stuck there, for what he sees are not distortions of himself, but rather images of his life, his failures. He is overcome with regret.

Regret is a great snare. While looking into the chasm that is our past, we must be careful not to become so hypnotized that we become paralyzed like this man in the Hall of Mirrors.

Failure is not an end, but a beginning. And there is no one who has ever achieved great things without at some point along the way coming to grips with it.

Terrorists Preying (cont.)

It’s Short Story Monday again. This is the first multi part story I have begun to post, and I’m having my doubts about the efficacy of trying to share such long stories in this manner. If it's a page turner that you can't put down, then such a piecemeal approach feels stifling, though Dickens did it with his weekly serials. On the other hand, a newspaper serial has a lot more room to work with than a blog, with it's unspoken prescribed 500 word limit.

Last Monday I offered up the beginning of Terrorists Preying. It is a first person account about a former art student from the east coast who now lives in Minneapolis. He visits the Walker Fine Arts Museum whereupon he unexpectedly witnesses a scene of great violence.

That scene of a group of three men assaulting an innocent man in an art gallery actually took place, but not in a gallery. It occurred in a dream I had one night twenty years ago. I mulled over where to go with it and wrote last week’s section, believing it a story. When I shared what I had written with a literary professor, he suggested that it was only a beginning. How did it change this man’s life? His soul? What happens next?

This, I agreed, was my homework assignment. What happens next?

Part two begins…

It’s evening and I’ve been changed.

I'm sitting in a chair, listening to music, recording my thoughts, trying to get in touch with my pain, trying to find a way to get inside myself. I don't even know where to begin. I've witnessed a terrible thing and I can't dismiss it. Why didn't I do anything? I want to excuse myself and I can't. Why did I just watch? Why didn't I scream? Or run for help? Or try to stop them? But what bothers me most is that I didn't do anything. I didn't do anything.

The hero regrets his passivity in the face of such violence. He tries to deal with it, gets drunk, remembers Les Garnet from college, his quest for fame at any cost. He recalls a dialogue in which he sees clearly that he and Garnet have different values.

He decides that he will return to the gallery and see if he can meet up with Les again.

I remember these things and wonder if I'm not watching someone else's life.

These were my thoughts as I left my car and began walking the two block hike to the Walker. It was late morning, the day after the assault. A steamy breeze whooshing through the shrubbery and trees blended with the traffic on Hennepin Avenue to create a white noise backdrop against which my memories performed. The headache remained lodged behind my eyeballs.

Once inside I was struck by how utterly different my experience of this museum was from the previous day. Was it only yesterday I was here?

First, the people were different. I looked at them differently, wondering to myself, "What if it had been her?" and "What if he had been the unlucky one?" What were these people thinking? What did they know about the thing that happened? Were they even aware of it? I found myself studying their faces for clues.

A middle aged man with a fat black mustache looked at me suspiciously and I became conscious of how different I was from the rest of these people. The thing I experienced has stained me.

The art today is different, too. The famous paintings are as wallpaper that has no attraction whatsoever now as I walk past on my way to Gallery 7. The Chuck Close piece gives me a start when I round that corner there, but as for the rest, it may as well be beige on beige.

I make the assumption that this is a temporary feeling. Then again, one never knows.

So I experienced the Walker differently this second time through, having been immunized against those very images that one day previous induced catalytic tremors in my soul.

I understand now why criminals return to the scene of the crime. It is not simply to see if there have been clues left behind. No, it's more than that. They return to reconcile themselves to the reality of horror. There has been violence, created and experienced, and they return to pay homage--in disbelief and in awe. Not a conscious homage, but in that same emotional vein. Will the blood stains still be there?

As I climbed the stairs leading to the Garnet/Benders show, the muffled sound of happy conversation reached me through the closed door of the gallery. The moment I touched the handle, the door flew open, revealing a man in his mid-thirties with rolling waves of thick dark hair, dark eyes and wide, fat lips. He wore the eager look of a Little Leaguer on his way to the Dairy Queen after a big win. He turned to say something to someone standing inside the gallery out of my view.

I enjoyed the process of writing Terrorists Preying, trying to let the characters determine where it was going. In many cases, I know where I want the story to go. But in this instance, it’s almost the closest I came to actually letting the hero decide where it should go.

To finish this story continue here ... One of my favorite parts is still up ahead.

Henry Poole Is Here

Went to see Henry Poole Is Here last night, a very interesting story well told. The film raises issues worth talking about. It's also not likely receive the audiences it deserves since it doesn't feature major stars, special effects or intense nail-biting horror or drama.

As a writer I came away saying, "I wish I'd written that." The way the story is told, something like a fisherman paying out line, little by little, letting a little more line out, or like a painter laying down thin layers of line and color... Each scene leads to the next in a rational manner, even though to some extent the premise is absurd. Through the normal interactions of the characters and Henry Poole's memories, motivations are revealed and the story takes shape.

Essentially, Henry Poole is a very depressed man who buys a house that he does not expect to live in very long. It is not the house he wanted. He had hoped to buy the house he grew up in, but the people would not sell it even though he offered them any price. Henry drinks and lies around, clearly depressed in an extreme way. We eventually learn he is waiting to die from an unnamed (in the film) disease which will ravage him quickly and soon.

His Hispanic neighbor, a cheerful woman who also has experienced hurt, tries to welcome him to the neighborhood in a warm manner. In the process she sees in a stain, on the back wall of his recently stuccoed house, the face of Christ. Through her well meaning meddling, she brings a priest, some friends and still more people.

There is also a relationship built with the woman who lives next door and her mute daughter. And the checkout girl at the grocery store also notices Henry's despair and tries to encourage him. She's a nice kid with coke bottle lenses for eyeglasses, a girl nearly blind with bad eyesight.

The tension in the story arises from Henry's desire to be left alone. Wallowing in his despair as he waits to die, he resents the invasion on his space by well meaning others. Henry has ruled out hope for himself, but is constantly challenged by Esperanza and others who begin to be influenced by the events taking place in his yard, for the wall begins to bleed the blood of Christ, and miracles begin to happen.

There are several refreshing aspects of this Sundance film. First, the priest in the film is not a fool or silly caricature, but a real man who responds like a sensitive person. Not your typical Hollywood stereotype for men of the cloth. Also, the story avoids a number of cliche side paths that could have cheapened the effect of the film. There are some who will see the film as hokey. For sure there is an element of implausibility in the premise... but through a directorial deftness, the film succeeds.

Henry Poole's story is ultimately about hope and despair, and what it takes to reach the deepest part of the soul when hope is utterly lost. If you get a chance, try to see it.

9-11 Remembrance

“The eastern sky is clear, but fierce looking clouds threaten us from the west. It may not be a pretty day.” ~ Journal entry, Sept. 11, 2001

I thought it might make an interesting blog entry to look back at my journal to see what I wrote that tragic morning when the towers fell. The note above was penned a little over two hours before the first plane hit. I’ve not looked back on this entry till now, and it’s uncanny what a prescient note is sounded in these words.

The events of 9-11 remind us that we live in a broken world. As Robert Burns once observed, “Man’s inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn.”

Rather than post more words, let’s pause for a moment of silence and remembrance.

Sunshine & the Blues

In the second year of our marriage, Susie and I served at an orphanage in Mexico (1980-81). Our hearts went out to the kids there in such a big way. At one point we even looked into the process for adoption. In Mexico there are enormous hurdles, we soon learned.

Susie has always had a generous heart, especially when it comes to children. As a result, she was often touched by the pictures of children seeking mentors that appeared regularly in our local paper.

The Mentor Duluth Program is designed to match kids ages 5 to 17 with adults who are committed to building long-term friendships with young people. For years Susie had home schooled our two very cool kids, but as Micah headed off to college, she could see this experience would be coming to an end. And so, she took the first step.

The girl who became a part of our extended family was named Christiana.

Mentor Duluth believes that all young people have the need for a positive adult, outside of their family, to be a friend and a support. Most kids are from single parent families or two parent families with special needs.

According to the Mentor Duluth website, "Our mentors come from all walks of life. If you are dependable, enjoy working with youth and are willing to have some fun, we are looking for you! Mentoring takes place in the community and activities can be anything from sporting events or cooking dinner to hiking up the north shore or participating in activities organized by Mentor Duluth."

In addition to being big-hearted, Susie is also very creative. They painted together, they dressed up, they made masks or pottery, and did whatever spur of the moment thing seemed an adventure at the time. The hamming for the cam at the top of this page was pretty typical. But the story took an unexpected turn.

Christiana was the youngest of five siblings. Her father died unexpectedly a few years previous, hence the family's introduction to Mentor Duluth. Her mother, who was wheelchair-and-bed bound with MS, was a remarkable woman. Four boys and a girl would be a handful for even a healthy mom, so her spirit and strength were impressive. What a shock when she passed off this earth after becoming significant part of our family for a season. Again, unexpected.

Susie's story, Sunshine & the Blues, is a powerful read that captures the flavor of mentoring, the impact of allowing the flavors of one's own family to be intermixed with others. If you don't have time right now, click the link anyways and bookmark it, so you can find it later.

More Images from South o' the Border

A few more pictures and another scene from my unpublished story, The Red Scorpion.

Chapter 2

Comstock sat at an outdoor cafe adjacent to the main plaza, El Zocalo, sipping a large concoction of jugo de tamarindo, a sweet thick juice squeezed from the brown, beanlike fruit of the tamarind tree. By his third day in Mexico, he had become increasingly aware of the passage of time. His first two days were spent in leisurely excursions about the city, consumed with a curiosity similar to a boy turning over fallen logs in the woods seeking salamanders and snakes. Now he was becoming anxious about how to achieve his objective. The days would pass quickly. He berated himself for having already wasted two.

A small band of peasant musicians playing an assortment of primitive flutes, whistles and drums had gathered in the street in front of the cafe. A group of children began marching around in circles making whimsical movements, whimpering and bouncing like puppies overeager to see their masters. Another group of boys worked the tables, selling Chiclets to the tourists.

Comstock recalled how the incessant begging had disturbed him during his first trip south of the border. By the time he left he had grown weary of the burros, mongrel dogs, roosters, strange smells, gritty eyeballs and clashing colors that seemed to throw themselves at him from every side. He was tempted to think that first trip had been a mistake and a preposterous waste of time.

Afterwards, however, Comstock missed Mexico immensely. He knew intuitively that one day he would return. He only needed an excuse. He found it in the legend of Quetzlcoatl, the plumed serpent.

According to native mythology Quetzlcoatl, also known as Yoalli ehecatl, was the third son of the Lord of Fire and Time. He was given to bring hope and light to the Nahuatl people in the same way his three brothers were given to three other peoples. When he betrayed his father, he was to be banished forever.

Comstock’s intent on this journey had been to find contacts who would be useful guides to the actual places where Quetzlcoatl was born, grew up, lived and died, even though legends said that the god/man simply “went away” and never died at all.

Click on images to enlarge.

Another Dylan Portrait

My friends know that from spring to fall I turn my garage into an art studio. They also know that I am a Dylan fan. This here is a portrait of Dylan which I did this past week. (click image to enlarge) I’d painted the background a year ago, but hadn’t known where to go with it. Last weekend I spent an evening working on several pieces with a variety of colors on my pallet. The background from last year, perched on the easel, had been patiently awaiting my attention. In a moment of spontaneous exuberance I decided to flatten my easel against the center of the painting.

For some reason the image of Dylan appeared, and with the help of a few additional brushstrokes, the face took the final form you see here. Since the image seems to reflect a Sixties Dylan, I will add the lyrics to a Dylan song from that same period, “It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)"

It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)

Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon
The handmade blade, the child's balloon
Eclipses both the sun and moon
To understand you know too soon
There is no sense in trying.

Pointed threats, they bluff with scorn
Suicide remarks are torn
From the fool's gold mouthpiece
The hollow horn plays wasted words
Proves to warn
That he not busy being born
Is busy dying.

Temptation's page flies out the door
You follow, find yourself at war
Watch waterfalls of pity roar
You feel to moan but unlike before
You discover
That you'd just be
One more person crying.

So don't fear if you hear
A foreign sound to your ear
It's alright, Ma, I'm only sighing.

As some warn victory, some downfall
Private reasons great or small
Can be seen in the eyes of those that call
To make all that should be killed to crawl
While others say don't hate nothing at all
Except hatred.

Disillusioned words like bullets bark
As human gods aim for their mark
Made everything from toy guns that spark
To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark
It's easy to see without looking too far
That not much
Is really sacred.

While preachers preach of evil fates
Teachers teach that knowledge waits
Can lead to hundred-dollar plates
Goodness hides behind its gates
But even the president of the United States
Sometimes must have
To stand naked.

An' though the rules of the road have been lodged
It's only people's games that you got to dodge
And it's alright, Ma, I can make it.

Advertising signs that con you
Into thinking you're the one
That can do what's never been done
That can win what's never been won
Meantime life outside goes on
All around you.

You lose yourself, you reappear
You suddenly find you got nothing to fear
Alone you stand with nobody near
When a trembling distant voice, unclear
Startles your sleeping ears to hear
That somebody thinks
They really found you.

A question in your nerves is lit
Yet you know there is no answer fit to satisfy
Insure you not to quit
To keep it in your mind and not fergit
That it is not he or she or them or it
That you belong to.

Although the masters make the rules
For the wise men and the fools
I got nothing, Ma, to live up to.

For them that must obey authority
That they do not respect in any degree
Who despise their jobs, their destinies
Speak jealously of them that are free
Cultivate their flowers to be
Nothing more than something
They invest in.

While some on principles baptized
To strict party platform ties
Social clubs in drag disguise
Outsiders they can freely criticize
Tell nothing except who to idolize
And then say God bless him.

While one who sings with his tongue on fire
Gargles in the rat race choir
Bent out of shape from society's pliers
Cares not to come up any higher
But rather get you down in the hole
That he's in.

But I mean no harm nor put fault
On anyone that lives in a vault
But it's alright, Ma, if I can't please him.

Old lady judges watch people in pairs
Limited in sex, they dare
To push fake morals, insult and stare
While money doesn't talk, it swears
Obscenity, who really cares
Propaganda, all is phony.

While them that defend what they cannot see
With a killer's pride, security
It blows the minds most bitterly
For them that think death's honesty
Won't fall upon them naturally
Life sometimes
Must get lonely.

My eyes collide head-on with stuffed graveyards
False gods, I scuff
At pettiness which plays so rough
Walk upside-down inside handcuffs
Kick my legs to crash it off
Say okay, I have had enough
What else can you show me?

And if my thought-dreams could be seen
They'd probably put my head in a guillotine
But it's alright, Ma, it's life, and life only.

Take a Picture, or Engage?

I was working on my Honda out in front of the garage this morning when I heard a loud buzzing noise behind me. It sounded like a giant bumblebee, making a vibrating buzz sound. When I turned, it surprised me to see that it was a hummingbird, trying to fly out through the window pane. My first reaction was to attempt a rescue, to make sure he found his way out of the garage. I opened the second door.

He then became fascinated by the lights, flew up to them and took interest in the bulbs and then the bright colored wiring. For half a second he perched on the red wire there after examining it, then resumed his exploration.

I ran houseward to fetch my Sony Cybershot, but when I returned he was gone.

The thought I had next was that I wish I’d stayed to watch him a little more… just because he was so near, so interesting. I wished that I had remained engaged, involved with this surprisingly wondrous visitor.

So often we reach for a camera to “capture the moment” but what is really happening? The irony is that we may capture an image, but we missed the real moment, the opportunity for engagement.

I am not opposed to picture making, video taking, or other forms of documenting special moments in time. What I do believe is that we need to take care to keep it balanced. Here are three areas where I believe engagement it vital.

Engaging Our World
Buzz Aldrin, in his autobiographical recounting of his moonwalk with Neil Armstrong in 1969, reflected that the mission was not really about humans experiencing the moon as fully human beings. Rather, NASA used them to accomplish objectives, assigning them the task of completing nearly eight hours of experiments in a four hour period. Aldrin wrote that for about fifteen seconds he was able to stop and allow himself the luxury of an emotional engagement with this incredible experience. He was standing on the moon. It had been a lifelong dream, and the dream was actually being fulfilled.
Unfortunately, he had no time for fully living and experiencing that moment. It was back to work, documenting, taking pictures, gathering moon rocks.

So it is that we ourselves can forget to engage the wonder that is all around us. The way the sun slants through the trees and glistens on morning dew, the shimmer of stars on a crisp moonless night… It’s an awesome world. As we travel through, let’s spend the whole of our time simply setting up the next shot.

Engaging Others
Listening is more than simply hearing words. Engaging others is more than simply being in their presence. We’ve all seen scenes in movies where the man is reading the paper, the woman is looking through her magazine. Engagement is possible when you put the newspaper down and the mag away. In our house, it was a dinnertime rule: no books at the table. This was a family time, a time to be present, not checked out.

One of the reasons many of us fail to ache for the poor and needy of Third World countries is that we do not encounter or engage such persons very easily. It is easy to stereotype the poor, or Republicans and Democrats, or business people, but wrong. Every person is a unique individual. Each has their own dreams, sorrows, hopes, disappointments. Every one is significant and important. In point of fact, it is impossible to fully understand the meaning of our own lives without connections to others through engagement.

Engaging Our Selves
Who am I, really? A lot of people don’t know because they afraid to peer that deeply within. Loneliness, anxiety, feelings of meaninglessness… what will I find there? What if I don’t like what I see?

Yet, true life satisfaction can only happen when we make contact with our true selves. Many there are who have idealized images of themselves, or distorted ideas of who they feel they ought to be. The net result is self-frustration, disappointment, tyranny by a host of shoulds, self-reproach and a divided self.

Let it go. Begin the quest to know and understand who you are. It will help you in every way, including relationships, career and life purpose.

At the end of your days, the pictures and journal notes you made will trigger memories long forgotten, and will indeed be precious. But the experiences are what have real value. The pictures are but a tool to re-illuminate them.

Thanks for letting my words engage you briefly. I hope you have enjoyed my pictures, too.

Eating Words Won't Won't Satisfy Hunger

This past week I made several blog entries regarding the world famine crisis that is unfolding. In my most recent entry I used the phrase "idiot legislators"... which for many is a relatively mild accusation, but in my case it feels unkind to be so harsh. Put yourself in their shoes. What would you be doing right now about the energy issues and economic challenges and international food supply issues our world currently faces?

Personally, I do currently feel that efforts to convert farmland from food production to energy production can be easily labeled idiotic. When people make stupid decisions, this does not mean they are stupid people. A lot of smart people make stupid decisions. I have made my share. This does not mean I am a stupid person. When I jumped out of a moving car, for example, it was a stupid thing to do. I still aced most of my tests in school.

So, as I eat my words I am noticing that there is not a lot of nutritional value in words. If there were, we could have our printing presses do overruns on every job. Words in abundance would pour forth from our shores. We're already bombarding the world with words through radio, and other media. And here I am pushing out more words through my fingertips onto computer screens potentially visible around the globe.

At the end of the day, an empty tummy needs food, not words.

I myself do not have an answer to this crisis since I myself do not have the facts. My hope is that those who have all the facts will be able to sort things out and make decisions based on truth. What we don't need is for moneyed interests to determine national policy for personal gain. It is in this sense that I do not always trust our legislators.

We cannot lose sight of our global interdependence.

My Fine Feathered Friends

Woody Allen called one of his books Without Feathers as a comic response to Emily Dickinson's statement, "Hope is the thing with feathers that perches on the soul..." In addition to the implied nakedness, he likewise signals the absence of hope in his heart. One might call him a tragic luminary.

Here's another poem by Emily Dickinson, about books along with short reading list of some personal favorites. May we never quit being a nation of readers.

There is no frigate like a book

To take us lands away,

Nor any coursers like a page

of prancing poetry.

This traverse may the poorest take

Without oppress of toll;

How frugal is the chariot
That bears a human soul.

The Short List

Here's a short list of some of my favorite Novellas and Shorter, Book-Length Fictional Works that have great power and are worthy of any reading list...

Death in Venice, Thomas Mann

The Tenth Man, Graham Greene

Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad

Cakes & Ale, Somerset Maughm

Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck

The Sybil, Par Lagerkvist

Barabas, Par Lagerkvist

Seize the Day, Saul Bellow

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch, A. Solzhenitsyn

The Forged Coupon, Leo Tolstoy

Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway

Welcome to Hard Times, E.L.Doctorow

The Great Divorce, C.S.Lewis

Animal Farm, George Orwell

Isabelle, Andre Gide

Theseus, Andre Gide

This is a list of stories and books that made an impact on me at key points in my life...

The Secret Sharer, Joseph Conrad

The Lagoon, Joseph Conrad

Too Late the Phalarope, Alan Paton

Cyrano de Bergerac, Edmund Rostand (play)

The End of the Affair, Graham Greene

A Burnt Out Case, Graham Green

The Power and the Glory, Graham Greene

Man of La Mancha, Dale Wasserman (play)

For Whom the Bell Tolls, Ernest Hemingway

In Our Time, Ernest Hemingway (stories)

Demian, Herman Hesse

Beneath the Wheel, Herman Hesse

Martin Eden, Jack London

1984, George Orwell

Brave New World, Aldus Huxley

That Hideous Strength, C.S.Lewis

Crime & Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevski

Labyrinths, Jorge Luis Borges (stories)

Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges (stories)

The Bet by Anton Checkov

The Goat

My senior year in high school I was quarterback for our intramural football team called The Nerds. I did not know what the name "Nerd" meant at that time, but assumed it was something dirty like one of the other teams in our league, the Galloping Gonads.

This was really the culmination of my years of street football and all the football games we played after school every day up at Hamilton School. In retrospect, I probably had more cred than I give myself credit for. As quarterback I called plays and engineered a winning season that brought us to within five yards of the intramural championship. If we won that last game, we would have been the school’s champion team.

As it turns out, we were on the five yard line with time running out. I called an option, and as I escaped the rush by moving to the left I saw Tony Ruggerio wide open in the center of the end zone. But I also saw a wide open space in front of me, inviting me to make a dash for it… which I did.

I have never been the fastest runner among my peers, and that day in the late afternoon sunlight, those five yards took a lifetime to traverse. An unsuccessful sprint I might add, because I was nailed on the two. So it is, I let everybody down with an impulsive bad decision.

Never mind that I had brought us to victory’s doorstep with a very successful year that surprised nearly all of our adversaries. (It didn’t surprise us, of course, because we’d played so many years together and fine tuned a lot of very cool timing plays.)

Ten years later I was visiting the old neighborhood. I don’t recall where it happened but I ran into Tom Dermody that day, one of the guys from our neighborhood who was on that intramural squad. His first words: “Why didn’t you throw it?” Ten years later. Not a greeting of “Hey, how are you doing? Long time no see.”

"Why didn't you throw it?" The irony is, that even with all that water under the bridge, I knew exactly what he was referring to.

I have replayed that decision a hundred times in my mind. It was a poor one, I know. And I wish I could tell the guys I’m sorry, but life goes on. Sometimes you let people down and no matter how hard you wish it you can’t undo what you’ve done. So the task is to learn from your mistakes, to be wiser, more disciplined and better next time.

Post 268: Don't Neglect Your Family

Hard to believe I've produced 267 blog posts to date since starting last June... but like all things in life, we can accomplish much by taking small steps one after the other. As they say "the journey of a thousand miles..."

Although the themes vary, much of the content has been produced in an effort to help others in their careers as they pursue their dreams. Having said this, however, I know that one important message has been neglected and this is a brief reminder. Do not neglect your family. You want to write books, make great art, change the world... go for it. But do not sacrifice the foundation that makes it possible. If you turn your back on loved ones to make a name for yourself, who will be there when you crash and burn? Failure is part of life, but let that failure be a project you were working on, not a marriage. Not your children.

Peter Lynch, famed fund manager of the Magellan Fund, in one of his books includes the telling statement that his seven days a week commitment to Wall Street success resulted in his missing out in two or three years of his daughters' lives, in the critical early teens. He warned that he can never re-do that decision or get back what he lost there.

PHOTO CAPTION: My wife Susie, one of the secrets of my success.

Not Walking to New Orleans

On the plane while returning home last night I read a powerful article about the continued disintegration of New Orleans called "The Killing Fields." (Ethan Brown, Radar magazine, April '08) The title comes from a book about the tragedy known as Cambodia during the reign of Pol Pot. The New Orleans killing fields have no leader. It is an anarchic situation involving guns and a general lawlessness that has overrun the city.

There had been hope that this year's Mardi Gras would reincarnate a phoenix from the city's Katrina demolition, but no such luck. Numerous shootings peppered the event with fear, the city's new mood.

The article paints a portrait of a city with no leadership. Corruption and incompetence have allowed the criminals to essentially get away with murder. In point of fact, there has only been one murder conviction in two years despite the city now heralding its trophy for the highest murder rate per capita in America. Yes, I say heralding because the idiot mayor even stated that the murder rate keeps the New Orleans brand name in the news, as if that were a laudable PR achievement.

Oh well... I did enjoy my visit to New Orleans four months before Katrina, but if you catch my drift here, I won't be going back soon. The cuisine is still wonderful I am sure, but when your stomach is in knots because you don't feel safe, I have to believe there are better places to find a good meal.

Beauty for the Ears and Mind

Henry Wiens, a Midwest pianist, recording artist and founder of Quiet Heart Music, is not “just another piano player.” After years of receiving letters and calls from grateful listeners coping with grief, chronic pain, and stress, Henry recognized that his music had significant healing potential and began to distribute his CDs to nursing homes, hospices and hospitals across the nation. For more information about Quiet Heart Music, visit http://www.quietheartmusic.com/

An interview with Yamaha recording artist Henry Wiens.

Ennyman: Why does music have such power to reach so deeply into peoples' hearts?
Henry: Music is like beauty for the ears and mind. The answer to why people are moved by beauty is rooted in what it means to be human. For me, creating and listening to music is linked to expressing love for everything that is beautiful about life. As a listener, I respond to what I "read between the lines"; as a composer-performer, I try to express that love & beauty to others. Any power that music may have to touch others is rooted in the authenticity and depth of the artist's expression.

As people experience music throughout their lives, they build up associations with that music which reinforce each other. Hearing a familiar melody will bring past experiences to life. For example, hearing a song that you danced to when you were 18 and in love will probably elicit some of those good feelings even decades later. Hearing a song that was sung in church while you were held on your mother's lap may bring comfort the rest of your life.

Ennyman: When did you first realize that your music had power to alleviate suffering and/or bring healing to hurting people?
Henry: My parents took me to sing at the local nursing home with others from our little country church, from the time I was about 9 years old. I saw elderly people who couldn't even speak trying to sing along with songs from their childhood. I saw that their souls were stirred, their faith strengthened and their joys rekindled. Starting around the age of 12, I began playing a pump organ at the "home" with this group led by my preacher father.

In the middle & late 90's, I got an amazing number of letters from people around the U.S. who had purchased my 1st CD, "The Quiet Heart", which was then distributed by a now-defunct record label called ColorSong, based in St. Paul. Some of them told how their loved one's passing was eased by my music. Some hospices called me for additional copies for their patient rooms. Most often, though, the letters told about listening to this CD over a period of months or even years after a bereavement. They wanted to thank me for the gift of music that had helped them through their darkest days, weeks, and months. The # of these letters reached critical mass around 1998, and led me to focus on music that heals. These letters also resonated with my own grief, having lost my father in 1994 and my closest friend in 1997.

Ennyman: Are there things you do consciously to make your music more effective in bringing comfort?
Henry: I try to choose songs that are already meaningful to people. I could compose original solo piano music in a soothing style, and I may do that someday. But because this music is wordless, I want to harness the meaning and significance these songs already have in the listener's life.

As I have written elsewhere, I consciously try to create a space to experience the feelings of loss. I do this by playing in a way that is deliberately unhurried. I believe this slower paced music helps to facilitate a deeper, reflective state of mind where memories of a loved can be savored. Some may think that the grieving should listen to music that is happy and distracting. There may be a time and a place for that, but I think there is generally too much hurry and distraction, and not enough opportunity to experience the memories that eventually bring healing.

Ennyman: How did you first become interested in music? What inspired you to take up a career in music?
Henry: I grew up in a home where my mother and older sister played the piano at home and in church. Our family would sing hymns around the piano. When I was 11, my mother said I should take piano lessons. I was reluctant to start, but enjoyed it almost immediately. I had a flair for improvisation, so much that my piano teacher told me -- after about a year of lessons -- that I would be a jazz pianist someday. Since my dad was the preacher and my mother was the choir director, I became the official pianist of our little church in 7th grade -- the 1st of many unpaid positions!! The simple hymns and gospel songs we sang week after week became fertile soil for improvisation. I had countless opportunities to play the same songs different ways, which was a lot of fun, compared with playing those boring notes on the page.

When I was 12, I heard a southern gospel group from Tampa, Florida, called the Rebels Quartet. Their pianist, "Little Jimmy Taylor" really fired my imagination with his playing. I made a point of meeting him after the concert -- a very rare event in our isolated Upper Michigan community. I told him I wanted to play just like him when I grew up.

When I was 15, I won 2nd prize in a local talent contest and got to shake hands with Miss Teen America and a couple of Green Bay Packers. Guess which impressed me more? Anyway, that kind of positive reinforcement motivated me to practice that much more.

While in my early 20s, I was very involved as an accompanist at a church in my college town. One night after choir practice the pastor's wife asked me "Have you ever thought of playing piano with performing groups that travel full-time"? Something clicked inside when I heard that and I soon decided to pursue such an opportunity. This led to living on a bus with a gospel quartet for 3 years, performing across the country in churches, nursing homes, schools, jails, etc. This led me back to college to study music theory and composition which equipped me to work for many years as a producer and arranger of many recordings for a wide-variety of artists. I also arranged hundreds of songs for publishing, mainly church related. And all of this goes back to that pastor's wife's comment after choir practice!

Ennyman: Who are your sources of inspiration?
Henry: On a personal level, I would have to say my loving father, who died in 1994, my 97 yr. old mother who still sends me daily e-mail, my wife of 36 years, Dr. Lisa Wiens, and our 4 daughters. Our pastor, Ken Johnson. Many dear friends. The late Tom Fitch, music minister at Park Ave. church, was very inspiring, right up till the end of his battle with cancer at the age of 45.

Andrae Crouch has been a huge influence musically and spiritually. I have always loved a lot of black gospel music. This "gospel" flavor is discernible on certain songs from my new CD, "Wind Beneath My Wings"; particularly, check out “Bridge Over Troubled Waters.”

Fernando Ortega's music is very beautiful, sensitive, creative, reflective. I love his Hymns & Meditations project. This is closer to what I'm doing today with music that heals.

Ennyman: You seem to enjoy being improvisational. How would you compare improv to coloring outside of the lines?
Henry: Improvising is the heart and soul of what I do. A painter works to communicate his unique way of seeing -- "Here's how I see it". When I make something new out of a familiar song, I'm saying: "This is how I hear it". Great painters go far beyond the literal re-creation of what is seen. After all, anyone can take a picture -- though a gifted photographer can take us beyond literal images, too.

Just playing the notes on the page is comparable to coloring inside the lines or paint by number. If I'm looking at notes, the written music merely reminds me of the literal melody; it serves as a point of reference for improvisation.

Ennyman: Everyone has certain motivations . (such as teaching, selling, helping.) What are your personal motivations that make you feel most fulfilled when you are doing them?
Henry: In the first place, creating the music is its own reward. Listening to a CD that represents months of improvising and pruning musical ideas is mostly a joy. (perfection is elusive!) The feeling is, "Wow, that really is beautiful!" But the greatest reward comes later when you learn that other people are also moved & inspired by the music; then I know they have felt and heard something like I hoped they would hear. I have a strong desire to encourage and help other people, especially those with grief and pain. I hope this music embodies love & mercy.

Ennyman: If you had not gone this direction with your life, what would you be dong now?
Henry: I would most likely be teaching math in a high school or college. I was certified to do that in 1973 in the state of Michigan.

Music Brings Comfort and Healing

Music is one of the more fantastic gifts of God. It lifts the soul on wings to ethereal inner spaces. Nothing more effectively breaks life’s monotonous hold on us, transporting us to the portals of paradise. How do musicians and composers do it? From nothing & emptiness they bring forth combinations of sounds, melodies, themes, so pregnant with feeling it seems an inexplicable mystery. Rainbows of sound, trembling with life, causing our hearts to break open with rapture, or sweet sorrow. ~June 30, 1993

Whether providing comfort for grief, inspiration for action, relief from stress, or alleviating pain, music pierces the core of our beings like nothing else. If you or someone you know is grieving a loss or going through hard things, you might find healing power in the music of Henry Wiens.

According to one consultant who sent this testimonial: From a consultant: "Henry Wiens' soothing and relaxing improvisations on 'The Quiet Heart' have a unique way of quieting and speaking to one's soul. His sensitive and unique musical touch provides the listener an oasis of contemplation that leaves them refreshed and comforted."

http://www.quietheartmusic.com/

Something Remarkable

Moved by Jose Sanchez's powerful novel, "God Was Looking The Other Way." For many, this is how it is. Unjust, horrible situations. And the heart's cries hear nothing in response. Where is God? Why doesn't He see?
April 13, 1994

From our human perspective, when overwhelmed by grief, by pain, by injustice, by the senselessness, and God's apparent indifference, it is easy to understand the sense of alienation and despair that pervades so many lives. It is an age old problem. It is our human situation to perceive things thus, because we are finite and shut off from seeing things "as they are." The supernatural realm is veiled from us. We grope inside the four walls of existence, trying to make the best of it.

In truth, God is neither silent nor indifferent. He has spoken, has entered the box and brought us light. The Book through which He speaks is also a lamp that brings illumination to many of these puzzles that perplex us. These horrible, unjust situations are not the end of the story. The world is broken, but it is not eternally so. Yes, our hearts ache at the suffering we see because God's heart aches and we are made in the image of God. In the end, if we read with care and tune our ears to hear His voice, we discover that God's method of helping the hurting is through human agency. That is, God desires to transform this world, to end injustice, to bring healing and hope but has chosen to do it in a remarkable, even unusual, way. Through us.... through you and me, for His glory.

How much can one person accomplish? What difference can we make? We'll never find out until we try.

Columbus Day Reflections

In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. With three ships he crossed the Atlantic: the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria.

This year in late summer a replica of the Nina, one of these three ships, came to Duluth, Minnesota as a tribute to this significant occasion. Simultaneously, our town was also visited by protestors of this historical achievement. With increased awareness of the dark side of the Conquest of the Americas, some have suggested that we discontinue the celebration of Columbus Day as a national holiday.

In December 1980 when I was at the Zocalo in Mexico City, archeologists had unearthed a room the length and width of a football field filled with human skulls to a depth of twenty feet. The protesters of the Nina here in Duluth may have desired to (correctly) note that Christopher Columbus did not herald all good things for natives of the Americas, but this single archeological dig is evidence that not all atrocities in this hemisphere originated with whites from across the seas.

Christopher Columbus' original aim was to find a route to India. His intentions were earnest, not malicious. And no, he was not a genocidal maniac.

The dark side of human behavior neither begins nor ends with Western Civilization. Robert Burns noted, “Man’s inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn.” Horrors have been committed by every race throughout the course of history. This past century we have seen horrors in Rwanda, Uganda, Cambodia, Algeria, Bosnia, Albania, as well as the German Holocaust and Stalin’s terrors. A-bombs obliterated Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And going further back we see the Spanish Inquisition, Ghengis Kahn, the American slave trade, Vikings, Huns and more.

Since perpetrating evil is the province of all races, perhaps the solution can be found by all races working together to find solutions that are relevant to all races… today. In our own time, better jobs, housing, freedom to live without fear of violence, hope for tomorrow… these are things toward which we can all work together, rather than quibbling over the meaning of a replica of a 500 year old boat.

Unfortunately, we can't change the past. Hopefully we can learn from it.