Posts Tagged ‘Polyneuropathy’

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 75: The Shadow People

July 17, 2015

Human Shadows Imprinted by Nuclear ExplosionHuman Shadows Imprinted by Nuclear Explosion

 I had planned on writing something more upbeat for this installment; I don’t like writing about the physical challenges I deal with—there are so many, with so many more…The hope, in writing the last installment, was that it might prove helpful for someone…

Then I was informed of the date: July 16, 2015, the 70th Anniversary of a horrific event.

On July 16, 1945, scientists in Los Alamos successfully exploded the first atomic bomb at the Trinity test site, located in nearby Alamogordo, New Mexico. The atomic age began; and the words were uttered by Robert Oppenheimer: “I have become death, the destroyer of worlds”. On August 6 and August 9—next month—the 70th Anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki will occur. The above images are from these cities; the shadows left on structures after their owners were vaporized by the atomic blast.

 Atomic_bombing_of_JapanAtomic cloud over Nagasaki from Koyagi-jima

 Wednesday afternoon I opened my email to find that people are suggesting that we go to war with Iran; for fear that Iran will become a nuclear power, and will provide terrorists with nuclear capability. The insanity of nuclear war must stop.

This subject is particularly meaningful for me, in that it reminds me of one of my ‘failures’ as an illustrator. I was hired [not sure I ever got paid] to illustrate a “Hiroshima Diary” but could not finish the illustrations in the time I was given. Most of the illustrations have never been finished, nor published in any form. The diary is the story of a teacher who entered Hiroshima after the bombing, looking for two children who had been sent to Hiroshima for schooling. As she walked the streets of Hiroshima she saw hundreds of children wandering through the rubble, looking for their parents. The only survivors she found were children. Her diary tells of her encounters with wandering, damaged children; all of whom die in her arms…

Ashes of HiroshimaWe did this.

I don’t care how much discussion occurs over the justification of our actions; we obliterated thousands of women and children. Non-combatants. Perhaps they would have become combatants if we invaded Japan. We didn’t, and they weren’t. We slaughtered:

20 U.S., Dutch, British prisoners of war
90,000–166,000 killed in Hiroshima
39,000–80,000 killed in Nagasaki
Total: 129,000–246,000+ killed

 Champions of Truth, Justice, and the American Way.

It must never happen again.

 

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 74: Life is filled with surprises…

July 11, 2015

p25From the soon-to-be-published, “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry

 Jim is a little dismayed…when he left for work this morning, his wife, Della had knee-length hair. At lunch he went out and bought her a pair of elegant hair-combs as a dearly-purchased present. Life is filled with surprises…

My birthday today. 63 is a surprising number. Not that I didn’t expect to reach this number, it’s just that it seems so soon; or so sudden. My brain is still somewhere in my 40’s. The last six years have tumbled all of my plans; and have made it difficult to make new ones…

In 2008 I worked with Medical Teams International in two different parts of the world. First in New Orleans, working on Katrina Recovery; and a few months later in Oaxaca, Mexico. While in New Orleans I watched an exhausted young couple coordinate the efforts of dozens of volunteers, sent out to various places, repairing damaged houses. Earlier in my life, I was a contractor; followed by 14 years in the Bureau of Buildings in Portland. I realized that I could give that couple a break; I knew how to do what they were doing. I just needed to figure out how I’d deal with the finances. I had a belt custom-made when I returned home, as a reminder of my desire to serve… Standing in my room in Oaxaca, overwhelmed with the foreign-ness of the nighttime activity happening on the street below, I realized that I might have found my purpose for the years ahead—using my experience in construction to help others around the world.

Six months later I started seeing neurologists, concerned about two numb areas, one at the bottom of each foot. Six months after that, I lost most of the sensation in my skin, over most of my body. While working with our church in building some homes in a village on the Baja Peninsula, I discovered that working with sharp things wasn’t very smart. I was able to draw blood without feeling it. A similar trip the following year, after the lack of sensation in my skin had covered the rest of my body; I was convinced that I was done with construction. I still have most of my tools; I haven’t found the self-discipline to get rid of them. Now, standing on my feet and walking around for a couple of hours exhausts me. My hands shake when I draw; I have difficulty with finger movement; so now I draw at large scale, and mostly work with digital versions of my drawings. There was a period in my life when I expected to become a ‘famous illustrator’. Life is filled with surprises…

And yet I still find hope… Not hope that the neuropathy will heal; not hope that I won’t have wheels in my future. Nor hope that I’ll still become a famous illustrator. Hope that things will work out OK.

It’s hard to explain hope; I believe that my hope is a gift of the Creator. I have two old guys in my life at present, 10-20 years older than myself. Neither of them has much in the way of hope; both expect to die soon, their dreams for the future unfulfilled. They are both angry. I’d be angry, too. Some days I am angry.

When I asked the Creator into my life in 1973, I determined not to become Religious. I found Religious people to be annoying; they had opinions about my life that had very little basis in fact. I have come to realize that the opinions weren’t far off the mark, because humans are remarkably similar; but they were rude in their presumption. There is nothing in my life that causes me to deserve Heaven, or to have earned a place in Heaven. We don’t spend Eternity with the Creator because we are good people. We spend Eternity in Heaven [whatever that may be] simply because that is what the Creator intended from the beginning of Creation. This idea messes with the minds of a lot of Religious people, and they have all sorts of verses from the Bible that justify their opinions, ‘proving’ me wrong. I learned a long time ago that there is no point in arguing Scripture with these folk. Scripture can justify nearly everything, if one is good at it.
There were two thieves hanging on a cross, next to Jesus. One of the thieves mocked Jesus.
But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

No “Spiritual Laws,” no going to church, no being a good person, no not-doing a list of things that good people aren’t supposed to do. Just, ‘remember me.’ And a promise from the Creator of the Universe, come to earth in the form of Jesus. Most of the people who are most critical of non-Religious people are well-intentioned, although it often doesn’t seem that way. They just never learned to play well with other children…

I see life in America, and life in the Church in an odd way. A dear friend recently described it as a “Specialized Uniqueness.” I have to limit it to America, because I’ve seen very little of the world. I have friends in various places in the world, doing mission-work among people who’ve never really heard of Jesus. The majority of the world has never heard of Jesus, or have heard a very peculiar version of Jesus. To the uninitiated, it seems like missionaries are trying to ‘win points in Heaven’. From my experience, these are people who have found a way to make sense of life, and they truly want to share the experience with others, out of love and compassion. A compassion that isn’t found very often in this world. And yes, it often comes with a ‘yardstick’. To me, that ‘yardstick’ tends to make a lot of sense. But it can’t be forced. Jesus never forced anyone to do anything; and He was fairly intolerant of those who did. Somehow this part tends to get overlooked. He spent most of His time hanging around with the people that the Religious people couldn’t stand. Jesus liked to party.

I’m not big on parties. I don’t like drawing attention to myself [how I ever believed that I could be a ‘famous illustrator’ while not drawing attention to myself I’m not sure I’ll ever understand]. Maybe when I get Home I’ll enjoy parties…

 the universe in his hands_1

 

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 70: The Battle of Bedford Falls

April 29, 2015

klara_holdenfrom The Book Lover

   The title of this entry is from a movie reference, Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life. George Bailey of Bedford Falls opts to take the role of Rescuer instead of the role of Adventurer; and the decision changes the course of his life. He takes on a job he doesn’t want, in order to rescue his family; he marries, ends up living in a drafty old house, takes on the role of father and ends up taking the fall for a mistake supposedly made by a daffy old uncle. On the verge of bankruptcy, he attempts suicide; and is rescued by an unlikely [and non-Biblical] angel. Clarence the angel gives George the gift of seeing what his world of Bedford Falls would have been like had he never been born…

The Battle of Bedford Falls is the battle of making it through another day when everything inside of you wants to opt out of the experience. There are a lot of other options to suicide that accomplish a similar task—‘opting not to play the game’ one more day; and immersing oneself in a variety of activities that postpone the inevitable.

When I started writing for public consumption—this venture into online journaling—I decided that I would only write about things I know about; things in which I have some expertise. I don’t write to gain “followers”—although they are appreciated; and I don’t write to ‘monetize’ my thoughts. I write as a way of exploring my life and myself, and hopefully express in words some thoughts that others may not be able to find the words for. Occasionally using bad grammar…

My only areas of expertise are subjects related to the Building Code; and a very particular style of illustration. These aspects of my life don’t offer a lot of practical wisdom [I wish I’d had more of the former, when I was building the house I’m in]. I’ve built houses, written City policy, raised kids into adulthood and stayed married for nearly 39 years. I’ve rarely left Portland; and at the same time have traveled to the Gulf Coast and to Mexico a few times for construction-related mission work.

I have years of training in how one can change their life for the better, and I’m happier with ‘me’ than I was 30+ years ago; but I only know how to change me—I can’t change other people. The most that I can do is create an environment where people can change, if they desire change. I can offer suggestions [many of which are for me, facts]—but until someone accepts my ideas as their own, they are simply ‘suggestions’. I can provide people with a list of books to study, but I can’t make them read the books or try to implement them into their lives.

There’s rioting in Baltimore; perhaps not tonight, but there has been rioting over the last few days. Rioting in lots of cities, reminding me of the late 60’s—the rioting then had different causes. Throughout the Twentieth Century and overflowing into the Twenty-first, we have become a people who prefer antagonism to mediation. Despite a century of bloodshed, people still pick up weapons in order to feel safe. The proliferation of weapons isn’t making us any safer.

The Battle of Bedford Falls—how do we get through today?

I feel shitty most days, at the start of my day; I start the day, these days, feeling like I did at the end of the day in the past. Due to my neurological issues, my entire body feels wrong; my legs, from the knees down feel wrong, but I’ve been walking for something like 60 years; my muscles know how to walk. I choose to ignore how I feel and walk anyway. The reality is that I know of dozens of people who are in worse shape than I am. So I start my day in prayer, listening to music that turns my mind toward the Creator and my inner self. I ‘lift people up’ in my prayers—I’m not smart enough to tell the Creator what His creation needs. Praying for others takes my mind off of myself. Do my prayers change the world? I have no idea. They change me, over time. Among those changes are a growing list of people—I pray for people I don’t know, I pray for people I’d rather not talk with.

I make sense out of my life by the belief that this life is but an eyeblink in the span of Eternity. I was told long ago, that we are minds with a body, rather than the reverse. Over time I have come to believe that we are Eternal souls that have a mind and a body. That Earth is a place where we are intended to learn how to live well with our fellow creatures. I believe there is another ‘plane of existence’ that isn’t tied to bodies and disease and suffering; and that we arrive at that plane when we leave these damaged bodies behind. I also believe that we could do a much better job of living with each other than we do. It’s our greed, our stupidity, our selfishness that makes this world a garbage heap…We blame God for not stopping us from doing the things we can do by our own choice.

And this is a lousy way to end this entry…probably indicative of my mood—I’ve been repairing a washing machine over the last couple of days, and I dislike the toll it’s taken on my body and mind. It used to be a lot easier.

In spite of a lot of evidence to the contrary, I look forward to seeing what another few years will bring into my life. I’ve met people I would not have met before; there are people I care about now that I didn’t know a couple of years ago. Granted, I’m not seeing a lot of points on the ‘win’ side of the ledger these days, but I lack the ability to see into the future. I have to wait for the future to show up. I see my kids overcoming huge obstacles, and I believe they will continue to move forward. Every day I see indicators of positive change for the future of mankind—if we will stop fighting each other long enough to pay attention. We walk in the shadows of giants; and I believe we will see more giants in the future, if we will simply pay attention.

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 68: We Aren’t What We Think We Are

March 31, 2015

Imagine a baseball stadium…

stadiumI’m not really a science guy, but I’m fascinated with science; I find that my generic understanding of science helps me to understand the Universe, which means that science helps me understand the nature of the Creator.

As I understand it, if an atom was the size of a baseball stadium, the nucleus would be the size of a baseball, and the electrons of a water molecule would orbit somewhere within the confines of the stadium structure. Quantum mechanics, and that concept which is sometimes, but not necessarily accurately called ‘Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle’, proposes that the act of looking for a particle actually changes the location of the particle—so I’ve indicated the Hydrogen atoms as amorphous ‘star’ like images. When you look to find them, they will most likely be somewhere else…

The rest of the volume of the stadium is empty. Electromagnetic forces and nothing solid. We are made up of zillions of atoms; consequently, we are made up of zillions of packets of empty space and a ‘few’ atoms. And yet, we believe ourselves to be made up of solid material. The apparent solidity is caused by the electromagnetic forces within the atoms.

We aren’t what we think we are.

So, what are we?

A question that has been asked for Millennia. One of the aspects of living in this cyber-era is that we have a tendency to believe we know so much more than our human counterparts of the last centuries. There are a lot of ‘factoids’ that we now know that people in the past did not know; but that doesn’t always mean we are all that much wiser…

I believe that we are eternal souls attached to bodies. Each of these bodies start with two cells, which when combined, divide and subdivide, and replicate each other; in the process creating a chain of DNA that provide all of the instructions for making an adult human being over a dozen or so years; with a certain hair coloring, a specific eye color, a particular skin color—all of the externals that give us identities. The little whorls on your fingers that are totally unique to you [at least as far as anyone has been able to determine]; the shape of the folds of the ear, which may also be unique to you. A zillion atoms, each with a unique DNA structure that can identify YOU even after death.

And the soul? People have been looking for the soul for centuries. People have tried to weigh the human body at death to see if one’s weight lessens as the soul leaves the body.

Perhaps the soul is found in all of those packets of ‘empty’ space within our atoms…

People tend to get very anthropomorphic about the nature of God—they believe that God has to look something like us, or some other created being. Torah [the Book of Genesis] states that we are made in the image of our Creator. If God was human, it would be reasonable to expect that our bodies are made in the image of the Creator. We make images based on our imaginings; these created images symbolize a larger idea.

Creatio_of_AdamDid Michelangelo really believe that the Creator was an old man with a beard, supported by a number of other beings? No. However, at this time in our history, painting the Creator as something more like E.T. wouldn’t have made sense to people. Michelangelo loved the human body, and felt that the human body could be the epitome of creation. I never took any Art History classes in college; and I don’t think in the same manner as other people think. Symbolism sort of escapes my attention unless it’s incredibly obvious. I’m not sure what attributes of the Creator Michelangelo intended to portray by portraying him as a guy with a beard. From reading The Agony and the Ecstasy, a biographical novel about the life of Michelangelo, the Pope who commissioned the painting of the Sistine Chapel was surprised by Michelangelo’s portrayal of the Creator; he expected someone more harsh and demanding.

I believe the Creator is far closer to pure energy than to human beings; that ‘created in His image’ refers to our ability to create, to imagine, to bring our imaginings into fruition. Not being of the Energy that created the Universe, we have to create using tangible or visible materials; and our creative efforts require sweat, work, and the determination to overcome obstacles. Or not.

We are never required to create; we can go through an entire lifetime never having created anything. I think I’ve met people like that—a lifetime of following instructions for the assembling of ‘pieces’ that someone else created. A lifetime on ‘the assembly line’—is this wrong? Probably not. However, I don’t believe this fulfills our potential as images of the Creator.

When I create the images I use in these mental meanderings, I’m not actually creating anything beyond an idea. Photons of light are absorbed by the retinas of your eyes; and electrical impulses travel up your Optic Nerve into your brain. Somehow [no one really knows how], these impulses get translated into a visual image.

This is the interior of your brain…

grady's brain

Microscopic webs of tissue that connect and reconnect and somehow incorporate to form an image. That bright web is a portion of a thought. Note: there are no flat screen TVs in your brain. You [ideally] have two small holes in the front of your head; they are similar in nature to the shutter in a camera. Light contacts cells in the retina—the back of your eye—and those cells send electro-chemical signals into this mass of tissue [it’s really grey] located on the top of your spinal cord. Folded layers of cells sort of like a sponge [the ocean kind of sponge]; somehow those cells present the world in your brain, as if you are looking at a flat-screen television. When I think of him, I have a ‘video’ in my brain of my Grandfather slowly dancing around the dining area of our family cabin; listening to Norwegian folk tunes on the record player. No one ever filmed this image; and yet I have a portion of the video in my ‘little grey cells’ [Inspector Poirot].

For those that are blind, a ‘picture’ of the world still forms; the image is probably more like looking at an infrared image, in black and white: objects in relationship to other objects—maybe something like a map. Some of those objects are connected to sounds; some objects are connected to smells. Texture becomes important in ways that we sighted people tend to ignore. Most of my sensory nerves are damaged; texture, taste, aroma are somewhat meaningless terms to me—my own form of ‘blindness’. Thankfully, my eyes still work, even though they don’t work like they used to.

We aren’t what we think we are.

We aren’t yet what we can become.

 

 

 

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 66: Story

February 25, 2015

My new gallery at Artistically Social:

https://www.artisticallysocial.com/users/mjartscom/gallery/

Marty Jones’s Stock Media: http://www.pond5.com/artist/mjarts

I started this illustration career in order to tell stories…

KQ1From my 20 year old, unfinished children’s book, “The King’s Quest”

But life doesn’t always work out the way we plan… Rarely?
My own projects have almost always had to wait their turn until I take care of income-producing projects.

One of my favorite musical artists is Stephen Curtis Chapman, particularly in his recent, middle years…
“And it may feel like 40 long days in a hard driving rain
Or 40 years in a dry desert sand
But when He’s finished we will see a beautiful tapestry
And know that nothing has been wasted in the end
Oh, and God will, He will finish what He started
No thread will be unwoven
Nothing will be left undone
Every plan and every purpose
That He has will be accomplished
And God will finish what He’s begun”

From “Finish What He’s Started” Steven Curtis Chapman

The back side of a tapestry doesn’t always look the same as the front side:

tapestryUsed without permission from
http://www.textiletextbooks.com/textilemania/u_4/u_4_3.html

 Sometimes the story of my life feels like this:
yarnI forget where I found this image; my apologies.

The story of our lives.
Bible teachers for a hundred years have talked about how here on earth, we only get to see the back side of the tapestry of our lives; when we get Home, we’ll be able to see the front side; and we will be amazed.

This has been an unpleasant ‘week’ for me [it started last week]; pain and weakness to the point where I haven’t been able to concentrate on work. The FEAR [False Evidence Appearing Real] is that I would be stuck in that state—still functional, still able to pass time; and pretty-well only being able to pass time. I’ve been either sleeping on my waterbed fully-dressed, or lying on our well-insulated couch under layers of clothing and blankets. My sensory nerves are mostly shot; I rarely feel warm, I feel the absence of cold. With enough insulation, I can feel what probably is ‘hot’ but to me is pleasantly warm. The ‘warm’ signal will drown out some of the pain signals.  I soak through the inner layers of clothing with sweat, which I can’t feel until the dampness cools down.
I love watching movies, and our library is great—thousands of movies that I can watch for free. But I want to do more than watch movies for the next years of my life.

I want to do more with my life than merely pass time—this is one of the fears that most people my age and older come to. “Waiting for God” as one BritCom called it.

I want the story of my life to have meaning. I am coming to terms with the idea that my life won’t be the story I wanted it to be. When I’m more faith-filled, like right now as I’m typing, I can live in the hope that the mess on this side of the tapestry will look far different when I’m Home; and that the mess will tell a story. I believe that I am designed for Eternity, and that this life, even if it contains 40 years of pain, will only be an eyeblink in the span of Eternity.

…and that my reaction to the tapestry I will be shown will be more like this:

Audrey red

…without the dress. I’m a blue jeans kind of guy…

 

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 65: The Unexpected Journey

February 20, 2015

 

valley of the shadow_crop
More marketing: my new gallery at Artistically Social:
https://www.artisticallysocial.com/users/mjartscom/gallery/

When I started working for the Bureau of Buildings, in Portland, I still thought of myself as a contractor. I discovered that when someone asked the question, “how do I build this?” and I gave them my opinion as a contractor, they treated the information as “the City says I need to do it this way.” Some of that advice I gave was pure guesswork—‘if I was doing this, I’d start by doing…’ I learned it was very important to not give advice unless I was positive that the advice was sound, in a variety of situations; sometimes I didn’t really have the complete story. This awareness helped me to understand why Bureaucrats exist—if they don’t provide you with any useful information, they aren’t likely to be responsible for giving out bad information. Fourteen years after I started my gig with the City, I learned that my body could no longer stand the strain of ‘being responsible’ for all of the things that I chose to make my responsibility.

A long introduction to the idea that I don’t like to give random advice unless I know that the advice is accurate in most situations. When I started writing these blogs, it was as much for therapy as anything else. “Public Journaling”—journaling can be a good method of finding out how I think about my life. The Unexpected Journey is the subject of the illustration above. Larger versions can be seen at this link, and at this link.

Pain is something I know too much about; and at the same time, don’t know enough about. I’ve thought of creating a public ‘pain journal’ in hopes of providing some useful information for those who deal with chronic pain. The idea also seems very much like hubris—an arrogance that seems like extreme pride or self-confidence—the American problem, looking at the concept from a political perspective. Consequently, I haven’t started that blog page. I feel as though writing about pain is some sort of strange way of drawing attention to myself/feeling sorry for myself. Feeling sorry for oneself can be a deadly pastime.

40+ years of chronic pain, which apparently has no real diagnosis. It’s getting worse; and I’m getting weaker. Lots of doctors are clueless.

The myelin sheathing on my nerve fibers is disintegrating—sort of like the insulation on electrical wiring falling apart—as happens with old wiring. Lots of my nerve cells have shorted-out and no longer send out signals; it also appears that having no myelin sheathing on a nerve fiber creates pain. So, I have lots of pain and no visible injury. It’s important to learn the difference between pain and injury. Pain happens when your body doesn’t like what you are doing; it doesn’t necessarily mean something is injured. If something’s injured, it needs attention. If something hurts, and doesn’t get worse by activity, it becomes a ‘statement’ your body is making. You have a choice as to how you are going to acknowledge the ‘statement.’

Took a nap today; second nap this week. Feels wrong. I’m not the guy that takes naps. Another thing to add to my growing list of “I’m not the guy who…” Apparently I’m becoming that guy in spite of my best efforts.

Pain Management. I’ve tried lots of methods, some better than others. My goal has always been ‘feeling better to the point where I can ignore the pain,’ rather than self-medicating to point of feeling good. Soaking in a hot tub of water is a pretty effective method of creating “feel good”—however it has some practical difficulties for one who lives most of his life in a world of electricity and paper—the major physical components of my life…

Being creative on demand can be tough. I tend to feel exhausted most of the time; my most creative hours are late in the evening by DVD light. While being creative isn’t necessarily complementary to pain, the process of creating can be a good way to shove pain into the corners of my mind. I find that writing has become a way to find the mood for illustrations.

Judi Dench wanted to be a designer until she watched a particular production of a Shakespearean play—the stage was open, and the only ‘backdrop’ was a column in the center—as it rotated around it became a rock, or a throne, etc. She realized that she could never be that creative as a designer, and turned to acting.

My daughter-in-law manages A Children’s Place Bookstore and they are in the process of relocating. One of the posters on their wall is a drawing by Chris Van Allsburg; when I started this illustration gig, I wanted to be another Chris Van Allsburg. I have the technical skill; I lack the imagination. Hard to admit, but it’s about time that I do.

Judi Dench is losing her eyesight, and has no desire to stop acting. She’ll make it work.

One of my new favorite songs is “The Glorious Unfolding” by Stephen Curtis Chapman, and has the following lyric:

Lay your head down tonight
Take a rest from the fight
Don’t try to figure it out
Just listen to what I’m whispering to your heart

‘Cause I know this is not
Anything like you thought
The story of your life was gonna be
And it feels like the end has started closing in on you
But it’s just not true

There’s so much of the story that’s still yet to unfold
And this is going to be a glorious unfolding
Just you wait and see and you will be amazed
You’ve just got to believe the story is so far from over
So hold on to every promise God has made to us
And watch this glorious unfolding…

I’m watching.

River Boat PilotUnfinished copy of Norman Rockwell’s “River Pilot” left unfinished many years ago.

Thank you, David, for the Rockwell book.

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 64: Plagues and Bubbles

February 20, 2015

More marketing: my new gallery at Artistically Social:
https://www.artisticallysocial.com/users/mjartscom/gallery/

Cassiopeia A exploded“This new view shows a more complete picture of Cassiopeia A,  the remains of a star that blew up in a supernova event whose light reached Earth about 350 years ago, when it could have appeared to observers as a star that suddenly brightened. The remnant is located 11,000 light-years away from Earth [64,620,618,408,000,000 miles].” 
http://www.nustar.caltech.edu/image/nustar140219a

Enders Game, Starship Troopers, Wing Commander…

Take the best and brightest of our children, send them into space, and teach them to be warriors.

Don’t teach the best and brightest of our children to be Explorers and Discoverers; I mean what can there possibly be in this Universe that we need to learn?

 

CS Lewis feared that we humans would launch ourselves into space, and then begin to infect the rest of the galaxy with our brokenness.

We aren’t alone in the Universe; it’s statistically improbable [impossible]. There have been visitors to our planet from other parts of the galaxy. Why haven’t they ever come back to contact us? Perhaps it’s because we have The Plague. I often wonder if there are giant billboards in space, somewhere beyond Pluto’s orbit, billboards that say “Do Not Enter—Quarantined—Plague-Infected”

Lewis’ theme has been used in movies like “The Day the Earth Stood Still” [the original]—the peoples of Earth are given the warning, that if we don’t stop our stupid violence, there will be consequences, delivered by the civilized species of the Universe; and the robotic guardians they have created to control their own violent tendencies. Lewis also contends that there are two kinds of civilizations in the Universe—“fallen” and “not fallen”—two mostly-religious terms that rely on the concept of a Universal Morality. “Not-Fallen” civilizations in which Free Will is always used in what we would describe as a ‘moral’ manner. No harm comes to another through malice or greed. Those “Fallen” civilizations such as our own will also have their Redemption stories, stories similar to the story of Jesus, the Messiah. The Creator taking a physical form, and dying some form of cruel death as punishment for making the claim to be God. And by that death, individuals can be redeemed and made whole again.

We know that humans tend to believe in “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,” ignoring Gandhi’s prediction that such behavior will leave the world blind and toothless. Anyone who has raised children is aware that this behavior tends to be pre-programmed, along with a ton of other ‘behaviors’—the beating of our hearts, for example. Negative behavior can be curbed by training; it can also be intensified by training. When a child learns that they have the power of choice, the child learns the concept of “no,” the concept of disobedience.

Right now, half-way across the world from where I am sitting, there are some thousands of guys who believe that torturing and killing human beings on camera, in a brutal manner, is completely okay. That somehow by exterminating people, who apparently have committed the ‘crime’ of believing something different than they, will somehow bring about a betterment of society as they see it. That society will either live in constant fear of doing the wrong thing, or they will live as monsters themselves. The numbers of those guys increase daily, as we go about killing them off, raining fire from the sky. Kill a bunch, and a bunch more crop up. They need to be eliminated; but in eliminating them we become monsters ourselves because of the ‘collateral damage’. We kill innocent civilians when we kill the monsters, and we somehow justify it. Our plague. I don’t have the solution.

The Cross is about forgiveness, rather than punishment. I have The Plague. I’m a recluse, I prefer solitude to having company; I know that I need the input from other people to become more than I am now. I’ve never cheated on my wife of nearly 40 years; the only woman I’ve ever had sex with. The last time I hit someone in anger was something like 50 years ago [a note to my kids—this may not be entirely accurate]. My last traffic ticket was something like 20 years ago, when we shut down traffic on Mount Hood… I am not a good person; I am a cautious person. The Plague rules my heart; I don’t give my body permission to act out that Plague. But in my thoughts…

By the Grace of God I am not the monster I could be; and it’s not of my doing. I was brought to the understanding that I could act like a monster if I so chose; I simply haven’t had/allowed the provocation. I am no purer than any other human being. I learned that I don’t have to let the monster part of me be in control; I can give control of my broken self to the Creator that made me. I am forgiven for sometimes wanting to be that monster.

Some people choose to live in a ‘bubble’—protecting their minds and their hearts from the Plague that swirls around them. It’s easier to avoid the Plague when one avoids the places where the Plague lurks. They raise their children in a Plague-free environment to spare their children from the disease; often their children don’t appreciate the protection—it’s cool to be daring and adventurous.

I wander in and out of the ‘bubbles’—not that I’m daring or adventurous; I simply find the protected bubble to be confining. I also find the unprotected bubble to be made mostly of illusions. There is little there that lasts. I walk a broken road, and that road sometimes beats the crap out of my body. My soul is free, and that is the important part.

the universe in his hands_1

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 63: Small Town America

January 26, 2015

Freedom of Worship-dwg

My version of Norman Rockwell’s
“Freedom of Worship”

   I don’t know a lot about Small Town America; I’ve lived nearly all of my life in Portland, Oregon. Portland used to be much more like Small Town America; the site of my uncle’s farm is now 5 miles from a major shopping center, and a mile away from suburban housing. When I was a kid, the fruit and vegetable guy drove his truck through the neighborhood; milk got delivered to the houses in the neighborhood. My grandmother lived in a small town in Eastern Oregon, we went there frequently. If my father had had his plans for his life, he would have been a wheat rancher. Economics and human greed stole that dream from him. I was shipped out to Eastern Oregon on two occasions, in order to learn farm life.
I didn’t learn much.
I grew up a city kid.

Much of my time is invested in watching a lot of DVDs—background sounds while I draw; it used to be VHS videos. I’m back in a “West Wing” phase. The fictional characters are heroes of mine. One of their shortcomings is that they, too, are city kids. They don’t comprehend Small Town American life; and a large part of our country is Small Town America. I watched a faith-based movie tonight that reminded me of my past; and at the same time, our present. The faith-based lifestyle is much like Small Town Life. Churches are communities; the expectations for life and living are very similar.

I sometimes fear that urban America and Small Town America will never understand each other—the mindsets are so different. Ultimately the goals are very similar—life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness; how one achieves these things are very different, depending upon one’s perspective. I know that the faith-based way of life is a place where those differences can be met; it’s hard to communicate this when the urban world thinks that religion is the problem. I am able to see the difference between faith and religion; apparently others can’t see that as clearly.

I have adult children that apparently think I’m delusional. That I see something that doesn’t exist. This is the only explanation that makes any sense to me; I’m not annoyed by the notion, more a frustration that my life hasn’t been the example I’ve wanted it to be. I’m not done yet.

How do I effectively communicate the fact that there is a Creator, an Infinite, Eternal Creator who loves His Creation enough that He would enter time and space in order to show us how to live. A statement more than a question. Free Will and Arrogance have prevented that message from making any comprehensive headway in life for very long. But the Message keeps growing and expanding, in spite of our incomprehension.

I was a witness to a joyous event this weekend; the retirement from public service, of the man who is probably the most influential person in my life. He led me to Jesus. He didn’t drag, or push; he simply was himself, a person of integrity and caring. He believed something I found to be preposterous, and he shared that belief in me. His friendship was enough for me to follow him down a Path from which I have never left. Brad led me to a ‘burning bush’ [I often wonder how many people before Moses passed by that bush? Or was it lit for Moses alone?]; he led me to a “Damascus Road” where I got knocked of my horse… Some sort of metaphor. It wasn’t Brad alone; Brad had friends, his friends were sincere.

The Path hasn’t been fun in these last years. I don’t know what ‘last’ really means; I can’t remember this Path ever feeling ‘fun’ for very long. But I’m thankful, Brad, that you gave me the opportunity; even if you don’t know what you did.

 

More marketing: my new gallery at Artistically Social:
https://www.artisticallysocial.com/users/mjartscom/gallery/

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 62: Where is the Hope?

December 26, 2014

While I occasionally go through and reply to comments I receive, I don’t reply to every one of them. It’s possible that many of the comments I receive are well-crafted spam; my hope is that the ones from ad-generating sites are sincere; and that the sender has taken a break from generating ads to reading stuff  that I write.

Thank you for your comments, even if I don’t reply to them. My hope is that my writing is an encouragement to people who think about the same stuff I do; and who go through similar challenges. This life is too difficult to go through on one’s own.

angel.grief_mjIn the 1890s, noted American sculptor, William Wetmore Story, created
the Angel of Grief monument for the future grave site of he and his wife in Rome’s Protestant Cemetery.  A number of replicas of the Angel of Grief—also referred to as the Weeping Angel—can be seen around the country in various
cemeteries.

I know, a dreary image for Christmas Day…

I was reading yesterday about Christmas in Baghdad. Before we invaded Iraq, Christians, Jews and Muslims all celebrated the time of Chanukah and Christmas. They may have lived under a dictatorship, but they felt protected. During this season of Christmas, children ask their parents whether Santa will be able to find them, now that they have fled their homes…

“In 2003, when the Americans invaded, there were an estimated 1.5 million Christians living in Iraq. Today, experts say, there are fewer than 400,000, many of them on the run from the Islamic State.” http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/25/world/middleeast/iraq-christians-ousted-by-isis-celebrate-christmas.html?_r=1

Saint Nicholas does not forget the children of War; even though it must seem like it. Children mostly live in the present; the past and future are somewhat vague.

I believe it is important to realize at this time in our lives, that Mary and Joseph had been on the run from a King who was killing babies, when they found themselves at the manger in Bethlehem. A time probably similar to today, when viewed from outside of America.

Are we thankful today, in America, that our cities aren’t overrun by the horrors of war? Or do we expect that freedom from war is our birthright?

Do we in America realize that we are the cause, or major contributors, of many of the wars fought in other countries over the last 50+ years? Today, children are being killed by American drone strikes.

The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.
He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.
Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. [John 1:9-13]

Joseph and Mary were given information by an angel about the unplanned child that was to be born. Shepherds and more angels arrived to confirm the identity of the baby. In time, astrologers from the East confirmed the story again. The Light had come into the world.

And then we hear nothing about Emmanuel—God With Us—for something like 30 years. We hear that as a pre-teen, Jesus [God With Us] spent a lot of time in the Temple once, astounding the religious leaders of the day. There are stories about events during His life, but they haven’t been adopted into the Protestant Canon. One day Jesus arrived at the Jordan River, near the town of Bethany, where John the Baptist was baptizing followers of the Lord. John identified Jesus as the sacrificial Lamb of God. Jesus knew He was the Sacrificial Lamb from the beginning of His ministry, probably from before that time.

I have to admit, I’ve lived in a metropolitan city for most of my life; the concept of ‘sacrificial lamb’ doesn’t have a lot of personal meaning for me. I buy meat from the store; we no longer make sacrifices of animals to show reverence. However, there seems to be a sense of justice running through us that says ‘crime requires punishment’.

Jesus was not a Christian, He was Jewish. Most of His followers were Jewish. Jesus said that He hadn’t come to start a new religion; He’d come to heal the broken-hearted, the wounded, the ones who knew they weren’t sufficient on their own. He taught for three years, He was crucified, died and was buried. Three days later He rose again from the dead; and said that we too could rise from death.

Jesus’ followers, after Jesus had gone, were Jewish. Eventually they had to deal with the Gentile Problem. People were coming to hear about Jesus, and they weren’t Jewish; it was decided that the Gentiles did not have to become Jewish in order to follow Jesus, and did not have to follow all of the Jewish laws. This concept worked for something like 300 years; and then an Emperor made Christianity the official religion of his Empire. Things started getting messed up.

The Creator knew that The Church would change radically over the centuries, and that the presence of the Holy Spirit would be sufficient. We are not saved by Christianity. We are saved by the act of the Creator on the cross. Jesus did not claim to be a great moral teacher; Jesus claimed to be the Creator of the Universe. He either was the Creator of the Universe, or He was a lunatic. Or He was one of the most inventive and persistent stories ever made up.

Hope.

Theological debates abound over the nature of God and the Universe; I have my own heretical ideas.

I believe the eternal and infinite Creator of Universe became Man to give hope to the human race. We have a Creator that knows our weakness, who knows our insanity, who knows our greed.

The Creator of the Universe endured all that humans could do to demean the soul and the Spirit; and as He died on the Cross, He said, “It is finished.” All that was Needed was Done. The Gospels state that when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, waiting for His betrayal, “an angel from heaven appeared to Him and strengthened Him…being in anguish, He prayed more earnestly, and His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.” [Luke 22:43,44]

I am of the opinion that Jesus was given, in the Garden, the foreknowledge of all of the hatred and cruelty that would be done ‘in his name’ through the centuries that would follow; and this caused Him the anguish that only the Creator of mankind, in all its Grace, could feel. A human being can only sustain a certain amount of mental anguish without breaking; I am of the opinion that He only knew the True Significance of His impact on history at the end.

The Creator of the Universe has a vision for the human race that is so huge that He was willing to endure death on a Cross in order for an idea to get planted in the hearts and minds of Jesus’ followers.

The idea that the walls that divide people can come down; that people can make peace. The idea that Light had come into a very dark world; and that all who receive this Light can become children of God.

“…That’s what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.”

tree

 

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Chronicles in Ordinary Time 61: The World’s Frivolities

December 15, 2014

Creatio_of_Adam“So now, from this mad passion
Which made me take art for an idol and a king,
I have learnt the burden of error that it bore
And what misfortune springs from man’s desire…
The world’s frivolities have robbed me of the time
That I was given for reflecting upon God.”
― Michelangelo Buonarroti

Michelangelo Buonarroti did not know about plasma and Tesla coils, otherwise he would have realized that some form of energy probably passed between the Creator of the Universe and the simple human called Adam…

It’s easy to let the frivolity of the world [“a lack of seriousness; the quality or state of being silly; something that is unnecessary”] rob us of the time we’ve been given for reflecting upon the Creator of the Universe.

An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified [angels apparently don’t look like fat babies or cheery old men named Clarence]. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”

When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.”

There are too many in our culture who don’t realize that the Good News isn’t ‘good news’ at all to many; and it’s often because the bearers of the ‘good news’ are a real pain in the backside. The Good News has become bad news; usually because of someone’s behavior rather than the Message…The Good News is that the Creator of the Universe is able to join with your soul—that which makes you whole; helping you to become more than you are right now; and the process has nothing to do with lists of Naughty and Nice. The process is a Gift of Grace, the picture of all that you can be.

From Nadia Bolz-Weber’s “Sarcastic Lutheran” blog entry, The Slaughter of the Innocents of Sandy Hook:

“… the Epiphany story of Herod and infanticide reveals a God who has entered our world as it actually exists, and not as the world we often wish it would be. Because God’s love is too pure to enter into a world that does not exist.

“I wonder if we’ve lost the plot if we use religion as the place where we escape from the difficult realities of our lives instead of as the place where those difficult realities are given meaning.  Of course, there are many ways of pretending shit ain’t broke in ourselves and in the world, but escapist religion is a classic option since at church we have endless opportunities to pretend everything is fine.

“But when we find ourselves in a world where we see up-to-the-minute images of human suffering, we simply cannot afford any more fucking sentimentality in Christianity. Not one more soft-focus photo of a dove flying in front of a waterfall with an inspirational verse on a coffee cup, not one more over-produced recording of earnest praise music, not one more Thomas Kincaide painting. I don’t think Jesus would abide this ignoring of reality in favor of emotional idealism and I know for sure we cannot afford it. Not when we live in a world where suffering is as real as it was when Jesus was born and people are longing for something to help make sense of their suffering. Sentimental images of Santa kneeling at a manger are not helping us make sense of the world as it actually exists…”

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/nadiabolzweber/2014/12/the-slaughter-of-the-innocents-of-sandy-hook/#ixzz3LxVBuPbd

I tend to get grumpy at Christmas-time. My normal state-of-being tends to be one of melancholy. I’ve had a ‘melancholy temperament’ for all of my life. At Christmastime in America [soon it will start after Labor Day], everyone starts getting ‘perky’—people tend to emulate a ‘good will toward persons’ that is so hard to find the rest of the year. Christmas in America is Shopping. Black Friday. DoorBusters, Cyber Monday… I live in an economy that is based on consumption rather than production, so I shouldn’t be surprised that our idol today is a plastic card; and that ‘swiping’ is a good thing according to society. When I was a kid, back when dinosaurs ruled the earth, ‘swiping’ meant stealing. Given the nature of Wall Street, maybe the definition hasn’t changed all that much.

All of my adult kids are dealing with serious stuff today. Stuff that I am largely powerless to solve at all; stuff that they are largely powerless to solve today. A weight upon my mind that takes some of the sparkle out of the lights. Other years, I’ve had other excuses. I have a body that leaves me in pain most of my time; and I battle constant fatigue. I am in the midst of another set of medical experiments [perhaps frivolity] to see if there’s a solution for some of the pain and/or fatigue. Another crapshoot. I keep seeing Dr. McCoy ranting in Star Trek IV as he encounters 20th Century Medicine in a hospital.

“…the world’s frivolities have robbed me of the time that I was given for reflecting upon God.”

We are each the product of the joining of two microscopic cells. Two cells that subdivide and replicate in the same manner that all living creatures on earth grow. So much so, that one can see the reflection of that miracle throughout the stages of embryonic development. At some point in time, as we measure time in this world, humans alone, of all of earth’s creatures [said with some hesitation—there is much that we do not know about life on this planet], become able to connect with the Divine Idea that each of us is in some way ‘larger’ than the rest of the teeming life on this planet. Not size, but depth. We are self-aware, and we can make choices as to how we live our lives. We aren’t ruled entirely by ‘subroutines’ created within our neurological systems.

We Make Choices.

Everything that follows, whether or not we like the results, is mostly because humans make choices. Most of the time we are oblivious to the choices we make; oblivious because we fill our time with distraction. This doesn’t mean that the distraction isn’t worthwhile; it’s simply distraction from other stuff. Frequently, distraction from other distractions from other stuff.

We are each grown; we aren’t fabricated. We spend so much time fabricating stuff that we can’t easily see that we aren’t just another fabrication. We are miracles of that which is called Life. Most of what exists isn’t alive. Because we are grown and are affected by a genetic code that is subject to interruption, we sometimes develop inadequately. Sometimes we mess up our lives by the choices we make. And yet, even the most damaged among us can be the source of joy, happiness and wholeness for others; as we choose to learn to care for those who can’t care for themselves. For us, 2004 was the “Year of the Great-Grandmother”. She came to visit is on Christmas Day, 2003; her mind left a few days later; her body returned Home on Christmas Eve, 2004. A profound experience.

Tens of thousands of people will die today. Most won’t have planned for it.

Two to three times more people will be born today. None of them have planned for it.

Something like 2000 years ago, the Creator of time and space and the Universe entered time and space in the form of a single cell in the uterus of a teenage girl. The Creator of the Universe chose to be born into the womb of a homeless, unwed teenager; she and her fiancé fleeing from an insane king who ordered the deaths of all of the children in his realm, under the age of two.

This Man who has divided history in two lived an apparently unremarkable life as a child and young man; and then Lived An Incredibly Remarkable Life for about three years; He then was murdered by self-righteous fools. But that was only the beginning of the Story, because He Chose to die at the hands of self-righteous fools. He then rose from the dead—He came back to life—and said that we can, too.

The significance of Christmas is that if we listen really carefully, we can hear the Voice of the Creator. Where? Most anywhere. In my experience, hearing the Voice of the Creator happens most often when I don’t expect it, and can’t point it out to anyone. On top of that, it isn’t really a voice; it isn’t a sound that drowns out the ringing in my ears. It’s an internal awareness that is more important than the ringing in my ears.

“I ask you neither for health nor for sickness, for life nor for death; but that you may dispose of my health and my sickness, my life and my death, for your glory…
You alone know what is expedient for me; you are the sovereign master, do with me according to your will.
Give to me, or take away from me, only conform my will to yours.
I know but one thing, Lord, that it is good to follow you, and bad to offend you.
Apart from that, I know not what is good or bad in anything.
I know not which is most profitable to me, health or sickness, wealth or poverty, nor anything else in the world.
That discernment is beyond the power of men or angels, and is hidden among the secrets of your providence, which I adore, but do not seek to fathom.”
— Blaise Pascal

whales

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