To a young lady

I want so much to communicate to you. But I know the impossibility of that chance happening. I just want you to see hope. You seem to feel 10 layers deep under despair and recklessness. God has so much more to offer you. But I can't tell you about God's love because you don't see Him and certainly not me as His conduit. So, I can only hand it to the Creator to work the events in your world to lead you Home. But, I miss your laughter. Perhaps, you are just saving it for those happy times in your life that are yet to come. That is my prayer.

Inspiring connectedness

Connecting with people is not only strengthening but is inspiring as well. I heard today halfway around the world, from Chile. One message was in English, one in Spanish. I needed both messages. One was to inform me of a patented move on God's part, the other an installment of a man's life whom I am getting to know. Both strengthened my faith in humanity and the Creator. Both inspired me to continue doing what I'm doing, for it is rewarding. Events half a world away. I'm not really involved, but then yes I am.

Death's gates

I went to death's gates today. I listened to some music recorded about a year and a half ago by my son who has gone before me to see the father. The strains of the music were every bit the reminder of him that a picture would be. But the music stirred my soul in ways a picture cannot. I felt his fabric in his music. The strains took me right to death's gates so that I could see over them. It was not dark behind the gates as some have depicted the next world. It was bright on the other side, full of inspiration and music and peace. I will soon catch up to my son. But for now, I have inspiration, music, and peace that leak through the gate. And anytime I try to see over the gate into the land it bars me from, I see brilliance, not darkness.

Safe speeds

Say it isn't so—not the movie title but our inability to move through life at safe speeds. I know of a teacher who sometimes chastises students for not updating their knowledge to match their new cognitive stage of maturity. They have a third grade memory of a concept, but a body that is in a high school or college classroom. They need to upgrade their knowledge to high school or college level since their bodies are verification that they really are that age. As we pass from one decade of life to the next or as we progress from one experience of life to the next, I see people continue with an experience level or knowledge level that remains stuck or connected to an experience or knowledge base behind where they have been brought. We resist upgrading. Going to slow (lagging behind) and going to fast (acting ahead of experience) make us dangerous drivers through life. Just as the driving down roads in a car require our close attention to stay alive, so adaptability in life requires equal amounts of attention to drive at safe speeds so that we won't damage ourselves or those around us.

Little Phrases

A colleague commented today on ideas that I had expressed to her. I try hard to speak from a factual base not a notional or conjecture base. She lumped all my ideas together and called them "little theories." She very quickly felt the need to repair her remark. " I didn't mean 'little'," she said. I said I understood, but I lied. Her stray utterance captured her true thought. I fully understand the function of a diminuitive in an utterance. At least now I know where I stand with her. I'm that dreamer whose ideas are impractical or worse, I'm that person who likes to think more highly of himself than he really is. Now I know. God forgive me when I act like that. God forgive her if I am not really that way. God forgive us all because we don't know how to interact with each other genuinely.

Sometimes

The word "sometimes" represents life so well. Life is so much the roller coaster—up on it at times and down on it at others. My life fully reflects the twists and turns, the fastballs, curve balls and sleepers that life produces. The sometimes life is hard to convey to others who want me to show consistency. They, of course also lead a sometimes life, but want more from others. I wish more people understood the somtimes nature of life. A person wouldn't tell a lion not to growl or to become a vegetarian. Why won't people understand the bumpy ride through life that all of us are taking. More understanding is what I would like to see. I would like to see that others know that life is unlike "print-on-demand" publishers. It is like the demanding life of Wall St. brokers. The Dow is up and down—like life—sometimes.

Park walks

Nearly every day I walk twice in the park near my house for a mile and a quarter each time. I look forward to these walks and am generally disappointed if I miss one of the times for some reason or another. This time started about a year ago when I was talking to God about taking my son to be with him. The walks have had healing power in that God has given me an understanding over the last year that I can trust him wholly for knowing how everything fits into the grand scheme. After a year of talking with God about my own understanding, he kindly nudged me to use the time for bringing others in prayer to him. I ask God simply to lead them home to himself. It has been amazing to me to offer people to God so that he can lead them home. I have not really acted in that capacity ever before because I had people to see, places to go. I always thought prayer time was for the infirm or elderly who had scads of time to dedicate to that sort of thing. Certainly I was exempt because I was searching for God in other ways or working hard to present my own children to God through much activity. Nowadays the park walk keeps me going. It gives me good health. It gives me time to say, "Lead me home" to the maker of all. Meeting God in a park walk - nearly every day - has envigorated an otherwise mundane existence. At 20, I would have said, "You're crazy. I don't meet God in parks." At 30, I would have said, "I will raise my children for you by taking them everywhere. At 40, I would have said, "I will be glad to promote God through my own success." At 51, I say, "I look foward to meeting God in the park. The most comfortable I've ever been in my faith is in the park - asking God to lead people home. So be it.

Pools

The pool in my back yard is in great need of maintenance. I plan to get to that in about 3 hours. In the meantime I have to look at the eyesore it has become in the middle of an otherwise nice back yard. My life at this time is analogous to the pool. Right now it is in a little disarray. Years I have worked on this part or that part of my life so that most of the time it is in decent working order. But today I don't see it that way. I plan to get to that also in about 3 hours.