May there always be a pirate under your Christmas tree!

I don't know his name. I do know that he is young and adventurous. He ran away to sea. I think he joined the navy actually and then deserted and joined a pirate crew where, he figured, he had a a chance of fair treatment. The thing is, I don't think he is nearly desperate enough to be a ruthless pirate. I think maybe he got on the captains bad side for being too soft and was marooned. Some of the other pirates were very fond of him and so they managed to get him left on a island that had some trees and other useful resources. They also seem to have left him a barrel of rum or something and a few other useful items. And so you see him now: Never one to simply resign himself to his fate, he has built a raft and befriended a parrot. (I'll have to think of a name for the parrot too.) They are a very cheerful couple. The two of them spied a ship that dropped anchor off the coast of their island. They watched while a crew come ashore to take on water and planed to stow away aboard that night. It's a rather crazy thing to attempt. He's one man and his parrot, who will undoubtedly give him away. He is armed well but it won't do him much good being so badly out numbered. He's a pretty bad situation. If the navy catches him he'll be in BIG trouble and he's also become an outcast among the pirates. He doesn't seem too concerned about it though. What sort of people are on that ship? There's a story in that somewhere.


I got this great little pirate figure from CC along with the raft. I see these little guys in toy stores all the time. We were never really interested in them before cause we like Playmobile and it's just better not to get into too many little things like that. I think they're pretty neat. There are all sorts of people in all kinds of poses. There not as versatile since they can't move so they don't appeal to kids in that way. If you have a knight raising his battle ax you have hard time playing that he is attending a feast or courting a damsel. But other wise they do what a good action figure (can it be an action figure if it has no moving parts?) toy should do; each figure has character enough in the design so suggest a personality and a story. Each face is just a little different even if it came out of the same mold. Even if they are not so good for acting out a story with at least you know they have one. I think they should do historical figures like Civil War soldiers and western frontier settlers. I really like the fantasy theme they have going now though.
You are never too old for a good toy. Especially pirate toys. One should always have at least one pirate under one's Christmas Tree. This fellow will be living happily on my shelf now. Up with Maleny's Treasure Island and my scull candle holder and other little oddments. I like him there. Maybe there will be other little characters to join him later. Thanks C.C.
Anyone have an idea for a name?

Merry Christmas!!

God thinks more of us than we think of ourselves.
We can see our past and how dark it is. We can see the way we are now, and it's pretty bleak. And from where we are the future looks a bit dreary too. But God has hope for us. He has so much hope for us that He became one of us so that we could have hope too.
God must think an awful lot of us!
Heaven met earth in a manger. Kneel in awe in the stable. God, made weak and little, sleeps in the hay. From here to the cross is just a tiny fraction of the love of God for His creation. Now we have hope of heaven.

May your Christmas be blessed with much love and hope for the coming year.

Merry Christmas!

Dreaming of a white Christmas

I don't believe it. It looks like we will have a white Christmas after all. We never get snow on Christmas! The weather here is very contrary. Temperamental might be a good word. We get some snow in November. A few inches and it melts in early December. Then we get more snow and every one get excited cause it's really deep and it gets below zero at night and sometimes the thermometer doesn't rise above ten degrees all day. "We'll have a white Christmas!" everyone says. Then is warms up and rains. The snow melts in record time and by Christmas there is no sign of it. Everything is greenish-grey. Then it snows for real in January and gets really cold again and the snow never melts completely until March or so.
But one thing that you can always predict about the weather is that it's unpredictable. There have been a few years where there was snow. Those are the years you remember the best so it feels like there is always snow. So unless there is a sudden heat wave between this morning and tomorrow night, it appears we will have snow for sledding and fort building and snowball fights on Christmas morning. Karen is Happy.

More colors!

You remember Jessica? This is her friend Catherine. (Also wearing a black sweatshirt cause I was a mean stage manager and made everyone wear black long sleeves even when it was eighty-five degrees out side) I am not as pleased with her face. But I think I did better on her hair. As usual I got a bit lazy in some sections. That must be the hardest part for me; staying with is till it's perfect and not just trying to get it done after the fun parts are done. This color paper was harder to work with cause it did not blend in with her skin tone. I kind of like it that way. Her face and hair have such warm tones that it's nice to to have the cooler background for contrast.

In other news I made myself a pair of gauchos this week. I just went down stairs and found some left over fabric from Clara's formal (which she still has not finished) and got to it. I had a good time. The finished product was not too bad. They are very pirate-ish. I want to dress up. We let s college student borrow our dress up clothes and I don't know if we will ever get them back. This is very tragic cause my pirate boots were in there and so was my whole gypsy outfit. *SOB* I'll get them back some day.

I'm too catholic to understand this

I've always sort of wondered about those Christians who opt not to celebrate Christmas. I've never had their position explained to me.Thanks Leah. It still doesn't make much sense to me. I guess that's because I don't believe in that whole Sola Scriptura thing. (I believe it to be un-biblical :P)

I think God knows we need to celebrate some times. We are told to rejoice hundreds of times throughout the Bible for various reasons. I think the Incarnation is a pretty good reason to celebrate even if there is nothing particularly special about Dec. 25th. Maybe Jesus was not born on the 25th but it doesn't really matter. He was born. God became man and we chose to remember and honor that moment on December 25th (and also on March 25th on the feast of the Annunciation). In fact, aside from the Death and Resurrection, I can't think of a better reason to be merry.

Then there is all that talk about how so many of the traditions and the very day the feast is celebrated are fundamentally pagan and should be shunned. I don't hold to that at all. The pagans who converted in the early church were no less Christians than the ones who were raised in the faith. Those who bowed before the sun god now bow before the child in the manger. The fitting traditions that honored the pagan god now honor the True God. Sol himself bows. In Mexico there are churches that are covered with carvings and paintings of the Saints and the Apostles all worshiping Christ. Right in there among them you can see the old Aztec gods worshiping Our Lord right with St. Peter and the Archangel Gabriel. Of course the Aztec gods are myth and Christ is real and living but the symbol remains. All these symbols that were precious to the pagans are baptized and welcomed into the Church, redeemed, made new and given new and truer meanings. You see the pagan traditions like the Christmas tree and the holly because they are part of Christ's triumph. Christ has conquered these pagan traditions and made them His. The same holds true for St. Valentine's day and St. Patrick's Day. These are not days than commemorate events in Christ's earthly life but they are still worth celebrating. St. Valentine gave us one more example of true love by dieing for Christ, Patrick brought the light of Christ the darkness of pagan Ireland. They are Christian feasts no matter how the world tries to secularize them. It is fitting that we should have a Christian feast of sacrificial love in place of there pagan feast of love. The pagan feasts in late December celebrated the end of the darkest days of the year. The sun triumphs and the days grow longer. It is fitting that on this day we should celebrate the Light coming into the world, His triumph and the dark days of the world coming to an end.

And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe [Christmas] has done me good and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!

A Christmas Carol ~ Charles Dickens.

Marry Christmas

Oh the wonderful forgetfulness of my dear Jesus!

This story is told about one of the great Saints but I can't find the book I read it in and I don't remember which Saints it was (St. Margaret Mary something or other, I think) so we will call her Mary. She was a nun so we will call her sister Mary.

Sister Mary had a beautiful and deep prayer life. Sometimes Jesus would visit her in visions. One day He appeared to her and told her "I'm sending you a priest to be your spiritual guide and confessor. He's a very good friend of mine." Sister Mary was delighted and the next day, when a new priest came to the convent she greeted him happily and told him about her vision. The priest was skeptical at first. He wanted to be sure that sister Mary's visions were authentic. So he told her to bring him a sign. "Ask Our Lord what my last mortal sin was." So sister Mary went into her cell and prayed and Jesus appeared to her and she asked Him as the priest had told her to.

Jesus smiled. "I don't remember." He said

By this the priest knew that sister Mary's visions were authentic.

~*~
I think it's a pretty sweet story even if I can't give you a source.

Happy Feast day!

It's the feast of Our Lady of Guadeloupe!

"Let not your heart be disturbed. Do not fear that sickness, nor any other sickness or anguish. Am I not here, who is your Mother? Are you not under my protection? Am I not your health? Are you not happily within my fold? What else do you wish? Do not grieve nor be disturbed by anything." (Words said by of Our Lady of Guadalupe to Juan Diego)

Every one needs a mother.
Happy Feast day!

The Wow List

"Two things are infinite; the universe and the stupidity of man. And I'm not sure about the first one." ~ Supposedly, Einstein, but I don't really know. It's a good quote anyway.

I was standing back stage just before a show began. There was a crowd of actors and crew members all crammed into the wings and behind set pieces and up against the walls. We were waiting for the stage manager to cue the overture. I was standing next to the star of the show, Andrew, and on the other side of one of the big black curtains that make up the wings, an actor named Stephen was standing playing idly with his prop. I was talking to Andrew about the movie Willow. Willow is an unholy combination of Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings, and the George Lucas part is very strong, obviously, because it's his movie. George, buddy, stick with Sci Fi. It made my Wow List, I told Andrew. Not knowing what exactly a Wow List was, Andrew asked, "Can I be on your Wow List?" I told him that he would have to do or say something that proved the infinite capacity of man for oddity and, or stupidity. At that moment Stephen came around to our side of the curtain. "Look guys!" He whispered loudly. He stood with his back to the curtain and slowly leaned back on it until it gave way and he started falling backwards. "It's like a trap door! Only in the wall!" He told us excitedly. Andrew and I looked at each other.

Wow.

Actors and other theater people probably make my Wow List more than anyone else. Like the crew member who left the theater that night with a piece of green duct tape hanging off the tip of his nose. All you can say is 'Wow.' It's a kind admiration. It's admiration that someone can actually take these things seriously. Or admiration that someone thought up something like that and actually said it out loud. Or admiration that it all makes sense to someone. Most of the time they are things that just made me laugh for one reason or other.
For example:

I always wondered why and when Frosty the Snowman will come back. And will he be accompanied by King Arthur. If King Arthur wants to come back, more power to him but does Frosty have to come too?

The Arabian Nights (or maybe it was those Indian fairy tales I read) are full of things that I cannot hope to comprehend. It's probably because I'm a westerner. The East and it's culture are mysterious and illogical to me. I love it. If ever you are about to be in a situation where you are going to be terribly embarrassed, the best thing to do is to simply kill yourself. Makes perfect sense to them. Wow.

The Book of the Dun Cow was a really good book, actually. I am very fond of many things on my Wow List. Dun Cow was a very religious book about love and temptation and leadership and following God's will and a few dozen other wonderful things. But it was about chickens. I can't explain. I don't know. It worked for the author. Good for him. WOW.

Then there are things on my Wow List that I just wish I had thought of first.
That's a creation of Millie's. She's Brilliant. Wow.

It makes life interesting. God must have a sense of humor.

"Positively Three-ish"

If you dig around enough in my closet, you will run across a slip of paper that reads:

Resolve: Blond haired, blue eyed four year old ought to take precedence over latin homework."

After which there is an outline for a speech. The speech had nothing to do with getting out of latin homework. That was a joke on my debate teacher who also taught the latin class. I was in debate and speech class in what (I think) would have been my sophomore year of high school if anyone had been paying attention. I didn't get very far in building a debate case but I did pretty well with the speech part.
So here I am, reminiscing about my waisted youth. Just kidding. I thought I would reconstruct my speech as a blog and add some old pictures. Here is a sample of true Splatness. I hope you enjoy it.

September 2004
~*~

My little sister, Maleny is a space alien. I have been observing her behavior for the last three years and have decided that she comes form a highly developed culture on another planet. She simple does not display normal earthling behavior.
After three years of living among us her tongue is still unused to our language but easily uses words that many adult earthlings struggle to pronounce.
She is undisturbed by the things in our culture that ought to be frightening to a three year old.
I have caught her performing what I can only describe as alien rituals that obviously have great meaning in her culture.

J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasy masterpiece The Lord of the Rings is filled with strange words. Professor Tolkien was a great linguist and created several complex languages for the people in his stories to speak. It gives the book a wonderful believability. The languages are beautiful and diverse but for a person who is just learning to handle english, they do not roll easily off the tongue. It has taken my other sister and me about a year to get all the names of people and places pronounced correctly. They feel strange and awkward until you have used them for a while. Maleny has them down quite solidly. In fact she has more trouble with english words than with Tolkien's Elvish. She can't pronounce my name, and refuses even to try. I am accustomed to answering to a variety of babyish renditions of my name. Maleny refuses to use any of them. She refers to me, with superb diction, as Faramir; her "Brover Faramir" actually. All of my family members and several of my friends have been given names from Tolkien's Elvish. She introduces herself as Legolas. Obviously the language Maleny spoke at home was very similar to Tolkiens Elvish. Perhaps the professor even had contacts on other planets. Maleny won't say.

Here she is using her bow and arrow. I'm assuming that the laws of physics are a little different on her planet. As are the laws of attraction. Let me show you.

Meet Saruman and Grima, nicknamed Wormtongue (Yes, Maleny can say those names quite easily) You might want to click on the photo to make it big so you can take a close look at these fellows.
They are rather shady looking characters if you ask me. If I met them at the bus plaza I would probably make a point not to make eye contact. Not the sort of boys you want your little sister hanging out with. You don't want to think about how long it's been since Grima washed his hair. Saruman's fingernails will give you nightmares. Even in a fantasy world they are not the sort of people you want standing where you can't seem them. Anyone from our planet can see that they mean trouble. Most small girls I know would be rather shy of these guys. At Maleny's age I would have been quite terrified by them and averted my eyes whenever possible.
You may notice that these particular action figures have seen better days. The tip of Wormtongue's nose has apparently been rubbed off, or drawn on with a black sharpie, or something. Saruman's staff is a bit bent. The reason for this is that Grima and Saruman have spent a great deal of time smashed together in Maleny's back pack. She takes them everywhere. She is a bit panicked if they are not with her. She will immediately opt to leave any of the nice, respectable action figures home if there is no room for Saruman and Wormtongue. They go to church with her and at home she carries them around in her arms. She talks to them. I hope they don't talk back but you never know.
I can only conclude that the aspects of appearance which tell us that these two figures are bad guys do not imply the same evilness on Maleny's planet.

Lastly there are certain behaviors that seem to have no explanation. She acts in a manner totally devoid of sense of propriety. I have caught some of them on my camera.



For your consideration:
Why does Maleny carefully draw on herself with markers? (I will make no comment on the child's head dress in this picture.) It is a common practice with her. One theory is that she wants to be in the water. Knowing that in our culture unnatural color on the surface of the skin will necessarily end in a good scrubbing, she marks her body with bright colors to draw attention that she could only get from verbal communication in our language otherwise and, as I have pointed out, she feels a little overwhelmed by our vernacular. This theory seems overly simple to me. She is too careful with the markers. The tattooing of the face and body is a fascinating process to watch. The slow uncapping of the marker is very ceremonious. And the very deliberate placement of color and shape bring me to believe that there is a pattern, perhaps beyond earthling comprehension, in the marks she makes. I conclude that this marking and washing are part of an alien ritual.
Why does she dress in news paper and dance in the front yard? She seems to have a defiant disregard for clothing. Or our clothing at least. Dance seems to be an important art form in her culture. I have posted multiple pictures of Maleny dancing in this blog. She has spent a lot of time doing it since she was barely walking. We can assume that Maleny comes from a very far advanced society and they have obviously sent her here for a purpose. I believe Maleny is sending a message to her fellow Aliens. The look on her face is triumphant with a touch of smugness. She seems to be saying "You just wait and see what I have in store for you!"

They are planning a hostile take over.

So if you happen to see this child running around with a laser gun don't be fooled by the sweet little smile and the big innocent eyes.

She's not to be trusted.












Meanwhile, I'll keep an eye on this guy too. He looks suspicious.

The perfect food

Would you look at that! I'm blogging about food again!

~ Soft squishy texture but not chewy
~ blendable in smoothies
~ Great source of protein (it's just darn healthy)
~ Mild refreshing taste
~ Great barbecued
~ Goes well with practically anything
~ Come in a wide variety of textures...
~ Slippery, silken, melt in your mouth... (for blending in smoothies or eating strait)
~ Or the firm variety ( for barbecue, finger-food, or in a salad)
~ The stares and odd looks people give you when you tell them your favorite food is...





(Are you ready for this?)






Tofu!


You just don't know what you're missing, Millie! :D

"Traditions, Traditions!"

Families are funny. Extended families are the bomb! My mom and my dad's side's of the family are so different from each other that it's a wonder that they could produce two people who fit so well together. I guess that's the great thing. You have a family of people who all fit together, each one is unique but they fit, and then they grow up and get married. My dad went off and found my mom. She fits perfectly with him but she's nothing like the rest of my dad's family. All of my dad's siblings did this. And there are eight of them. So this week, eight beautiful and unique families gathered at my grandparents house to celebrate the life of my grandma. It's been over ten years since all of them have been together. There was one cousin, one aunt (married in) and a few cousins-in-law missing but all grandma's children were there. It was an interesting and varied group, knit together by love. I looked around the room and I knew every one's name. A few people had to ask what my name was but that didn't matter. Everyone seemed relaxed. What ever happens for the rest of the year, however little we have in common otherwise, we still belong to each other. We have a few precious shared memories and they pull us together. When one person cries, it's hard not to cry with them.
There were tears in plenty. And though they hurt they were not a bad kind of tears. You can't bring up old wounds or inflict new ones at a funeral. You can only heal them. There was much grieving and much healing. And a healthy does of laughter and good times mixed in.
All the family traditions were present and accounted for. We gathered round the piano down stairs and had a wonderful time singing and playing. The sound of acoustic guitar and the voices of my uncles bring with them memories that I was not even aware of. I was humming along and singing when I knew the words and my sister leaned over and asked wonderingly "You know this song?" Well, I don't think I could tell you what it's called and I don't know all the words but the sounds form on my tongue and the notes are deep inside me, easily accessible, as music always is. It's the sound of a time that my younger sisters don't remember, when some of us lived closer together and came up to Omak more often. Suddenly I remember siting on the floor and listening. It's part of my childhood and I'll always have those songs in me.
Some of us cousins compared games we all played in Grandma and Dada's basement. It turns out everyone slid down the stairs on their backsides at one time or other. My sisters and I were the only ones who played Pooh Sticks at the bridge over the ditch in the orchard. So we shared that tradition with some of the other cousins and their children. How could you not play Pooh Sticks? It would be like not sliding down the stairs.
Every one had a camera or three. The boys all talked computers and cars. Every one brought something special and every one was there to truly BE with one another. I sat and eat and talked with cousins I had never spoken more than three words to before. A funeral forces you to remember that the chance to be together comes only rarely and lasts only a short time. Everyone wanted to be a family. The eight and more families meshed again into one big family.
I love funerals.

Grandma is proud.

WeBLOG!

They tell me it's supposed to be a "Web Log" and that got shortened to "Blog". That's so very american. "It's too long. Two syllables is too long and it's too descriptive. We need a shorter, sillier sounding word that makes no sense unless you know the story behind it. Then we can make up a whole new meaning for it and not follow any of those rules that set definitions give you." Yep.
Does that happen with other languages? It seems very typical of 'American' english.
So, a log of my web surfing today would be very boring but I don't have to follow any rules here. It's My blog after all. So I'm going to tell you about some sights I have book marked.

I stumbled on this sight because I wanted to know what a hawk cry sounds like. (I think I was describing it in a story and felt like a cheater cause I've never actually heard one. I feel bad when I can only take everyone else's word on what something is like. Purple mountains, for example. I would never use that description cause I had never seen a mountain look purple. Pink mountains I have seen, but not purple. I saw my first purple mountain this summer when we went hiking. Now I can use that in good conscience.) The Bird Guide let's you look up all sorts of birds and hear what they sound like and learn a bunch of other stuff about them too. My sisters spent about an hour on this the other day listening to all kinds of ducks. It's fun to explore.

And
The American Chesterton Society
This is a sight dedicated to my sisters fiance. Yes, she is aware that good old Gilbert is already married (not to mention dead.) Dana's a little odd. She just really admires his writing and we joke that she's going to marry him. He's also the creator of Fr. Brown; a shamefully unknown detective rivaled only by Sherlock Holmes. I'm a little bias I guess.
I really like This Essay he wrote too. What a guy.

There you go. You know, I actually got on here to type about something else. What was it? Now I'm too tired. It's late. Families. That was it. I was going to type about how cool it is to be inseparably connected (willingly or not) to a group of people, even if they live hundreds of miles away. I end up typing a lot about that, don't I. Almost every one has one so maybe it's not too boring since people can relate. But it's weird to type about your family when you never know which members of it are reading. *Waves to cousin Seth* Maybe tomorrow.

Lunch

Another unpublished bit of nonsense from this summer. I have cabin fever and refuse to post about it. What sort of egotistical person thinks every one wants to hear about their day and how annoying their little sisters are? But I have to post something! So I'm wasting your time with silly rants about my lunch and how annoying my little sisters are. Because there's a BIG difference. Enjoy.
~*~
I hate food. I'm one of those weird people who forget to eat lunch cause there are so many other things they would rather be doing. I don't like to eat. I was really hungry today. I only had one bowl of Rice Checks for breakfast. Rice Checks are like glue. If, as a child, you leave a milk saturated Rice Check on your chair over night, it will still be there when your kids eat their first Rice Check. It sticks to your teeth and becomes a natural (sort of) filling. There was a spoon that had a Rice Check stuck to it and it went through the dishwasher four times before some one finally got out a chisel and hammered the stupid breakfast cereal off. I only felt like eating one serving of glue this morning. By 11:30 I was starving. I guess it doesn't stick to your stomach very well. It's amazing how your refrigerator can be full of nothing to eat. With all the differing tastes in my family I have grown accustom to making compromises. I have three younger sisters who are picky and they are much more assertive than I am about food details. I pick my battles. I guess I'm picky too. But It's not that important to me whether my milk is 2% or non-fat. So i always loose the food battle. There is nothing to eat. Lots of food but nothing to eat. Mom is nagging me about how I need to pray for the grace to enjoy food enough to be creative about it. Maybe I will have a cheese sandwich. I ought to have something more than that. I need a vegetable. i don't get enough greens. We have pickles. Cheese and pickle sandwich. Oh look there are tomatoes on the counter. At this point my ten year old sister is yelling to mom that I've gone crazy.
"She's making herself a cheese and pickles sandwich!!"
Mom: "Maybe you should just have a tuna sandwich."
Yeah. It looks like I'm coming up with a tuna sandwich without the tuna. So much for being creative.
It took me forty minutes to make my sandwich. Five Minutes to make some sickeningly sweet strawberry kiwi juice. One minute to figure out that I don't like Strawberry kiwi juice and to add fizzy water and less than a minute to decide that the fizzy water was flat. Than I eat my sandwich and tried to enjoy it. It's just not worth the trouble. I guess if you spend enough time on it, you will be so hungry that you won't care what it tastes like.

"Happiness is having a sister."

Some people who have sisters will disagree with me, and the rest don't need to be told. Sisterhood is a very special bond. Of course there is a universal language of womanhood that men are always being bewildered by, but there is also a kind of communication that goes on between sisters and very close girl friends. A sister keeps track of things about you that your mother will forget. Next to God, no one knows me better than my sisters. A sister is the kind of friend who will eat your chocolate cake for you.
"And.... this is a GOOD thing?"
No really; that could really be a good thing if, like me, you don't like chocolate. So there.

In memory of...

On my seventh birthday a box was delivered to my house from Omak. I opened it and buried my face in the soft folds of hand stitched shapes and colors. The smell was what I wanted most. It was the smell of Grandma's house on the hill. Grandma made a quilt for every one of her children and grand children. I had one with bunnies on it when I was a baby and she even made me a little one for my doll. Now I had a full sized one for my bed. A big warm piece of grandma to snuggle under at night. I would bring the corner where she had neatly stitched her name and the date up to my face and lie against it and breath deeply. It was almost like being in Grandma's house.
Grandma and Dada's house was on a hill in the middle of an apple orchard. From her kitchen window you could see across the orchard to the great hills surrounding the Okanogan Valley. Standing on the deck at the back of the house the air was chill and breezy. Grandma would sit on the bench swing with a grand child on each side. There was a long cord tied to the deck railing behind the swing with a spool on the end. This Grandma would pull to make the swing rock gently. But she was more often to be found in the living room. She would sit on her rocking chair by the fire with Tonka the husky lying on his blanket. There were stories to read. Some little grandchild would crawl onto her lap bringing Uncle Remus tales. We loved to hear her read the story of Brer Rabit and the Tar Baby.
Gradma was a famous cook. She had diabetes. So she couldn't eat much sugar but she made fabulous cakes at birthdays and wonderful meals of every kind. "It is a great act of love to make a meal for some one which you yourself cannot eat." My uncle would remind us. It has been so long since I've tasted her cooking that I hardly know what it was like but I remember that it was good and I never worried too much about not liking things.
Grandma was proud and dignified. She moved with a slow grace and and kept her house with proud precision. She was an old school home maker. She and Dada had raised two girls and six boys together! One felt very cared for when you stayed with her.
Some years ago she moved to a nursing home. Alzheimer's could slow her down but it could not rob her of her dignity.
She died yesterday morning. After so much suffering it's finally finished. Just days after the feast of All Souls, she finished the race.

May the souls of the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace.

What are mothers for?

Mom found me. Okay, I told her my address. She's been wanting to know for a long time. She has not been nagging or anything. She knows that doesn't do much good. She just asks now and then what I'm writing and when I say I'm working on my blog she asks if she will ever get to read it. So I finally gave her my address.
(Hi, Mom! *waves*)

Then she sat down and e-mailed someone. She wouldn't tell me who. I suspect relatives, maybe the sisters at the Poor Claire Convent. Maybe I should add a link to their web sight. *waves* I don't mind really. It's only mildly annoying to have your parents brag about your blog as if it was incredibly profound and entertaining. The only thing is that now I don't know who's reading this. Mom could have sent it to anyone and his neighbor. I can't imagine that no one reads it anymore. This is more than mildly annoying. It's almost distressing.
Maybe I'll crawl back into my shell.
Maybe I should ask every one to sound off.
Actually, I don't really want to know who's reading this.
Maybe I should have made mom swear to secrecy.

*Sigh*

Hi every one. This is my blog. I hope it was worth your time clicking on the link.

Observations on a summer morning.

I was reading the 'off internet blog' today and found this. It's from this summer when I took my younger sister to swim lessons every morning. I didn't post it before mostly cause I had no profound comments or conclusions about it. It was just something that interested me those morning. It's a little scary. And sad. But there's something beautiful about that person. I don't think I did her justice at all.
God bless her.

~*~
"Where's your car?" Asked the elderly lady sitting quietly in her wheel chair. Her voice is clear. It has little of the crackly quality that so often comes with age. She speaks quickly but in a low unconcerned voice.
"In the parking lot, Jenny." is the reply from the woman sitting on the bench across from her. I assume this is her daughter but find it odd that she should call her by her first name.
"Are you going to push me to the exit door... in the wheel chair?" Jenny questioned further.
"When it's time. It's not time. Watch the kids."
"I will."
She stares through the window between the painted sunflowers that decorate it. On the other side there is a long blue pool with red stripes. There is no one in it. On one side there are benches full of people. They are talking but we can't hear them through the glass. The water ripples do not hold Jenny's attention for long.
"Where's your car?" She asks again.
"Watch the kids, Jenny"
"I will." She's doesn't. She pulls out some chap stick. "Put chap stick on both lips." She says. "Their dry." She laughs. It's a slow low laugh, cut into little pieces; "Yeha-ha-ha Yeha-ha-ha." Then suddenly, "I'm done."
The woman sitting across from her smiles indulgently.
The hall is narrow and long. At the other end there are big windows and doors just out of sight around a corner. Jenny stares at them. A young woman pushing a stroller comes walking towards us. She smiles at Jenny who follows her with two bright eyes.
"Hi." She says with little enthusiasm.
"Hi there, how are you?" The woman says as she sits down. It's politeness; she tends to her baby without waiting for a response.
"Pretty good for an old lady." Jenny laughs again. "Yeha-ha." She stops suddenly. "Chew my gum." She mutters. "Good flavor. Good for me. I'm gonna be eighty on June thirtieth."
At our end of the hall there are two big soda machines. One with Gatorade and one with bottled water. Then a large room opens out with halls branching off it. Jenny sits with her back to these.
"I'm done. Where's your car?"
"It's not time yet. Watch the kids."
The kids are in the pool now. There is much movement; splashes and kicking. The children kick or paddle from the wall to their instructors on little yellow boards or on white foam noodles. We can see them splashing and yelling but we can't hear anything. The hall is quiet except for a few toddlers (too young to swim) who run their little cars along the floor. Sometimes they go to the window and peer through making little incomprehensible squeals of recognition and pointing. Their mothers nod and softly assure them; "You can see big brother in there, can't you."
"Are you gonna push me to the exit? In the wheel chair?"
"It's not time yet."
"When it's time?"
"Yes, Jenny. I wont leave you here. Watch the kids."
"I will." She doesn't. "Chew my gum." She looks over at her friend. "Did you give me my gum?"
"Yes."
"Good for me. Yeha-ha-ha. I'm happy to be with you today."
"I'm happy to be with you, Jenny. Watch the kids, Jenny. They're about to jump into the pool."
We see the splash through the window. We don't hear anything. Jenny laughs loud and high this time and fast. "Hahaha hahaha."
The hall is lined with one long bench. I sit on one end and all the mothers and Jenny's friend sit along it. Jenny sits in her wheel chair by the window. She stares between the pain on the glass. The pool is busy with movement but we can't hear the noise. It's cool in the hall but we can see that the pool room is hot.
"Put chap stick on bother lips. They're dry." She is restless in her chair.
"Jenny, sit still and watch the kids." Her friend spoke more severely. Almost impatient. Jenny turned back to the pool window.
"I will." She mutters about her chap stick again and laughs.
"You crazy hot lips." Her friend smiles tenderly.
"Crazy with love for you... Yeha-ha-ha."
"Watch the kids."
"I will."
The kids are getting out of the pool. My sister comes around the corner with the big windows looking out on the parking lot. I gather my books. I walk past all the people sitting on the bench and the lady in the chair by the window.
"Are you gonna push me to the exit doors... in the wheel chair."
"It's almost time, Jenny."

Evil and the Father of the Prodigal Son

So, Fr. Spitzer, (S.J.) the president of Gonzaga university and a great philosopher, gave a mini lecture at a dinner I got to go to. The subject was the problem of evil. Can an all loving, all powerful, and all knowing God coexist with evil? It was totally awesome so I'm going to try and type up what I got from it. The way he said it was, of course, much more entertaining and articulate. He's writing a book about it. It comes out in about six months. I want to read it. You should all look him up and read one of the books he wrote. Brilliance. In any case this is something like his points from the other night:

1. The first thing to remember in times of suffering is who God is. Jesus came to reveal the Father to us. The parable of the prodigal son reveals God to us. God is the father of the prodigal son. Any image we get of God, that cannot be reconciled to the Father of the Prodigal Son is wrong. He is not the vengeful god who waits for a chance to get us back for all the nasty things we do. He is not the steel god who is sick and tired of our whining; "Stop being such wimps! What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." He is not the god who could care less. All these false images of God come from the devil. If you start thinking God is doing something that the father of the prodigal son wouldn't do, then you have something wrong.

2. The father of the Prodigal son didn't cause any of the bad things that happened to his son. God did not create evil. He is not the steel god who created evil to make us stronger. He created love and freedom. Love is a choice. So if God had made humans to love Him but not given us free will to love Him then He would have created nice little robots who display loving behaviors. God can't make true love without freedom and you can't freely choose to love without also being capable of choosing Not to love. But, God, if He is all powerful, can create us any way he wants, so why did he create us with the ability to choose not to love? Fr.'s answer to this was that God is incapable of making a square circle and it's not God's problem it's a problem with the square and the circle. They exist in a finite world. They are mutually exclusive of each-other. God cannot create a contradiction. A creature who can choose to love but cannot choose not to love is a contradiction. The Father of the Prodigal Son does not withhold the inheritance from the Son. Neither does he limit how and on what the son uses that inheritance.

3. God works through suffering and evil in the world. He did not create them but he works through them. (Just like in Tolkien's Silmarilion,) God robs evil of it's victory by turning it to His greater glory. We can trust the Father of the Prodigal Son to make good come of rather bleak situations. One example of this that Fr. Spitzer gave was the loss of his own eye sight. Spitzer has macular degeneration and is almost completely blind. He says the worst part of this is that he has to ask for rides. He told us about when he first found out and he made God a list of things he could do if God gave him back his sight. But you never hand God a plan cause he doesn't follow them. And you never hand God a time table cause his time table is always bigger and longer than yours. Since he has been almost blind, Spitzer has gotten twice as much work done as he did all the years before. "I was lolly-gagging!" He pointed out jubilantly "Since I've been here, I've written five books!" There were questions after and he told us that he would not be offended if we left early. He wouldn't see us anyway. It was not as if God liked to see Spitzer struggling with his sight. He has compassion: He suffers with us. But He worked through it for the greater good of Spitzer and (I think) the world.

So, that is what I got out of the talk. There was a lot more. Fr. Spitzer is a very entertaining and articulate speaker. I wish I could reproduce all the stories he told and the points he made. It was awesome. You can just feel love and deep faith radiating from this man. I can't wait till his book comes out.

I love colors.

This is Jessica and she was on my crew for a show I stage managed. I have had this photo of her, I think is just gorgeous, for almost three years and I have always wanted to draw it. So I finally printed it out. Me and my box of colored pencils got to work a few weeks ago and I have been working on it little by little. I finished it the other day and was really pleased with how it turned out. I wish things that came from my head looked that good. This is probably the first drawing that has turned out something like what I wanted. A big step for me. I love colored pencil but I drive myself crazy trying to get things perfect. I got colored paper for my birthday and have had a ton of fun with it. It's so different having to work to get your highlights light enough rather than worrying about your shadows being dark enough. I like it. But my shadows still don't want to be dark enough.

So, now that I've said how much I like it I will start with the self critique. I got lazy with her neck and it's all wrong. Then I accidentally brushed some of the black onto it and so now it just looks funny. All the hair on her right side was really hard to get right. As you can see, I didn't get it right at all. The colors are all wrong and I was pretty much making up the shapes as I was going along. Part of the problem was that my printer refused to print the colors right. So the whole picture is accurate to my print but much less glorious than the original photo. Some day I'll have to do it again and get some decent prints and pay attention more. Her face is pretty good, I think. I wasn't perfectly accurate but it's not too bad.
But it's pretty good for a first attempt. :D

So, I've totally lost contact with Jessica. I can't remember her last name.
In any case, if you're out there Jessica, thank you for posing for the picture. I hope you don't mind me drawing it.

The smell of burnt Marsh-wiggle

"On word. All that you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder. I'm a chap that likes to know the worst and then put the best face I can on it. So I won't deny any of what you said. But there's one thing more to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things - trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play-world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overworld. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's small loss if the worlds as dull a place as you say." ~Puddleglum ~C. S. Lewis ~The Silver Chair

C.S. Lewis be praised! It's so simple and so good. Whenever I'm frustrated with relativism or anything else that puts down my faith to escapism or superstition I have only to read this passage from The Silver Chair. Never let yourself be lulled to sleep by the "logic" or materialism or anything else that smells of enchantment. Step back and stop trying to fight the battle on their terms. Burnt Marsh-wiggle may not be an enchanting smell but it sure makes it easier to think.
Life's just better here. It's infinitely cool to be a Christian and anyone who tells you otherwise is either jealous or ignorant. Christ's world licks the atheist's world hollow. People who live like Narnians are just more fun to be around.
Humans have an insatiable appetite for perfection. We all want that perfect beauty, that perfect love. They don't exist in this world, it just doesn't happen. Somehow the idea of perfection came into this world. Maybe the humans made it up. It doesn't matter. I'm going to live out my belief that perfect love exists and it is shaped like a Cross.

P.S. if you haven't read this book, the burnt Marshwiggle thing goes like this; The evil witch of the underworld had put some powder on the fire so that it gave off a sickly sweet smell. It was part of her enchantment. She was telling them all that there was no sky or sun or anything above ground and that they had all made it up or dreamed it. Puddleglum the Marsh-wiggle was a hero cause he stampped out the enchanted fire, burning himself very badly thereby clearing his head of enchantment, which makes it hard to think, and makeing the room smell like burnt marshwiggle, which is not at all an enchanting smell. Then he makes this speech.
Now go read the book.

Just last week... no wait... it was about a month ago...

The first thing you loose when you leave civilization is respect for you clothes. After a mile or two you are still looking for a clean spot on a log to sit on. After another mile or two you would plop down in the middle of a muddy stream bed without a second thought.
Summer is the time when you have allot of adventures and then you spend fall catching up on them in your blog. One of my last summer adventures was a eight mile hike in the Montanan mountains... or some of them anyway. More like big hills actually, I know what a mountain is.
It was amazing. I've never been back packing before and I don't know exactly what I was expecting but this was way better. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to carry a thirty pound pack for as eight miles but I did alright. From far off all those big hills make a pretty postcard. They're all misty and purple against the morning sky and then you get so close to them you can't see them anymore. This was supposed to be an easy hike since it was my first time. I don't think our guide did his research very well. Eight miles, three thousand feet. Not bad. I"m sure me climbed more than that from all the ups and downs we took. We gained every foot at least twice. Three steps up two steps down all the way. Then there was the little detail of the trail. No one had been on it in who knows how long. We pretty much blazed our own trail for the last few miles. And there was, of corse, the thousand foot rock hill right at the end. No one remembered to bring ropes or climbing gear of any kind. My dad gets half way up, then he radios back "Some one take my picture from down there before I die." We did.
If you can pick him out I'll give you a virtual mountain goat. It wasn't that bad actually. It was worse than it looks in that picture of course but I've been told by more experienced hikers that I have no real bragging rights. I got up in one piece (all the casualties happened on the way down).
There was this deer... doe, I guess. It was the biggest fattest doe I've ever seen. The ones that live around here and eat peoples gardens are like little stick figures. This beast was the size of a horse. It wasn't shy either. I wish I had gotten a picture of it. I guess it was a little shy of cameras, though the rocks we threw at it didn't bother it a bit. Every few hours at night it could be heard snuffling around our camp. I was sleeping next to a tree so it didn't get me but I guess it stuck it's big snout into my dads ribs, right through the tent. It was a little unnerving to have it saunter on through while we made our breakfast. We took to calling it the "dumb-dumb-dumb DOE" Like Beethoven's fifth.

Our camp site was really beautiful. (you can't actually see it in this picture. The trees on the right block it but you can see teh rocks we fished off of over there.) I has a lovely day, went fishing for the first time, climbed up another few hundred feet (cause we hadn't had enough the day before) following the stream that filled the lake we camped at, took some pictures,


(like this one. It's really hard to make a 'w' with rock fragments so the tense is wrong now. I'm there in spirit, how bout that?) a butterfly landed on my hand and hung out there for about ten minutes.
Hiedi, you should have been there when it got dark. The stars were incredible. I found Draco and some of our other friends but then the Doe came and ousted me from my observatory. Okay, well, we could hear her stomping around and I wasn't going to wait until she found us. Wait a minute, I don't think Hiedi knows I have a blog... Maybe I should fix that...
Then we packed up and trekked back. On the way down The Rock, we sort of had to crab walk or slid on our back sides to keep from over balancing and toppling to our deaths. Dana lost the seat of her jeans. My back pocket didn't survive. One of dad's water bottles went bouncing and spinning down the hill and into the forest below. We didn't find it so it's still up there somewhere if anyone wants to earn a virtual helicopter by leading an expedition out to rescue it. After we got off The Rock, walking felt like trying to stilt on tent polls cause my knees were so shot.
The rest of the hike back went really fast. We got back to the amish bakery just before they closed and bought some very delicious sandwiches and milkshakes. It seemed so unfair to spend half the day getting our eight miles behind us and then take just a few minutes to drive the other eight miles to get lunch. It's amazing that Americans spend so much time thinking of ways to save time when we move so fast anyway we should have all the time in the world.
That sentence was probably horribly incorrect grammatically. I think it's time for Karen to stop typing.

There's a story in that somewhere.

It came from a dream or a conversation or something I read on the web.
I worked it in my mind as I walked to the bus. The sleepy college students silently commiserate at the bus station. They hunch their shoulders and stick their fists in their pockets. My chin rests on my color bone and I watch the moister from my nostrils make fog on my glasses. It slowly clear and I see the still figures with their back packs full of books. Then they are gone behind a cloud of precious heat escaping from my body. The bus pulls up. The doors open and we all file on sullenly flashing our passes at the driver who nods and counts us as we pass. Suddenly we are people again. the hoods are lowered and heads are held up. People get comfortable for the long ride. I sit by myself for now. At the next stop there will be many more students getting on. Across from me a student is making an attempt at getting some reading done. Another is listening to his i-pod and getting ready to fall asleep. We mind our own business. We are all in this together but no one wants to talk about it. Not this early in the morning.
It starts as a few lines in a green note book. I scribbled hastily on whatever page falls open. No one can read it but me. No one would try.
It's just an idea. Maybe it will stay an idea forever. There is nothing terribly original about it. It's been done a million times. Somewhere some one else had an idea and wrote it down and it grew. It was special to that person. It's special to me. Something about it strikes a spark in my mind. It's a door that begs to be opened and explored. I'll get around to opening it someday. The green note book was supposed to be for taking notes in class. Now it sits in one of the darker corners of my closet filled with thoughts and musings.
Funny how these things come: in dreams and little things people said. And always on the bus.
"No one ever writes stories about the happily ever after part." Some one said that once. i can't remember who. I thought about it on the bus. I wonder what happened to Sleeping Beauty after she woke and, presumably, became the queen of a country at the ripe old age of one-hundred-sixteen. There's a story in that somewhere.
Speaking of princesses, I read once about a viking damsel who turned pirate and had the first co-ed long boat known to legend. She was finally defeated by a Danish prince in a stunning sea battle. The Danish prince was an old suitor of hers. At the end of the battle he fell to his knees on her blood stained deck and asked her to marry him. She said yes! That's quite a story already but it would be interesting to explore.
"You know what's cool about being Catholic? You can be very Irish or you can be very Mexican and be very Catholic either way." That would be a fun thing to write about; a Mexican and an Irishman stuck together somehow. There are several ways to get a story out of that.
Maybe one of them will actually become a story someday.

"Rules suck"

Where did our culture get it's fear of rules? Somebody decided one day that rule existed to keep us from having fun and therefore ought to be broken shamelessly. I think this is one of the sillier concepts America has come up with. I was talking to someone about what it would be like to do God's will at every moment. The person I was talking to kept objecting that having God control him so much would be torture. They don't seem to be able to reconcile the idea of an all loving God and a God who uses phrases "thou shall not" and "deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me". Yes, God is loving enough to give us free will, and he asks us, in love, to form our will to be one with His. He's bit smarter than us, after all. The fact that doing as your told actually brings you greater happiness never entered my friend's mind. If you asked him if God loved him, he would say yes. If you asked him if God knew what was best for him, he would say yes. But if you ask him if he would like to do God's will at every moment of his whole life, he says "That's Torture!" There is something wrong with this picture. It's so sad it's almost funny.

A couple thousand years ago somebody had it right. That somebody wrote a psalm about how wonderful it was to follow the commandments of a loving and wise God.
He says:

"With my whole heart I seek thee; let me not wonder from thy commandments!
I have laid up thy word in my heart, that I might not sin against thee.
Blessed be thou, O Lord; teach me they statutes!
With my lips I declare all they ordinances of they mouth.
In the way of thy testimonies I delight as much as in all riches.
I will meditate on thy precepts, and fix my eyes on they ways.
I will delight in thy statutes; I will not forget thy word."

Later he goes on:

"Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things our of thy law."

A little later...

"My soul is consumed with longing for thy ordinances at all times."

He longs to understand and follow perfectly all the rules. They guide him, console him. It sounds strange on my American ears. Statutes and Delight in the same sentence? His souls is Consumed with Longing for God's Ordinances? It seems so contrary. He's either crazy or the biggest suck up ever. I wish I could pray this whole psalm with sincerity. When I think about giving God my every moment, it terrifies me as much as anyone. But I want to want to do it. I know in my head it will be the best for me. Getting things from my intellect to my will is the hard part. At the moment my will is in rebellion. I read once that if you have even the smallest desire to be a saint, and you give that to God, He will do great things with it.

I want to want Your will. I will fix my eyes on thy ways. Teach me thy statutes.

The are verses from Psalm 119 (or 118). Revised Standard Version. Catholic edition.

Oh and by the way.

I have been meaning to write about my new baby brother. I think I mentioned him earlier but he has not had a blog all his own. I have been trying to think of something to say about him. What do you say about you first brother? I could go on about the baby things but they are not all that new to me. I remember three other babies. They all make adorable little noises and faces and they mess their diapers and nurse and sleep for most of the day. Not that every baby isn't a miracle that is new and beautiful but I don't think I need to describe his daily activities for all and sundry. He does normal baby things.
I could talk about how I am feeling about having a brother. I have four wonderful sisters. In the past we've proudly boasted of our brother-less state. Our family had an identity of having no boys and no regrets. During the pregnancy we were a bit defiant. Why would God give us a boy when we do so well with girls. Maleny said that if it was a boy we had to send it back. I even said having a boy in the house would make me all the more anxious to move out. (Which is something I will need some pushing to pursue.) Now that he is here I don't mind so much. He's a baby, which is what we wanted. Even Maleny said that he was exactly what she wanted, if not what she expected. I thought we should have named him Isaac because of all the laughter when we found out. But dad said this issue was a non-negotiable. I guess St. Isaac is his patron along with St. Lawrence (patron of comedians, on whose feast day our David was born) But now that the shock has worn off we are all falling back into our natural family routine. Only with a baby brother. It's not that much different yet. I guess we're in for an adventure when he gets a little older, or so all our acquaintances have been eager to remind us. "You're gonna have to redefine everything you thought was normal." A dear friend gleefully informed us. Our one male cousin was playing cool and disinterested. "I'm planning on ignoring him till he's old enough to play video games." My mother was indignant at this comment. "It's just a boy thing." My aunt assured her. We're not looking forward to all the "boy things." Mom says most of that is just bad behavior and she will tolerate none of it. There have been all sorts of comments about what sort of psychological problems a boy raise in a house of five girls will have to face. "Poor kid." is probably the most repeated phrase. Just the way "Your poor dad!" used to be when we told people that we had five girls and no boys. Some one today commented on David's tendency to sleep with half open eyes. "With five sisters, he's gonna have to sleep with one eye open." This makes no sense to me. What terrible things are the expecting us girls to do to him? It makes me wonder if they know us very well. Honestly now! I don't think it would take a deep acquaintance with my sister and I to deduce that we are not particularly pugnacious. Most of us treat each other with a decent amount of respect and have no intention of picking on any one. We're all different enough so that we are either all normal or all oddballs in one way or another. We just have better things to do than harass each other about it. Our evilest plots for David involve teaching him how to swing dance and getting him into theater because there are simply not enough boys in the world who know how to sing and dance. Maybe this sounds like torture to some people but he can hardly escape being musically inclined. He comes from a family of musicians. Dad's side of the family is incredibly musical. If he doesn't get it in the genetics, he will get it in his upbringing. In the average day he hears folk music, contemporary christian rock or folk rock, classical flute music, broadway show tunes pounded on the piano along with some classical pieces, all of us singing along to all of the above plus some a cappella gregorian chant and medieval polyphony. And we dance with him all day long. Poor kid. Some one call child protective agency!
Well, in any case. I'd like to introduce you to my brother: David Francis.
Here he is being wonder full, looking over my sister C.C.'s shoulder. Odd looking child. Skinny and big eyed. He looks like a staving child from a third world country. If only he wasn't so adorable when he cried he would get his dinner a heck of a lot faster. :P

Five

Five is sitting next to me on the computer counter. She swings one leg over the edge and sinks her teeth (and her noes) into an apple that is almost as big as her head. In a few minutes she will hand the apple over to me so I can eat another section of the skin off for her. I could congratulate myself on being so generous as to eat the skin of Five's apple for her but I think it benefits me as much as her. It's been a long time since I have eaten an apple and I need some fruit in my lunch. I would not have bothered if she had not wanted one. That's what being a sister is all about. Even if I do get the less desirable part of the apple, and she doesn't learn to eat through the bitter stuff to get to the sweet, I get some nourishment that I would otherwise not bother about. Little sisters are for learning the things you missed the first time you grew up. Five keeps me looking at the world as if it were something new and exciting. I learn things over again that I may have forgotten. Yeah, I have to listen to the same story for the hundredth time as I read it out loud but it's the first time for her and her excitement spills over and I see it as she does. It never hurts one to go back to kindergarden once in a while. Winnie-the-Pooh is even better when you are reading it to Christopher Robin. I guess God makes them that way on purpose. But you have to open yourself up. Sometimes I'm so caught up in being Nineteen that when Five invites me to do something with her she just comes off as annoying. I have to make a little sacrifice to open myself up. I have to eat the peal off her apple. I have to say yes and give of my time before I can get any nourishment out of it. The apple's flesh that comes off with the peal is sweet. It's not a full meal but it's a little extra I would not get otherwise.
Would you believe that? Five eat that whole apple and now she's getting some one to make her a burrito!

What happens when there is no spell check.

Arranged marriages

If you watch enough chick flicks (especially movies aimed at younger girls) it will not take long before you run into a story with an arranged marriage in it somewhere. The parents who want their daughter to marry for money versus the girl who wants to marry for love. I always sympathize with the parents. They always portray the parents as being clueless about the man they have chosen or evilly plotting their child's destruction for their own gain. Based on this I hear girls comment on how horrid that situation would be and how glad they are that society doesn't work like that anymore.
I don't know. I think I would trust my parents to pick a man who was far above tolerable.
That was something that bugged me to no end about Mulan 2; (Yes I am publicly admitting to having watched that movie. Little sisters are my excuse.) The Emperor, whom we all admired in the first movie, was stupid enough to set up his own daughters in a marriage with a kid he had never met. I expected better of him. He would have been wise enough to base his daughters match on more than just politics. He would have made sure that the boy was suitable, not just that the marriage was good for the country. Portraying arranged marriages as evil is a categorical imperative in our culture even at the expense of otherwise admirable characters.
I don't think it's any more inherently evil than our current system. You can't argue that there was little love in marriages that were arranged based on the love that exists in the average American relationship today. There are as many unfaithful spouses now as then, if not more. There were certainly fewer divorces. Divorce seems have become commonly acceptable and necessary when the young people started choosing partners for themselves rather than there parents. It seems like it ought to be the other way around. If your parents choose your husband no one will blame you if it doesn't work out and a divorce might be a very reasonable option. Yet it didn't happen nearly as often, as far as I know. Now that young people choose for themselves they often find that they chose wrong and have to try again. As CS Lewis observed, it must have worked since we are all here and many of our ancestors had arranged marriages for hundreds of years.
I told my dad that if he wants to arrange my marriage he is welcomed. Saves me the trouble of having to get rid of guys I don't find suitable. Just send anyone interested to Dad and let him weed out the losers. He didn't seem to enthusiastic about the idea. He thinks I've a pretty good chance of ending up in a convent so finding me a man would be rather useless anyway.

Play time.

This is what I was doing this morning.

I side swiped a parked car.

Don't laugh, it's not funny. I only got my license a week ago and my parents don't want me to drive cause I'm not on the car insurance yet. I was lucky they let me go. Typical.

So it's like this, my older sister Dana was on a school trip to the neighboring state. She took a train. Her train got in at midnight. My dad was supposed to park the car in the parking lot of the train station and and ride his bike home so she would be able to just drive home when her train got in. That was the plan. Then there was my little sisters chamber music concert that got out a bit late. My dad is like "well, if I go park the car and ride back it will be ten thirty and I have to get up tomorrow morning. Karen! I bet you would like to get up at midnight and go get your sister." Yeah. Sure. So my dad bailed and the only other option was my mother who is seven months pregnant and NOT feeling very well. So I agreed. Dad gave me directions to the train station and they were pretty simple. I actually had no idea there was a train station down town. But it didn't sound hard to find. Mom suggested that my younger sister Clara come with me so that I would not be driving around down town alone on a friday night. That was fine. But Then... mom started giving Clara some well meaning advice and just making sure she knew what she was getting into. There are going to be lots of intoxicated people roaming the streets and you are Not to make eye contact with Any one. As she continued I could see Clara getting more and more nervous. By bed time she was like "Maybe this is not such a good idea." Too late now! So we put a DVD on the computer and watched until it was time for us to go. So we get into the car in our pajamas and start heading for down town.

The streets were pretty empty until we got right to the heart of town down. Then we ran into the one thing that could throw off dad directions: Hoopfest. Well, if you know what Hoopfest is than I guess you know where I live but if not, Hoopfest is when about two thirds of the population of my city get together and play basketball. All the roads are blocked off and filled with basketball hoops. It's a huge deal. My city is a little obsessed with basketball. So we get to the street that we are supposed to turn on and, naturally, it's blocked off. Or at least it looked like it was blocked off. I might mention that my vision is kind of bad right now cause I have a clogged tear duct in my right eye that waters and oozes puss every once in a while and generally makes it hard to see. I have glasses as it is so at every stop light I had to take my glasses off and wipe my eye. As for the time between stop lights; I just prayed and squinted and blinked. So, seeing that the street is blocked, we pull into a parking lot and use the alley to get onto another street. This begins a long adventure of trying to navigate the one way streets and detours. Oh and did I mention that there were indeed crowds of intoxicated people stumbling around, j-walking, running (not just blindly stepping but running like they wanted to get hit) out in front of traffic, and generally making things interesting for the two lost little girls in the giant station wagon. Clara was freaking out. "I am really interested in the glove compartment right now. I am NOT making eye contact." She so comforting. This is doing nothing for my nerves. "LOOK! Hallelujah! there is the street we are supposed to be on! But dad said to just keep going cause there was a dead end and that is the train station. But this is a two way street (amazingly) and I have no idea if I would go right or left. Wait, do I even have a choice? Is that way blocked off? No. I guess we're going to go right cause it's easier right now and I am not sure if it's legal to go left just now." There are all these do cones and those sandwich board type 'do not enter' signs all over the street so I am trying to get into the right lane without hitting any of them when Clara yells "Karen your too close!!!" *CrashScrape* "You just hit that car." No! Really? "I think that's called side swiping." "you're just going to keep going!" "Yep hit and run. No I'm going to find a place to park and survey the damage." "You're going to get OUT of the car!!!??" I did a really bad parking job in the first parking lot that presented itself; just on the other side of the block. We sat there in the parked car for a few just catching our breath. Then I we got out (against Clara's better judgment) and looked at the side of out car. In the dark with water in my eye it did not look all that bad. Nothing was missing. We still had our windows and our rear view mirror. There was no obvious paint scratch. There are lots of people laughing and some yelling in this parking lot so at this point we just wanted to be back in the car with the doors locked again so we did not do a real meticulous check. Jolly good enough! Karen has trouble backing out of her lousy parking job but she gets back on the road without hitting anything else to we can call that a victory. Three cheers for two way streets! We when back around the block to see if we had hurt the other car. It was this big ugly black ( or so dirty and old that it was very dark anyway) truck. Or something. I am not good at identifying different kinds of cars. In any case it was bigger then ours in every dimension. It's not hard to have a taller cars then ours (though this one was fairly tall) but it was pretty impressive for its girth and length. We could see a little piece of the wood paneling off the side of our ugly old station wagon on the ground next to it but it did not look at all damaged (in the dark, through the window, with water in my eye. So we were a little distracted looking at the car we hit and forgot for a moment that we were looking for the train station. Then we got back on task. "Dad said it was a big brick building and you can't miss it." Right. All the buildings in this part of down town are big and brick. There is no dead end. But there is that building sitting a ways back from the street. Could that be it? Yeah. That's it. We side swiped a truck parked across the street from the train station. But, of course, by the time we figured this out, the only entrances to the parking lot had big 'do not enter signs on them. We have to go around again.

Once again, between detours and one way streets and people we were not supposed to make eye contact with it took us about another ten minutes to get back to the parking lot across the street that we had parked in before. Dana was just going to have to walk a little way cause I was not about to chance missing the entrance again trying to get closer. My parking job was a little better. Once I decided on a space that I thought might fit the ark. There was also this little black pickup (or it looked black. Everything looks black at night) sitting in the middle of the lot, not in a parking slot but just sitting there with it's lights on blocking my way. I had wanted to find a place closer to the cross walk where there were not so many cars and I could make a really wide turn into the slot. But no. There was this pickup. I thought at first that it was waiting for us and as I was not eager to park with this guy staring at me, I stopped for a moment hoping it would pass me or go park or something. But it didn't, it just sat there. I wasn't about to try and make eye contact with the driver and signal for him to go so I pulled into a slot and parked.

I gathered up my purse and looked around for anything else in our car that any one might want to take. I can't imagine anyone suspecting there was anything of value in that hunk of junk but you never know. That pickup is still sitting there. We're in our pajamas. We were counting on getting a place in the train station parking lot and just waiting for Dana to come find us. Now we have to walk across the parking lot, across the street, through another parking lot, and into the train station to wait for Dana who might be searching the lot already. Smooth. We got out and Clara was paranoid about the doors getting locked. I just want to get inside where there are security guards. But she insists that I have to lock her door with the key. Stupid old car doesn't have power lock on the key chain. We stood there with a pickup behind us for three minutes or so trying to get the door locked but it's not happening so we close it, stick the key in and pretend to lock it. No one would want to rob out car anyway right? We walk away, past the pickup. We didn't make eye contact of corse but I could have sworn the two guys in the pick up were watching us. I looked back as we waited for the light to turn and so one of the guys get out of the pickup. He was walking towards our car but he looked over his shoulder at us the next second so I starred at the light again rather hastily. "You know, Clara, now would be a very appropriate time to say a prayer to St Michael the archangel." I don't know why we did not think of this before. St. Mike and I should have become very good friends by now. "God save the car." I mutter and we cross the street.

It's 12:10. Dana said her train got in at midnight so by that information she should already be here. There is no sign of her in the parking lot. Or in the lobby. Clara remarks, at this point, on the large number of people we ought not to make eye contact with in this building. Thank you Clara. She is staring at the various vending machines and trying to look inconspicuous. Without making eye contact we, deduced that the guy sitting behind the counter over there must be a security guard. Karen is very glad and resolves not to go out of sight of said personage. We approach and ask him if a train had come in with in the last quarter hour. After assuring us that he didn't know anything and we ought to ask the train people, he said that he hadn't seen any large group of people disembark so it must not have come yet. Good. We sat down and waited. Clara stared very hard at a bus schedule in order to avoid making you-know-what-with anyone. I considered what would happen if someone decided they wanted a big ugly station wagon to drive home in. It was 12:30 when Dana's train came in. She was one of the first people off and she got in line for the ticket counter cause she had left something at the station on her way out and needed to retrieve it. When we first saw her we waved but I guess she was not making eye contact with anyone either so she did not see us. We would have yelled (cause it would have embarrassed her and that is our solemn duty as little sisters) but we were a little hesitant to draw that much attention to ourselves. We sat and watched her for a little while before we got up and and tapped her on the shoulder.

This is really long and it was all pretty painless from here. Dana had two male classmates with her. It was really nice to have some guys to walk with us (although Clara said they looked just like all the other people we're not supposed to M. I. C. with. Dana drove. I wonder if mom had not worked Clara into a state of paranoia we would have done better. Nothing was as bad as it seemed at the time.

So that was my adventure. I hate Hoopfest and one way streets. Dad asked what happened to the car this morning. I have not seen it but I guess it's worse than Clara and I thought last night.

Good grief. I rambled on forever. I think I am going to walk down town and watch some basketball.

Ahoy, There!

Did I mention that I'm a pirate? Yeah, I've been a pirate for two years or so. I've always been fascinated by them. I became one the other year when CYT did Treasure Island. I tend to take part of the characters I play with me after the show is over. I'm one of the the two girls in there. The rest of them are my henchmen. That was my all time favorite show to be in. It was not one of CYTs better productions but we had so much fun that I think it made up for it. Our director was always telling us little factoids about sailing and pirates. I was lucky enough to have the best of all worlds because I was double cast. I got to be a main comic character and then the next night I would switch parts with another girl and play a pirate for the first few scenes and then a loyal english sailor for the rest of the show. As a pirate I got to murder some one, (my good friend Jared) and wear cool cloths and have henchmen. Being a sailor was awesome cause it's just nice to be a good guy cause you win, even if you die doing it like my character did. The other sailors were really fun to hang out with. On stage there were all sorts of subplots happening behind the main action that the audience probably didn't pick up on. There was a rivalry between the captains sailors in our blue and white stripes and those unruly fellows in all manner of colors who turned out to be pirates. Us sailors started out being very civil but they were always pulling pranks on us like sloshing buckets over us while we were trying to swab the deck. Then it was war. Good times.

But that ended. The pirate-ness came home with me and infected my younger sister. Now I am the boatswain on a small but sturdy craft. The captain is fierce and fearless. We're not a particularly successful but we have so much fun together that none of us would dream of giving it up no matter what bride or black-mail we are offered.

Pirates are source of endless entertainment for a theater kid with a camera and some imagination.

Pirates are infinitely cool for many reasons. (The greatest of these being their incredible fashion independence.) I am as much fascinated by the history as the reputation and images they have accumulated through popular culture. I would love to read trials of some of the famous pirates. I read a children's book about female pirates that had a bunch of legends and tall tales. It was great fun. There was an old viking legend that had me glued to the book just because it was so odd. Normal women simple do not become pirates and then accept their arch enemy's proposal of marriage. I mean, the guy slaughtered her crew, then fell to one knee on the bloody deck of her ship and asked her to marry him. And she accepted!! It made my 'Wow list'. But I liked it. If you try to fill in motives and things to these stories you get some really interesting characters. Then there was a story about woman in colonial america who dressed as a man to rescue her husband from prison. I Really liked that story but when I researched it I could not find out if it was fact or fiction. Not that is matters so much. A good story is a good story but it was frustrating that I could not find any more details than the kids book gave. Jean Laffite and John Paul Jones are my favorite historical pirates. Well, I guess Jones wasn't really a pirate but he had that under dog tenacity.
I've always wanted to write a pirate story. With all the bells and whistles; plank walking, buried treasure. It would be really fun. Now, if only I can think of a plot. I have several character sketches and beginnings but no point, no conflict. I'll get to it some day.
Why am I writing all this? No particular reason. It's in my head right now and I am having fun putting pictures in my blog. I have allot of pirate pictures.

This is just a complaint. Ignore it.

Yesterday I was supposed to give a talk to my girls club about friendship. I have given and listened to similar talks dozens of times. Everything was all wrong. I don't know what's wrong with it. Or if it's me. It was a good talk. I spent all week working on it. Mom read it and did not see any problem with it. Clara (my sisters who is fifteen) read it for me and liked it allot. That was really encouraging cause she can be a pretty tough one to please. She said that if she was a ten year old hearing the talk she would be greatly encouraged. So all was well. This meeting was on friendship because we were expecting some new girls and when ever someone new comes to the club we like to give them a picture of how our club is different from others. e.g. we are not an exclusive clique but a group of girls trying to bring each other closer to Christ. So anyway, after I sent out schedules to all the girls who had ever come to a meeting and a bunch more who said they were interested, a total of four girls showed. Now I wonder if the schedules got sent to the new girls. I had filled out the envelops but mom sent them off. I wonder if she did not send the ones that were not all the way filled out. There were some that were missing a zip code cause I was interrupted or needed to look for the address in a different list. That would certainly explain why no one showed. I don't think it would have made the meeting any more successful though. In any case the four girls who came must have needed to be there. God knows. So we all sat down in my living room and said our prayers and read a passage in the gospel and meditated on that for a while. We were talking about the two greatest commandments and I asked them what they though loving God with all your strength meant. One of the older girls got it right away. In so many words she stole my explanation: Using your physical strength for Gods glory or to serve others in Gods name is loving God with all your strength. So that was cool. We had and nice little discussion on that. Then it went down hill. Clara was part of the problem. First, one of the girls brought her little brother. He had a little toy car that was broken some how and Clara is exactly the sort of girl who can't walk by a broken toy, especially not a car, without trying to fix it. So she was over on the other side of the room giving a detailed commentary of what was wrong with the car while I was trying to talk. The girl next to her would double over laughing every once in a while. It was really distracting. I don't know what happened to the talk or if it was just my lack of skill in giving a talk. It was really good on paper, or at least I thought so. But out loud it was really boring and disorganized. I think it was mostly me. I had to reiterate myself a bunch of times cause Clara was so distracting and my points weren't connected in any logical fashion. The girls kind of drooled through it. Only God can know if they got anything out of it but I felt like I was wasting their time. My resolution was not concrete enough. The activity was to vague also. I think part of the problem is the was my living room is set up. That seems odd but it's true. I was sitting on the hope chest at one end of the room with Clara and her friend on the opposite end. The other girls were siting along either wall. I have a mental block about making eye contact with people for some reason. I tend to stare off into space when I'm talking to some one. I stared at the carpet for most of the talk. Every now and then I looked up at the two girls on the other end of the room. But it was really hard to look over at the girls on the couch. I need to find a way to arrange our little living room so that all the girls are sitting together and I can face them. That might get them more involved. Yes it would. It's really pointless to talk about being open to new friends and not closing people out when I am practically acting like there is only two other people in the room. Stupid. Okay I guess I'm done ranting now. I can't really know how much of a failure I was and I don't need to. I need to just let it go. Even if I'm no good at giving talks, I'm here doing it and no one else is stepping up to take over so I guess God must want me here. He will have to take care of the drooling girls. In my weakness He is strong, right? I hope next week goes a little better. Maybe it will be sunny and we can go out in my back yard or up in the playhouse. That would be easier. I need a new way of writing talks. Mom suggested that I just give them a topic to talk about and kind of guide the conversation to the points I want to make. That might be a good idea, I will have to try it. Next week I have the older girls (assuming they show up). This summer I am trying to get one of them to put me out of my misery and lead the younger girls. I am supposed to talk to them about a leaders relationship with God. That would be allot easier to talk with them about rather than talking to them (or at them) I am not a good person to be lecturing any one on prayer. I'm such a novice in that sort of thing. Zita of the three second attention span and no will power. Alright, I'm really shutting up now. If you wander into my mind you are going to have to deal with pointless rants like this.