Paying attention

When we trained our Puli with a trainer (for all the good that did!) one of the things we learned to do was jerk on his choke collar (which, in his case, is made of metal) and say, loudly and with disapproval "Pay Attention!"

Which, according to Bern, I don't do.

Most recent (of many) example: last week she changed all the drapes in our kitchen--all 3 big windows--but the new drapes, like the old, didn't match. So, I didn't notice the new drapes, which, once she pointed it out to me I could see were all different colors and patterns than before. But, in my defense, none of them matched and none of the previous drapes did. I'm a 'forest' guy, not a 'tree' guy. I didn't notice they were new because what I noticed was that they didn't match.

Bern rearranges furniture all the time. Do I notice? Well, after a few days I do.

Bern contends that I would do better with a choke collar and someone saying "Pay Attention!!!"

Maybe so.

Sunday afternoon, sitting at a concert at St. Andrew's in Northford--a great, great concert by the way--I noticed on the walls beside the chancel a big-ass American flag and an equally big-ass Episcopal Church flag. So, I've been serving there for...(another thing Bern points out is that like Billy Pilgrim I am lost when it comes to linear time)...a couple of years--between 4 and 1, that much I know, I'd never seen those flags.

I asked a couple of members of the congregation if the flags had been put up for the concert and knew before they answered that the flags had been there for years and I simply hadn't noticed.

I tried to come up with justifications to why I'd never noticed the flags...(I sit in the chancel and now in the pews, on the Processional hymn when we move down the aisle toward them, I'm singing, not looking....during the peace I'm interested in the people, not the wall....) all of which are 'justifications' pure and simple for why I don't Pay Attention!

I don't think it reaches the level of a character flaw, but it is an interesting observation. I AN focused on people rather than surroundings and am always aware of body language and tone of voice and attitude of folks (which I can't 'turn off' and is a tad annoying in a grocery store when I'm taking the emotional temperature of everyone I pass) but I am, I must admit, often oblivious of my surroundings. I have no explanation--just like I don't know why I can't place events in linear time with accuracy.

But I don't wear a watch, probably because I can't be troubled to know what time something happens...

(To my credit, I did notice the choir pews and the lectern were gone from the chancel for the concert so the Yale Camerada's chorus, 32 of them, could stand there....Give me a little credit at least....)

OK, it's just my problem

Because I fooled with the 'schedule' adjustment on my blog--trying to get off of Pacific Standard Time, the blog I wrote first was published before the blog I wrote second.

But wait, I just checked by viewing the blog and that isn't true at all.

What I thought was true 'absolutely' wasn't 'true at all'....

Does that ever happen to you or is it just my problem?

Often I am confronted with something that confounds and contradicts what I thought was True, like REALLY TRUE and find it false as false can be.

In the workshop I help lead from time to time, we make a circle on a piece of newsprint and then carve out about an eight of the circle and call that 'what we know we know'. And you can talk about that endlessly: I know I can do math, I know I can use a computer, I know I can drive a car--AND I KNOW I know that.

Then a second piece of the pie of knowledge--the things I KNOW I DON'T KNOW. Again, about an eight of the circle. And, once more, we can talk endlessly about the things we 'know we don't know'. I don't know how to fly a plane, how to do brain surgery, how to replace a muffler on my car, how to read Sanskrit. On and on I can go about what 'I don't know' and KNOW I don't know it.

The whole rest of the circle we've drawn is the third part of the Knowledge Available in the Universe--and that 3/4 of the circle is what we call "What We DON'T KNOW WE DON'T KNOW."

And it is in that part of the Knowledge Available in the Universe that things like Wonder and Magic and Amazement and Wholeness exists.

It is precisely in 'what we don't know we don't know' that we can find creation and possibility and recreation and astonishment.

Tripping across 'what we don't know we don't know' makes us feel upside down and inside out and totally ALIVE.

You are never more 'alive' than when your well traveled apple cart is turned on its side and you are standing somewhere you've never stood before....or ever imagined standing.

Here's how life shows up, I think: we walk through life noticing things and saying, "I know that" or
"I don't know that" or "I don't know that" or "I know that" and then we trip over something we didn't even see that WE DON'T KNOW WE DON'T KNOW and things open up and shine with a new light and sparkle and glitter and make us anxious and excited and confounded and confused and really, really alive...like hair standing up on your arm, butterflies in your stomach, fog in your head ALIVE.

The problem is we are 'thrown' to go unconscious when we meet up with what we don't know we don't know and shrug it off as meaningless. But the truth is this--All the Meaning in Life is there in WHAT WE DON'T KNOW WE DON'T KNOW. That's where the rubber truly meets the road, where things get interesting, where possibilities we never even imagined (couldn't imagine since we didn't know we didn't know them) live and move and have their being.

Being Alive begins when we trip over stuff we didn't know we didn't know.

AWE lives there and only there, my Beloved, along with THE ETERNAL and WHAT REALLY MATTERS.

That's the land we travel through in those places and things 'we didn't know we didn't know....'

That's where I want to dwell most of the time. That's the trip I have in mind. I'd like to meet you there where what we KNOW and DON'T KNOW is confounded, twisted out of shape, made meaningless and we have leaped off the edge into the unknown, trusting we will be caught....or not....

Just a few things that annoy my wife

Since I retired, back 4 years ago, I've been around more at home and have discovered whole new ways to annoy Bern.

*I get a glass from one cabinet and a plate from another and leave both doors open.  (I never leave kitchen drawers open because they have that cool 'push me hard, I slow down and close deal going--but come to think of it the doors have the same feature...so who knows why I leave them open.) Just today I emptied the dish washer and had almost every door in the kitchen open. Bern came in and shut them all without looking at me. (I don't know how long I can rely on her good humor about it all.)

*Doors and drawers again. We have a refrigerator with a door and a drawer--which is the freezer compartment on the bottom. When I'm doing something having to do with the refrigerator or freezer--taking something out or putting something in--I leave them open to long for her sensibilities. I just don't see the point in shutting them before I'm totally finished doing what I'm doing. Apparently, she does.

*When I go out on the back porch, I tend to leave the kitchen door open while closing the storm door. If she is in the room, she comes over and shuts the kitchen door a tad harshly.

All of this has to do, on first blush, with me being 'open' to life and adventure and possibility and Bern being 'closed' to such things.

On further analysis, it's probably just that she likes things 'finished' and I don't object in any discernable way that would impact my behavior, having things 'unfinished'.

I suspect she is on the side of the angels in the long run. Things that 'close' should probably be 'closed' to fulfill their ultimate destiny and purpose. Like, 'being closed'.

I also tend to use the bathroom without closing the door--even the one downstairs next to Bern's desk and computer. But let's not even go there....I 'get' that completely.

(More annoying things I do in a few days. They are legion....)

Why I am not only annoying to my wife but am annoyed at blogger.com

I have noticed from time to time that the 'time' given to my blogs was 3 hours later than I wrote them.

Just today, I noticed that I could 'schedule' my time. So I went on and changed the time to what I said it was. But I also noticed that my computer things I'm on Pacific Standard Time--imagine that, three hours later than what time it is in Connecticut.

So I reset the time but couldn't reset the "Pacific Standard Time" thing cause I couldn't figure our how. So my last post will be posted at 10 something Pacific time which will make it even more off (*I think, if I understand time zones). I put the setting back, so if you get this post before the post about how I annoy my wife by leaving things open....Shit, I can't even figure out what that means, time-wize.....) I learned to type on a manual typewriter (anyone remember those? Before electric typewriters) so I should have to get a license of some sort to be allowed to be on line.

But there isn't one, more the pity.....

Thanksgiving is coming....Cahoo, Cahay....

Well, it happened today, the official 'watch' for Thanksgiving. Bern came home with a fresh turkey and the bread cubes for the stuffing. All that remains is the waiting and the dreaming and the cooking and all that stuff.

Thanksgiving is by far my favorite holiday. First of all, I don't have to do church since I retired. Second of all, I love all the food. Third of all, it is such a joy to be surrounded by the people I love most. Fourth of all, there's nothing much to do after dinner but watch football or take an over-full walk. Fifth of all....Well, I could keep going. Just let this be clear: Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday!

We're having 14 people for dinner. I'm not sure we have 14 appropriate chairs, much less enough table to handle that. But all that is OK because the 14 people are some of my favorite people on the planet--Maybe like 14 of my favorite 20 people in the world, including the top 8.

The top 8--Josh, my son, and Cathy Chen, his wife and the three best granddaughters on the planet if not in the universe: Morgan, Emma and Tegan. They're all coming Tuesday of next week, early to miss the traffic from Baltimore. When 'the girls'--as we call Morgan, Emma and Tegan--arrive, most all order goes out the window! They take over the house, consuming space much larger than their size requires. The dog gets anxious because he has to herd and guard them and they move fast! What a joy to anticipate....Sumi, their best-of-all-most-gentle dog, won't be coming. Sumi died this year. She was a testament to how pit bull's bad rap is a lie. The sweetest ever dog. I will miss her.

Mimi and Tim will come from New York, I hope, on Wednesday, so they'll have an extra day with the girls, who adore them and so I can be with them longer. They're getting married on October 12, 2014. They've been together for as long as I can remember and they'll be married before next Thanksgiving. I thank God for them each day. I love them both so much--my baby girl and the man she deserves.

And then, Bern, of course, my love since I was 17 and she was 14 and my wife for 43 years of that time. Bern has moved from being 'the love of my life' to being 'my life' since I retired. I move within her orbit with joy and gratitude.

The other 5 (I make it 14) are John, who we've known since Bern was in college and I was a social worker, a fellow West Virginian who lives in New Haven. If I have a 'best friend' it is John, though I tend to move among multitudes I think of as friends.

Sherry and Jack and Robbie are coming. A shift in the Force. Sherry and Jack are part of our Easter 'family'....since we have no relations in New England, we've adopted 'family' for Christmas and Easter and Thanksgiving. John is always there, but the others shift and change, though usually the same for each holiday. But Robbie--their son who is a year older than Josh--will be here for Thanksgiving and they called and invited themselves. No problem. We've known them all since we moved to Connecticut in 1980--33 years, amazingly. Robbie and Josh and Mimi grew up together, more or less. Sherry (along with John) goes to North Carolina to the beach each year, joining Bern and Mimi and Tim and I there on Oak Island. We love them like a rock.

Finally, Hanne--a German born woman who was a member of the search committee who called me to be the Rector of St. John's in New Haven in 1980. Several years after I came, I was visiting her and noticed that on her bulletin board in her kitchen, she had a picture of Bern and Josh and Mimi and me along with members of her family. I've loved her ever since. She always comes on Thanksgiving. I'm not sure how old she is--in her 80's for sure--and still has piano concerts in her apartment in Hamden though she has macular degeneration and can hardly see at all.

So, that's the cast of characters.

The food seldom varies, though with Sherry coming she might bring some Southern thing--Jack is from Virginia and Sherry from South Carolina. Turkey, dressing (which I make from a recipe I have in my head for over 30 years now) green bean casserole with those dried onions, gravy, mashed potatoes and some kind of sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce--all the things everyone eats on Thanksgiving--and several kinds of pie for dessert. And lots of wine.

Here's the great thing: as soon as Bern brings home the turkey and puts it in the fridge, I start anticipating Thanksgiving. I have 12 days of anticipation this year. What could be better than that? Thinking about being with those people is just about as good as being with them for real. But not quite. But I wouldn't trade the anticipation for anything silver or gold.

The next 12 days will be silver and golden enough in my mind and heart.....

Some inquires worth asking....

I'm finishing up a course at the Osher Life-long Learning Institute at U Conn in Waterbury tomorrow. This term I led an inquiry into the so-called 'Christian Gnostics'. I say 'so called' because they didn't think of themselves as 'Gnostics', they thought of themselves as 'Christians'--but they didn't win and they didn't write the history.

Anyhow, it's been a good class. Numbers are down but I keep getting the dreaded 11:40-1 p.m. slot. So I have 8-10 rather than the 20-30 I've gotten at other time slots. But everyone has been involved and engaged and questioning and pondering: how much better than that can it get in this life? Not much, I'd suggest.

So, I have some inquires of them tomorrow. I always have a 'connection question', something I learned from leading Making a Difference Workshops for over 20 years. "Connection before content' is one of the mantras of the workshop. It works always to get people in the same place and time together before beginning something. I'd recommend a 'connection question' to be discussed in small groups or pair or threes at the beginning of anything. In fact, I'm going to start having one at the beginning of Cluster Council Meetings to get us on the same page.

But tomorrow, I want them to have a 'connection conversation' about a whole series of questions that I think are raised by reading the "gnostic" Christian texts.

*Do you think Christian writings that aren't in the New Testament may have some value?

*Do you question some of the articles of faith of your church?

*Do you believe faiths other than Christianity might have some validity?

*Do you  think women should be ordained?

*Is your relationship with God more important to you than what the church tells you to believe?

*Is your style of faith about honestly seeking what is 'true' about the world and God than about 'blind faith'?

Answering 'yes' to some of those should make you take the writings of Christians that were suppressed and destroyed by the Church in the 4th century and beyond have some importance.

Answering 'yes' to all of them probably makes you a 'gnostic Christian' but who knows?

Just good stuff to ponder on the way to wherever you're journeying.....

writing to the girls

Emma and Morgan, my twin granddaughters (though they look nothing alike: Emma is almost a head taller at 7 and has her mom's Asian black hair while Morgan had the brown hair of my son, her father) can both read now. They read well. Tegan, the baby (though 'babies' aren't 4!) doesn't read yet but will, having two sisters who read, read early.

So I decided to write them letters. I always loved getting letters. When I was in college and Bern (the girl's paternal grandmother) was still in high school, we probably wrote every day if not more. Letters, in the day before email and blogs, were the most exciting way to communicate, bar none.

Letters are one of the victims of the technology and it is a great loss. The beauty of getting a letter is you know it was written several days before. The beauty of writing a letter is you know it won't be read until it passes through many hands of members of the postal service. I'm a big one for 'delayed gratification'--the waiting is half the fun.

I think I'll do this every other week or so--write the girls a letter, knowing they won't read it until a few days from when I write it.

It was a simple letter I wrote--about what I was doing today, about how cold it was, about looking forward to Thanksgiving when they'll be with us, about a book I'm reading which has a main character who is a bookseller of antique books, about how Jack, who will be here at Thanksgiving, used to be a bookseller and if I wanted an old book I'd still ask him to find it, about how much I love them. Simple stuff like that.

I regret that I typed it, but a second victim of technology is hand-writing. I do it so little now that I can't even read the notes I write to myself about something not to forget or the lists I make for groceries! So, the girls will have to get letters typed on my computer and printed on my printer--but at least the letters will travel by truck and be touched by a whole host of strangers. I like that, how so called 'snail mail' is touched by people you'll never meet whose purpose it is to get the letter from you to the names on the envelope.

I like that. That's much more akin to the 'community' I love than to the 'online community' we all settle for most of the time.

(I know up in the attic is a box full of letters I wrote to Bern when we were apart. Someday, when she's out, I may go up and read some of them to get in touch with the young man I was some 4 and more decades ago, head over heels in love with her...as I still am...but I suspect that younger me was more poetic and lustful than I am now. Bern and I have a prose love--a long narrative--today. And though the sight of her is one of the things that gives my life meaning and often makes my heart beat faster...she is so lovely and we have been together so long...and yet that much is still true. Being a guy, I didn't keep her letters. More the pity, since those would be the letters I'd really like to read here in my dotage...the love letters of a beautiful young woman to me....)

Perhaps it is my ache that my granddaughters will grow up in a 'letter-less' world that has inspired me to begin writing letters to them.

Writing letters...even on a keyboard...still hold sway over me....

I should thank them in my next letter, for giving me a reason to write letters again....

I'll ponder that.