Going, going...Gone!

We're leaving on vacation Friday morning, driving down with Jack and Sherry to be joined by Mimi/Tim/Eleanor and John who are flying to Raleigh and Myrtle Beach respectively. So, we'll have three cars. For what I don't know, we seldom leave the house at Long Beach, North Carolina.

Groceries and wine, I guess.

Bern and I have been going to Long Beach since I was in Seminary. We had friends at school from N.C. who led us there.

Our kids grew up at that beach.

We even owned a house there for a while where we seldom stayed, since it wasn't on the ocean, but rented out.

So, after tomorrow, I won't be blogging until Monday or Tuesday week.

I'll miss you, but not that much, since I'll be at the beach with people I love.

 

 

Busy Weekend

On Saturday I did a wondrous service on a hilltop for a couple celebrating their 50th anniversary. The two of them read things and I said a few words and blessed the bread and wine--which they passed out to their family and two friends with tears in their eyes. Then they said words to each other and we went down the hill to their house for food and drink.

Then, Sunday morning I baptized a 10 month old--it was incredible--he watched my every move. His three siblings were his god-parents. Very moving.

Sunday late afternoon, Sherry, Jack and John came for dinner. They are three of the people, along with Mimi, Tim and Eleanor, who go to the beach with us. We handled details and had burgers, Bern's onion rings and salad along with Sherry's peach cobbler and ice cream.

They are three of our oldest friends and being with them in a joy--if John didn't talk so much!

A busy and gracious two days.

I am thankful for days like those two.

 

Time for some quotes

 To make a prairie it takes one clover and one bee,/One clover, and a bee./And revery./ The revery alone will do,/ If bees are few.   --Emily Dickinson

Ever tried./ Ever failed/ No matter./Try again./ Fail again./ Fail better.  --Samuel Beckett

Happiness,/ Not in another place.../Nor for another hour,/But this hour. --Walt Whitman

What is soul? It's like electricity--/ we don't really know what it is,/but it's a force that can light a room.  --Ray Charles

Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward; They may be beaten, but they can start a winning game.   --Goethe

Our task is to listen to the news that is always arriving out of silence. --Rainer Maria Rilke

He who cannot change the very fabric of his thoughts will never be able to change reality, and will never, therefore, make any progress. --Anwar Sadat

Conversation is a meeting of minds with different memories and habits. When minds meet, they don't just exchange facts: they transform them, reshape them, draw different implications from them, engage in new trains of thought. Conversation doesn't just reshuffle the cards, it creates new cards.  --Theodore Zeldin

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality.  --Martin Luther King, Jr.

I swear to you, there are divine things more beautiful that words can tell.  --Walt Whitman

There is no need for temples, no need for complicated philosophies, my brain and my heart are my temples; my philosophy is kindness.  --Dalai Lama

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.   --Mark Twain

(Ponder at your leisure. And thanks to the Mastery Foundation for my box of quotes.)

 

2020 census

 According the the census data, white population dropped 6% in the last 10 years.

Black, Latino and Asian-American populations all grew.

I say--GOOD NEWS!

White people (an I am one of them) cause more problems for our country than all the other groups combined. Think of January 6 and the White Power rally in Charlottesville and Q-anon, among others. Attacks on Asians continue to climb, Black Americans suffer from the police, and Latinos are denied the immigration our ancestors took advantage of.

The three churches I served as a full-time priest: St. James in Charleston, WV (a predominately Black church); St. Paul's, New Haven (1/3 Black) and St. John's, Waterbury (1/3 Black--mostly from the West Indies and a Hispanic congregation of over 100 on most Sundays)--those were places where I learned what it meant to people of color of White dominance.

My daughter-in-law is Asian. She's a judge and her father and two brothers are doctors.

Come save us Asian-Americans!

I hope I live long enough to live in a country where White people are in the minority.

That will be the day America is truly GREAT again....

The Terminator is pissed!

 Arnold Schwarzenegger can be found on You Tube--just type in his name and search--bad mouthing those who haven't got the vaccine.

He says to people who talk about 'their freedom', "screw your freedom! Freedom implies obligations and responsibilities."

The Terminator seems angry enough to beat someone to death if they don't get the vaccine.

Never mind, Arnold, they are killing themselves!

Too bad they are putting others at risk with their 'freedom'....

Some things

This weekend I'm doing two things that give me great joy.

First, on Saturday, I'll be present on a hilltop in Milton to oversee and bless Peter and Eileen on their 50th wedding anniversary.

They are dear people and will have only family except for two long term friends.

Then on Sunday I'm baptizing a baby at church. I love baptisms with all my heart. Welcoming a new member of the family of God is always a wonder.

I look forward to both of those experiences.

It's as hot as it's been in CT right now.

Bern hates the hot and I hate the cold.

Not the only way we are different.

Then, also on Sunday, we're having John and Sherry and Jack over for dinner to talk about details about our trip to Oak Island, North Carolina.

Mimi and Tim and Eleanor will be joining us at the beach.

I just pray there are no hurricanes to send us home early.

Lots of things happening in the next few weeks after months of Covid made nothing much happen.

Hope your life is looking up a bit though this pandemic isn't nearly over.

 

A change of life

 Having Josh and Cathy and the three girls here for three days changed our lives.

We're so used, Bern and I, to being alone in our house with Bridget that sharing it with five others is strange.

We loved having them here. Emma and Morgan, going on 15 and Tegan, going on 12 is amazing. They talk constantly. It's entertaining but exhausting.

This morning I mentioned that I had a strange dream last night and what resulted was 30 minutes of their chatter about their weird dreams, talking over each other, and no mention of my dream!

We love them so, but they are all approaching young womanhood and are not the children we last saw a year and a half ago.

What a joy though, to be family for a few days.

Now it's back to normal.

And that's good too.