A Good Season

June and July have always been my favorite months.  As a child it was the annual rebirth of freedom for children everywhere.  School was out and each day was ours to decide and make to whatever our whim was that day.  Growing up a generation ago, my choices were not held captive to the restrictions placed on children today “for their own good and safety.”  If felt like riding my bicycle to the beach 20 miles away, going to the pool to meet friends, head into the woods to build a fort, or play ball with a bunch of kids  (and no grown-ups to watch over us), I did it, and I was home before dad was for dinner. 

June reminds me of one of my greatest blessings, my wife.  Every year we celebrate our anniversary in June.  This year we celebrated half our lives together as a married couple.  That’s a long time, but not nearly long enough for me; I look forward to many more.

The month of July brings us the rebirth of summer in all its fury.  Motorcyclists begin a new riding season, with more events available in which to participate than open days on the calendar.  As a teacher, I now look forward to time off to spend with my children, even if it’s just having breakfast for lunch when some of us wake up a little late. 

Recently I have been learning, through a family study of the Westminster Shorter Catechism, about the whats & whys of our faith.   The 8^th, 9^th and 10^th questions deal with God’s creation in Genesis chapters 1 & 2.  I found the intermingling of good and evil in these chapters immensely interesting.   Reading the words we found God’s creation to be “good”; God himself proclaimed it so several times, and when He was all done, the whole of it was proclaimed, “very good.”  In chapter 2, evil becomes a present fact of the world as man, God’s highest creation, the one He to whom gave dominion over all the rest, decided to disobey and choose the one thing he was forbidden.  Since then, evil lives right here along with us in God’s “very good” creation. 

We have so much good in our lives, but even so, in the midst of trials and tribulations it can be sometimes hard to remember how very blessed we are.  This past month my chapter lost an old friend, one of the early members of Chapter 500, Chris Allen; he was only 53.  Several of CMA's leadership regionally have been also been touched by the loss or illness of a family member.  We also lost members who have had to move or give up riding due to economic conditions.   At work, my teammates and I lost 5 close family members while 5 of our student suffered the loss of a parent (in one case a young girl lost both mom and dad in a hail of bullets) this past year.  

It sounds like I am on a real "downer", but I encourage you today, as trials come, and they will, to take time to remember how richly and undeservedly you are blessed.  The hurt and confusion will still be there, but I am certain that it will be tempered with a refreshed understanding of just how good our God really is.

Frustration

I'm feeling frustrated right now.  I am a member of a group that should share Christ in as many ways as we can, but we don't.  I am a member of a group that is uniquely gifted to make an impact in the community for Christ, but we don't.  I am a member of a group that has numerous chances to show Christ's grace and mercy to people with whom we come into contact, but we don't.  I am a member of a group that has promised to be an example of salt and light...., but we don't.

What next?

Help me to understand.... What now?

I was so sure, so certain how this would end, how all this would come to a close and how from this end we as a nation would go forward.  I was wrong.  I feel lost.  I am at a loss for what to say.  I am sitting here questioning all I know and understand about the rule of law.  As I write this the words are still sinking into my consciousness,"...the Court has upheld the legislation including the individual mandate..."  This will take a while to really sink in, when it does I fear that I will be unable to recall these feelings and thoughts so I put them down now.

No authority on Earth or in the heavens is there unless by God's will.
All things are planned to one end, that is to bring glory to God.
Love people, by this they will know.
The ways of the Lord are too wise for man to understand, though it is His promise to
     give us the understand that we need as the moment arrises.

I have lived through things I did not understand, I have even through them flourished.
I need not know why in every instance.
There are thing that I do know right now, and these things I will hold onto right now.

This is not a surprise to God.

Pizza Dough

Made pizza dough tonight.  Man that stuff is stretchy with out actually stretching.  You roll it out, pull it out, pinch it out, and it springs back.  It's kind of frustrating to put so much effort into making something change and not get much done.  wow, that's an analogy just waiting to be expanded...

-Like parenting difficult children
-Like training a hyper dog
-Like trying to point out ethics issues with our local mayor
-Like convincing a cat to take a walk on a leash
-Like God convincing me His way is better

SUper coOL

My wife is so cool....

No, I mean it.  She has this ability to see what I am interested in and somehow find a way to show that it's cool with her that I am spending way too much time checking out this new thing.  A couple three weeks ago I came across this picture of what I thought was an old cafe racer style bike.  (Cafe racers started showing up in Britain and then later Europe in the late 50's and 60's.  Guys with common interests in going fast and riding bikes would tinker and tune their off the shelf bikes or bikes they'd salvaged from a heap. After a while these stripped down two wheel hot hods began showing up in number at the highway cafes around Britain's major towns.  The hot thing to do when 2 guys got to saying who's bike was fastest, was to put a song on the jukebox, a bet on the table, then both would hop out the door and as fast as they could ride down the road to the next cafe, turn round and be back before the song was over.  The first one in the door took the bet.)  These bikes were all the rage for a generation, and soon had their own mystique and unique styling that set them apart.

They were clean, their owners/makers stripped off every extra ounce of unneeded metal or plastic that they could.  They were stream-lined with shortened and often down turned handlebars, indicator lights moved out of the wind or just plain removed.  Many had engines from a bigger bike put into the frame of a smaller lighter one for better power.  Most had little packing in the exhaust and made a dreadful racket.  And best of all, rarely was one just like any other one, they were unique.  As individual as the guys who made them and rode them.

I started by talking about what I thought was an old cafe racer, but I was wrong, it was  anew one.  These old bikes are getting making quite a comeback in popularity so it seems and for a lot of the same reasons they originally came into being back 50 years ago.  Guys want a personal, unique bike and they don't want to break the bank getting it.  (Don't get me wrong, you can BUY a pre-made one for as much as you want to spend.)  There are a bunch of little shops out there willing to build you one.  But for the most part most of the new cafe racers are being made in a backyard shop a few hours a week by some guy with a cool idea in his head.

I also started off by saying just how cool my wife was.  She came home today with a cafe racer tee-shirt for me (YEAH!).  Babe, you rock!  I hope you know that I love you a ton, and that I will make sure to take you for a ride on it once I build it......

Happy Fathers' Day Dad

Yesterday was fathers' day, the first one since my dad died last November.  It felt bad to not be able to call him on the phone and say hello, thanks, I love you.  I did a lot of things to take my mind off this over the weekend, but in the end I don't think I ever stopped thinking about him.  I took a lot for granted with my dad.  I took for granted that he loved me, he didn't say it a lot, but he made sure I knew it through everything he did.  I never had to worry where my dad would be at the end of the day, he would be home. He would walk into the house at the end of his work day and head straight for mom, he would put down his lunchbox, hold her shoulders in both of his hands, kiss her full on the lips and say "hello honey,or how's my girl."  The he would greet both my sister and I.  That seems so simple, but I only just recently came to an understanding how vitally important this and dozens of other little things dad did was to me.

I know I started by saying how hard it was to not have the chance to call him this Sunday, and I said that with full understanding that the last 2 years I did get the chance to say it, he really wasn't there to understand it.  Whether he did or not, it meant a lot to me to be able to thank him for what he did on a daily basis for my sister, mother and me.  At no time did we ever doubt he was rooting for us.  He may have been grumpy and contrary at times, but he was always a fan of us.

I love you dad, thanks for everything.

Life on Prednasone

So 2 days ago I had to go back on prednasone, my allergies were kicked into high gear by some environmental aspects in a classroom in which I have to pend the next two and a half weeks.  I was absolutely miserable, but I was totally not wanting to call my doctor because I knew he was going to use the word I dread, prednasone.  Now understand, the stuff works, in fact within just a few short hours I could feel my histamines shutting down, prednasone is a miracle drug.  The thing about it that I hate is that it makes life almost unmanageable.  The best way I can describe how prednasone makes me feel is to ask you to imagine what spawn would come from crossing a species with the attention span of a 16 year old male, the energy level of that hyperactive squirrel in the movie "Over the Hedge," and for good measure throw in the communication skills of one of those lawyer-talk-disclosure-statement-giving-advertisement-announcer guys.  Ugly thought isn't it?  Well that's where I am right now.  I'm locked in a class with a bunch of teachers as the spawn of the afore mentioned unnatural combination above while being asked to think in an analytic and, get this, coherent way.  (You laugh, but if you saw how many times I have used spell check and grammar correct in this short paragraph you'd probably laugh harder.)  6 more days, I have just 6 more days....  Help.