Lyrics and Revelation

Thank you, God, for Nat King Cole's voice. And thank you for inspiring these guys: words: John Turner and Geoffrey Parsons; music: Charlie Chaplin. Hey, is that the Charlie Chaplin?? Smile though your heart is aching
Smile even though it's breaking
When there are clouds in the sky, you'll get by
If you smile through your fear and sorrow
Smile and maybe tomorrow
You'll see the sun come shining through for you

Light up your face with gladness
Hide every trace of sadness
Although a tear may be ever so near
Thats the time you must keep on trying
Smile, what's the use of crying?
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you just smile

That's the time you must keep on trying
Smile, what's the use of crying?
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you just smileWhile dealing with my hair this morning and replaying some conversations from yesterday at work, it dawned on me: CT's major issue, the reason she's so fucking annoying all the time, is that she's incredibly disappointed in life.

Whenever there is a discussion of why something stupid happened, or why people do things a particularly stupid way as a matter of course, CT can be counted on to pipe in with a comment to the effect of "But that's not the way it should be."

Well, no. But life is rarely as we think it should be, eh? I think she's never really figured out how to stop raging against fading chance at utopia and deal with life in practical terms. Look, there are certain things people do that are thoughtless and/or backward. They shouldn't do those things. But the fact is that they do, they have done them, and all the rest of us can do is a) bitch about it and/or b) deal with the fallout. I'm OK with bitching (if you've read the blog, that's pretty obvious), but at some point we all really need to get past that step and carry on. CT seems to be rather stuck there.

In the case of yesterday, we were talking about a method of doing something work-related that is bass-ackwards, but due to circumstances, it's kinda the way things happen. We all do this procedure this way, and most of us recognize that it's really stupid, but there's no efficient permanent workaround. (Yes, I'm being obtuse on purpose.) Occasionally, we discuss changing it, but it would be a LOT of work, so we mostly just gripe and then get on with it.

Not CT. She jumped into the discussion Box Lady and I were having--across the workroom from CT--about part of this issue. CT's introductory comment was, "But we should do [this/that/the other thing]. It shouldn't be [the way it is]." Yes, of course we should, and it shouldn't. How about taking the next 6 full weeks of your work-time to coordinate and streamline the process and then train the whole world to do that? BL and I were just trying to figure out how to make that one step a little less painful, but by all means, CT: go nuts. Fix the world. Really. Go on.

Which leads to her next problem: follow-through. As in, she has none. Several years ago she was going to 'prettify' the Large Print section so all the labels said the same thing on them. Some currently say LP, some say Large Type, some say Large Print, and some just have the author's name all alone. She did two shelves, out of about 150 total.

So, now, having come to this realization about her--that she's constantly fighting reality rather than managing it to her benefit, or at least ignoring the bad parts--I think I can get through the day without murderous rage.

Sometimes God just drops this kind of stuff in my head as a gift. So, thanks, Big Guy.

We're home

Mood: Probably the best I've felt in months
Hair: In desperate need of professional help...or even shampoo!
Eyes: Good
Listening to: Beast snoring through the NASCAR race

I'd have written before now, but we were totally exhausted by the time we got home to stay last night and I worked all day today.

We are psyched, sunburned, and stunned from a wonderful week working with various urban ministry sites. There are some amazingly wonderful people doing some good work in Milwaukee to make life better for people who just need a leg up. Props to Raymond Rivera and Sister Clara Atwater to name just two.

Personal memory moments:

• blowing up at the site leader for arranging the smallest group to clean up the biggest post-dinner mess on the night with the least amount of clean-up time
• blowing up at two girls who were were standing precariously on a second-floor window-sill hanging up wet towels over Beast's C-pap (feet on my pillow and Bible, and pressing on the aged window glass for support...it was totally justified, but handled poorly)
• watching Sparky's eyes swell nearly shut after throwing mold around all day while cleaning out a flooded room (THANK YOU GOD for the nudge to pack a Large Bottle of Benadryl!!!)
• one of our girls' commitment to mentoring two younger girls on their faith walk
• realizing that I shouldn't EVER pay retail for a vase or coffee mug but should hit the resale shops because they have hundreds (they actually throw away coffee mugs they get so many!)
• being prayed over by a real saint
• gaining a son (by adoption)
• goofing with a fun(ny) guy who spends his day reclaiming gang-bangers of every stripe
• lying on a large flat rock baking on the beach after an hour of mid-morning walking on the edge of the water
• locking the keys in the car and crying over the situation
• being called a "day brightener" by one of the other adult leaders; apparently, our appearance at the worksite halfway through each day caused her to realize that she was going to survive. Not sure what that was about, but I do know that keeping her half of the group on-task was like herding spiders
• having sore feet EVERY DAY--hobbling for the first 10 minutes every morning, including today
• NOT having sore neck/shoulders
• watching all of our kids outshine so many others on the trip as they grew stronger in their faith and melded as a group
• growing my own faith, and learning some wonderful new songs
• so many others....

Now, I'm going to wake Beast up and tell him that if he's sleeping he should be in bed. :-)

---

Urban Word:

fake the funk: (v.) To act with a false ethos surrounding oneself in an attempt to win respect from a certain influential party.

I'm not cynical, just realistic: I wonder how many kids were faking the funk this week. Time will tell, I guess.

Am I caught up? Hah

I'll never catch up. But that's ok.

Tomorrow I will attempt to dig my desk out so its usable again. And then go on from there.

I'm feeling pretty mellow about stuff right now. Perhaps I should go to sleep on that note, before I start obsessing over everything.

Everyone else is in bed. I think I'll join one of them. G'night.

Poetry Month

Requiem
by Robert Louis Stevenson

Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
        And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
        And the hunter home from the hill.

I quite like this one.


And that's the end of my Mom's checkmarks. Omitted from her chosen poems are those by Wordsworth, Pound, Frost, St. Vincent Millay, Houseman, Brooke....

Oh, well, what can I say? She was 12. At least she 'got' Shakespeare!

Poetry Month

Section XIX is called "Peace."

Prospice
by Robert Browning

Fear death?---to feel the fog in my throat,
The mist in my face,
When the snows begin, and the blasts denote
I am nearing the place,
The power of the night, the press of the storm,
The post of the foe;
Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form---
Yet the strong man must go:
For the journey is done and the summit attained,
And the barriers fall,
Though a battle's to fight ere the guerdon* be gained,
The reward of it all.
I was ever a fighter, so---one fight more,
The best and the last!
I would hate that Death bandaged my eyes, and forbore,
And made me creep past.
No! let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers
The heroes of old,
Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's arrears
Of pain, darkness and cold.
For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave,
The black minute's at end,
And the elements' rage, the fiend voices that rave,
Shall dwindle, shall blend,
Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain.
Then a light, then thy breat,
O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again,
And with God be the rest!

Ooooh, I like this one. Note to self, and anyone else: keep this 'un in mind!
* guerdon = payment

Stop It!

When I got home last night, I would have liked nothing better than to drink a bottle of wine, get blotto, and punch Schedule Dingbat in the head. So it was probably fortunate that, just after eating a banana before leaving work, my stomach started hurting. [Great, am I now allergic to bananas, like my dad?!] I came home and had yogurt and two slices of white bread.

I took my blood pressure (thanks for suggesting that, Lisa!) at about 7:30 and found that it was WAAAAY up, for me, at 138/78. I tend to focus on the diastolic number; somewhere along the line, a doctor told me that is sort of the 'heart attack monitor' and mine is usually around 70. "Normal" systolic is around 120. My normal is between 105 and 110.

OK.

This must cease.

I have to get a handle on all the stress and manage it better. That is clear.

While I was in Colorado, I stopped in my favorite shop to browse. One of the things I ended up buying was a little labyrinth similar to this, crafted out of silver and about the size of a large slice of bread. It came with a stylus in a velour drawstring bag. I think I need to schedule some time with it every day.

There are also a couple of physcial labyrinths in the vicinity. I have wanted to visit them for years, and just never made the time. I think I need to start forcing the issue. [If you don't know why this would be helpful, here's a good resource.]

The other thing that would help is getting away in purely fun ways more often. Last week's Entertainment Weekly magazine had a pull-out with most of the big summer movies listed with their release dates. I think I'm going to try to get to the local theater a couple of times a month (are you listening, Beast??) this summer; it's $3 for a ticket and free refills on snacks, so how can this be bad?? (well, except for the whole concept of the food being crap!)

Maybe I should take up kick-boxing, too.

Hee.

I only say that because Sparky is playing a ninja video game on the TV here in the living room and there's a lot of hitting, shouting and repetetive smacking going on. Normally, it drives me nuts. Today, the sounds are actually sort of soothing.

And on that semi-violent note, I'm off to the grocery store. On a Saturday morning. Things could, indeed, get scary.