Why Christmas?

So this is Christmas
And what have you done
Another year over
And a new one just begun
And so this is Christmas
I hope you have fun
The near and the dear one
The old and the young

Happy Christmas by John Lennon

For many of us, Christmas is that time when we look back at the year nearly gone, we rush to get presents and we try hard to enjoy quality time with friends and family. All as it should be. All very good aims and endeavors.
For me, Christmas is also a realization that, as John Lennon said, "And what have you done?"
What have I done that I can claim to be a good person?
A person worthy of believing I can dictate my relationship with the Creator of everything?
What could I possibly do that can elevate me to divine status?

It's an easy answer for me - nothing.

There is nothing I can achieve, do or contemplate that would make me worthy of experiencing God's concern and care. Yet, I believe I benefit from those things. How can this be?

Christmas is the answer. Whether one takes the Mary and Joseph stories in the Bible as literal truths or not, to me this represents the ultimate reaching out by God to humans. Just like an intervention with an addict, the healthy one took the needed first step to put things right. Why?

Love.

Same reason one of us would stage that intervention for someone we cared so deeply about. Just like an addict getting well, the intervention represents the beginning of the cure. I'm not going to say that I know exactly how it works between us and God. That'd be pretty audacious. That's something each of us needs to work out on our own. But sometime during this holiday rush, I hope you can find just a moment to think about it; take a pause to consider there are other things greater than each of us and wonder how we fit into the puzzle. Ask, "Why?"

Here is my Christmas prayer for all of us:
A very merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear

Love Came Down at Christmas

The painting at left is Paul Gauguin's
Te Tamari No Atua (Nativity)

God did not wait till the world was ready,
till...nations were at peace.
God came when the Heavens were unsteady
and prisoners cried out for release.
God did not wait for the perfect time.
God came when the need was deep and great.
God dined with sinners in all their grime, turned water into wine.
God did not wait till hearts were pure.
In joy God came to a tarnished world of sin and doubt.
To a world like ours, of anguished shame,
God came and God’s Light would not go out.
God came to a world which did not mesh;
to heal its tangles, shield its scorn.
In the mystery of the Word made Flesh,
the maker of the stars was born.
We cannot wait till the world is sane to raise our songs
with joyful voice, or to share our grief, to touch our pain,
God came with Love: Rejoice! Rejoice!

-- from “First Coming”, Madeleine L’Engele

Wishing the most blessed of Christmases to All

It's the Friday Random Ten Time

Here's the rules for the Random Ten. Basically, let your iPod, mp3 player or iTunes, winamp or Windows Media Player make a random playlist of music on your drive. Then list them.
Annamaria is swamped with work this week and asked me to host. I'm so honored, but I'm also going to be really busy on Friday - Hannah comes home!!! So, since she is still on European time as she spends the night in Gatwick Airport on a 12 hour layover, it is Friday where she is! Here's my list (this is from the home collection):
1)Beautiful - Audio Adrenaline
2)Three Marlenas - The Wallflowers
3)Much Afraid - Jars of Clay
4)Trouble in the Fields - Nanci Griffith
5)I've Been All Around This World - Jerry Garcia
6)In Two (Lament) - Jennifer Knapp
7)Catch a Wave - The Beach Boys
8)Seven Little Indians - John Hiatt
9)Tell It to the Devil - The Marshall Tucker Band
10)A Dios Le Pido - Juanes
Whatcha listening to?

Oct. 15, 1968. A Tuesday.

I'll never forget that day. And I have this scar to remember it by.
It was a typical fall afternoon in Connecticut. The temperature was low enough that we had on longsleeves, but we didn't need coats or anything drastic. Mom had left for work at 5, same as every week day. Dad didn't get home until around six; that's when dinner was. I guess my sisters Karen and Gretchen were inside finishing it up, per Mom's instructions. In the meantime, the boys were out front playing football.

We would play football in our front yard. It was about 30 yards long and about 10 yards wide. That's a pretty small field if you got alot of guys playing but there were probably only six of us (three on a side). So I'm thinking it was probably me, maybe wake, definitely Billy Keenan, probably Joe Keenan, maybe Mark and Frank Keenan. I was 9 years old, Billy was 8. Joe would've been 11, Mark 13 and Frank 14. Wake would have been 15. Because Billy and I were playing, this was a two-hand touch football game.
My team kicked off. The ball was sailing toward the trees at the goal line. I was charging down the yard to make a play on the ball. Billy's job was to block me. Block me he did. Sort of. I was a bit taller than Billy then. I was running full speed when he stepped in front of me. How we meshed exactly, I'm not sure. But suddenly I heard my brain hit my skull when I stopped dead. Then he was howling, and I saw his face covered with blood. I tried my best to comfort him and get him to stop crying as the older boys assessed the situation, began assigning blame and scrambling for cover. Someone pointed out to me that I was also bleeding and the situation got drastically more intense. Gretchen probably came out of the house. She would have been 17, I guess. More or less in charge of us kids. Billy headed home with some form of bandage over his left eye, his brothers shepherding him across the middle. That's what we called the area between our houses.
It was decided that I needed medical attention. For some reason, Austin, our oldest brother was home that afternoon. His new Mercury Cougar was going to be my transport. It was maroon with a black vinyl top, red interior. I remember him admonishing me not to get blood anywhere.
Off we went to Dr. Dwyer's office in the center of town. His office was in one part of his house. A very pleasant man, he informed those in charge of me that, although he had stemmed the bleeding, I probably should get stitches.
I'm told when we got back to the house, my father was a little upset, because dinner wasn't ready yet. And then even more so to learn that our evening was going to be spent on a trip to Hartford Hospital, about 20 miles away.
The doctor there went to great lengths to insure that my scar (pictured above) did not protrude. He tied eight individual knots instead of using a chain stitch approach.
"This way, when he is older and shaves, he won't knick himself every time."
I appreciate that every time I shave.
Billy wound up with 15 stitches over his eye. He said the doctor told him it was cut right over the top of his whole eye and he (the doctor) was able to see behind it.

But you what to know the worst part about this event? Back then, Heidi and I had an eight thirty bedtime. Except one night a week we were allowed to stay up until nine. We used that night to watch Julia. Julia aired on Tuesday nights on NBC, right after The Mod Squad, which was on ABC. Heidi was mad, because she had to go to the hospital with us and missed the show.

Well said, Mr. Churchill

"What is the use of living, if it be not to strive for noble causes and to make this muddled world a better place for those who will live in it after we are gone?"

We wish you a Merry Christmas!

Ok, so it's last year's picture. Sue me.

What leader are you?

Saw this link on Bruce's blog and co-opted it.

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Well, I do think I'm honest.

This guy scares me....

Dick Cheney is one scary mother. I have a feeling that he played a major role in the Administration's decision to forgo the inconveniences of obtaining secret court approval for spying on United States citizens. Check this quote:
"Watergate and a lot of the things around Watergate and Vietnam both during the '70s served, I think, to erode the authority I think the president needs to be effective, especially in the national security area," Cheney said.
(a link to the whole article)
You mean things like using the IRS to punish political opponents, Dick? Or maintaining a list of enemies of the Administration and devising strategies to discredit them? How about calling anyone that disagrees with your policies "unpatriotic," "weak on defense" (read national security) or "shameful"? Does anyone remember, "My country. Love it or leave it."?

I am not a big fan of Cindy Sheehan and the (left) wingnuts around her these days. I realize there are legitimate interests in protecting our country from those seeking to do us harm. But I also subscribe to the theory that if you give up freedom to protect liberty, pretty soon you are left with neither.

The willingness of Cheney and company to obviate the protection of the Constitution in the name of protecting it displays a disturbing trend in our country. Incrementally, we are being overtaken by a goverment intent on protecting us from every threat possible. From both the liberal side and the conservatives. It is a power grab that is escalating in intensity and potential danger.

The framers of the Constitution intended for the goverment to function only with the people's consent. Our inaction and ambivalence toward the current political scene and its stench of influence buying is sliding the land I love toward a tipping point from which the return may well be incredibly high in lives lost or ruined.

The Red Scare of 50s' McCarthyism, the backlash of Watergate, and the taint of anything associated with Jimmy Carter's presidency could pale in comparision to the police state we could become if the consolidation of Executive power and the elimination of any oversight, either judical or legislative, and opposing views through character assassination are unchecked.

Everything is called a war these days. The wars on drugs and illegal immigration allow federal agents to stop northbound traffic on the highways of the Southwest and search the vehicles. The war on drunk drivers allows checkpoints to be randomly set up anywhere and cars and drivers stopped, interrogated and investigated. Curfews to prevent teen violence are in place in many cities, meaning it is possible for police to stop vehicles at will in late hours. Cameras monitor intersections and toll booths with surveillance lens to record the vehicles that go through them. The goverment is allowed to enter any residence at will and claim afterward that it was in the name of either drug trafficking or terrorism suspicion. Assets can be seized without recourse. Guns are becoming the culprit in crime fighting and their registration mandatory.

I know the intention behind each of these was good when begun. But it won't take much for a change to be made, for a manevolent power to tighten its grip and emmasculate its opponents in the name of the common good. All of these could be used to intimidate as well as prevent opposition to the goverment's "leadership." And Dick Cheney may be leading the charge.

An indelible memory

This picture is of Lake Manitook, the small lake in Granby where I grew up. This picture is from the south looking at the north shoreline. In among those trees was where our family shared a "beach" with another family, the Keenans. We both lived in houses located directly up the hill from the lake. It was a one hundred foot descent down "The Gulley" to get to the beach.
The Gulley did double duty. In addition to providing a footpath that was more gradual than the steep embankment rising from the edge of the small beach, during the winter it was the place we tried to recreate the difficult bobsled and luge runs of Lake Placid. Many days when the snows were still falling, we'd be out there in The Gulley, packing walls and making little jumps that our metal (later plastic)flying saucers would careen and fly off. The start of the track was pretty tame, but it soon got willie.
A root that served as a step in the summer was the first launch. After gaining air here, the ground dropped into a much more severe slope. Our footpaths for summer generally took us above winter's sliding zone and the boys, well we were vocal about maintaining that pattern.
"Stay off the track"
"Don't walk on the track"
"You're gonnna ruin it"
These howls either echoed off the sides of the gulley, adding to their shrillness, or were hushed by the new snow - Mother Nature's was of saying, "Calm down. I'll make more. It won't be the end of the world."
Anyway, once the track had been set in place, we'd pray it would stay cold and last the winter. I don't think it ever did.
Sometimes, after a series of warm days or sunshine on it followed by very cold nights, the snow would harden like cured steel. That's when the track got really fast. Then, when blessed by Mother Nature with a slight dusting of snow (an inch or less), things could get exciting.
Did I mention The Gulley wasn't exactly a straight shot to the lake?
About two thirds of the way down it sort of eased its descent. There, in summer, was a fork where one could go left to the beach or right to the collapsed boat house. Straight ahead of you was a very small shack in the middle of an area the forest was busy reclaiming when I was a child. Birch trees, oak and maple saplings were busy turning into strong hardwoods. As long as they didn't grow on the path, we didn't bother them because they weren't bothering us. There was one in particular though that had terrorized us with threat which one day was fulfilled.
It was about three inches in diameter and it was maybe four feet off of summer's path, dead in the middle of the fork.
That winter had been very kind to children and the track had been hard set for maximum speed. Ample snow and Wide World of Sports bobsled coverage had inspired us to new heights. Being in the youngest group of siblings, Billy Keenan and I had finally reached the age of being bigger than our fears. I think I was 10, Billy 9. So at that fork, we opted to build a left turn which was followed by a right then a rapid drop straight toward the lake which was by now frozen to the edge. Every year's great hope was that you could make it all the way down the track and zip out onto the frozen ice with a triumphant "YIPPEE!" A small bit of brush had been cleared away to make the ice accessible.
A cancelled school day due to an inch or two snowfall had us out to try our luck. It took a few runs to pack the new snow into the track, but now things were getting up to speed.
Billy and I had had a couple turns and were climbing back up when we heard the raucous laughter. My sister Heidi (she's my Irish twin) and Billy's sister Maggie (she would have been 7 then) were going to give it a go.
Next thing I know, Maggie is screaming down the hill, both in speed and voice.
Over the jump and she is still on the plastic toboggan! She didn't fall off!
She whooshes by me as I stand above the track under the great hemlock tree where the Keenan's path goes up. Precariously balancing myself, I swivel my head to follow brave Maggie, her red hair a mass coming from her knit cap, racing to catch up. Never before and never again would my eyes behold someone traveling that fast our little track.
Unfortunately for Maggie, our engineering prowess (or lack of) combined with youth's impatience had left the wall at Maggie's Fork of Destiny about as adequate of the 7th Street levee in New Orleans. Instead of directing her to the left and a world record run onto the ice, it served as a launch pad. With more air under her than Tony Hawk, Maggie and the plastic toboggan went their seperate ways. Her body rotated to face us, parallel to earth. I think she looked at Billy with a mixture of blame and planned revenge.
I swear I thought she broke her back.
Saved by the flexibility of youth, Maggie hit that tree with the middle of her back at top speed. If I had slo-motion film, I'll bet we'd see her feet go past her head as she wrapped around that tree.
Stunned, Billy and I stood paralysed, rooted like the trees around us.
You know that moment in between? The one that seems like it lasts forever and later you wish it had? Between something bad happening and the realization that something bad happened?
Maggie's in between hung between us all. Billy and I frozen in place. Heidi at the top of the hill staring with a mixture of disbelief and I-told-you-so (Heidi has always been more prudent than I). And Maggie trapped in her in between time.
Then the moment snapped with the howl of her terror and pain.
What happened next, I can't really describe. It is lost in time, blocked out by the larger memory of brave Maggie sailing through the air on her way to meet that tree.
I'm sure we comforted her, made her promise not to tell her mother (it had to be the boys' fault, somehow) and confirmed she was ok.
No Care-Flight helicopters.
No lawyers or lawsuits.
No permission slips needed.
Just four kids out being kids in Mother Nature's playground.

All I know is this. Just when I thought I had outgrown my fear, it leapfrogged me that day. Suddenly a run that ended on the ice became an impossible dream, for never again would I travel The Gully with complete abandon, hands up, feet tucked in, trying for every bit of speed. Whether it was respect for or fear of the laws of physics, I somehow slowed myself before that fork.

I wonder why we didn't just make the wall higher?