OK, I admit it. I’ve been a slacker.

Well, maybe not a total slacker. The fact is that January is just not my most productive month, for writing or anything else. It’s cold, it’s dark, the after-the-holidays slump kicks in full force, and I go into semi-hibernation. So now I’m trying to peek out of the cave into the February light. Sounds like the groundhog, doesn’t it? So if I see my shadow it’s six more weeks of hibernation??

Another confession: I actually watched the Super Bowl last Sunday. Haven’t done that for years because I usually don’t know who’s playing. The NFL season is one of my favorites because there’s nothing quite as restful as a Sunday afternoon, post-church, football nap! So it’s logical that, for me, the Super Bowl is the culmination of all those naps. You know, like a coma or something. But I just had a feeling that this game might be worth watching, and it was. I’m so glad that there is still hope for the underdogs of this world. Go Giants!

As far as the commercials are concerned: the Clydesdales always impress me.

But I noticed something about a couple of the other commercials that was, well, disturbing. Specifically the commercials for SalesGenie.com. There were two of them, one with an Indian employee with seven kids, and the other with a couple of Panda bears. Maybe I’m oversensitive. No, I AM oversensitive.

I used to be a systems analyst and computer programmer. I was very good at it, and maybe if I had been able to be a programmer and ONLY a programmer then I would have continued to enjoy my work instead of coming to hate it. The sad thing is that, either way–loving or hating it–I can’t do it anymore, for two reasons. One is health-related. The other is more insidious. I learned recently that my co-workers, all of them, are now unemployed because their jobs were all outsourced, to India. This was happening before I left, and I did my fair share of training foreign workers to do my job, or at least of trying to train them. The story then was that the old system work would be outsourced so the employees could do new system work. I didn’t belive it then because management was trying so hard to spin outsourcing so that it sounded like a good thing for the employees. Whatever. The end result is that hundreds of American families are now scrambling to keep their lives together, while foreign nationals are scrambling to do the work without the help of the American workers. Nobody wins.

So, I see commercials for a company that is supposed to help sales people perform in their chosen career. And those salespeople are portrayed as cartoon Chinese bears (who were replaced at the zoo by cartoon North American grizzly bears) and cartoon Indian nationals. Sorry, I can’t get past the subliminal messages as to who is actually doing the work.

I talk to teens at church. I’m supposed to be the teacher, but I learn more from them! Anyway, someone asked me recently if I would recommend computer information technology or systems or whatever as a career option for students entering college. I had to say no, and that makes me sad.

And angry.

OK, why do I have a video of a gospel choir on my blog? Because it’s awesome, that’s why.

And because it’s the easiest way I know to introduce this song to the kids in Pulse University Way to Live 101.

I got a letter today, from me.

Guess I better explain that. For the past few years the first weekend in January has been “Ski Retreat Weekend” for the teens at church. When my baby boy graduated to the youth department 6 years ago, the ski retreat was, more accurately, a ski trip. Since then, thanks to a fantastic youth minister, the ski retreat has evolved into an actual retreat, where we take the kids away from home for a weekend to a peaceful retreat center in Valle Crucis. Of course it’s much less peaceful while we’re there! Friday night, Saturday night and Sunday morning are set aside for time to be together, to sing and talk and get to know each other and get closer to God. My first experience with the now, more accurately named, Winter Retreat, was 2 years ago. There was actually snow on the mountain so outdoor winter activity occupied our time Saturday. I tried to ice skate; I succeeded in falling, three times, hard. Last year there was no snow so we improvised a plan that involved Linville Falls and Linville Caverns, which fit into the “Indiana Jones” sort of theme we had in place. The jury is still out on whether or not there will be any snow on the mountain for the upcoming Winter Retreat next weekend.

So, where was I? Oh, the letter. One of the things that our youth minister has us do is write a letter to ourselves, to be read the next year just prior to the winter retreat. It is a totally cool experience, both the writing and receiving of the letter. We take time on Sunday morning and write a letter to ourselves sharing something of what we’ve learned over the weekend or something we hope will be meaningful to our one-year-older self. We address our own envelope, put the letter in and seal it up. Everyone’s letters are collected and held in trust until the next December, when they are mailed back to us. So each member of our family got a letter today.

I didn’t realize what was in my envelope, even after I’d opened it and taken out the notebook paper. I knew the handwriting on the envelope was familiar looking, but I couldn’t place it. Think about it….how often do we really look at our own handwriting? And with computers, how many of us even have legible handwriting anymore?? But as I unfolded the paper, I remembered what it was. I held the paper, wondering what it said, knowing I’d written it to myself but really not remembering what I had written. My first thought was, “I wonder if I told myself to lose weight?” because I really needed to do that last year. There’s a Special K commercial currently airing that was also broadcast last year. In it, the mom is wearing a red velvet robe with white trim. She comes into the living room and bends over in front of the fireplace. In response to seeing her in that position, a child exclaims “Santa!” I hated that commercial last year because it spoke to me where I lived. Well, it took from March to now, but I lost almost 40 pounds. I see that commercial now and think to myself, “Wow, I tackled that one.”

So, had I fussed at myself last year about being overweight? I’m sure I’d fussed at myself for something. I always do. I unfolded the letter and read:

A year has passed by, all too quickly. What’s happened–are you working, are you healthy? More importantly, have you heard the voice of God clearly? Are you walking His path, or are you still wandering in the desert?

Treat your body carefully. It truly is the temple of God. He enters with each breath you take. Make sure there is room for Him to enter with the breath. Make Him welcome there.

Treat your family with respect.

Take your ministry seriously.

Do you know what your gifts are now? Are you using them wisely, reverantly?

Did your life, your faith, make a difference in anyone else’s life?

I can never live up to the expectations I set for myself in my letter, but I can take steps in the right direction. I can get closer to the mark. And with each step I take in the right direction, the more likely it will be that my walk may give someone else pause to stop running off in the wrong direction, to turn around and look for a better way. And in so doing, I have made a difference, in my own life if not in anyone else’s.

Gentle reader, your life is a gift. You have a purpose. Find it, use it, give it away. Make a difference.

(yeah, I know it sounds like Bruce Almighty, but it is good advice.)

Christmas in Radford

The city’s Christmas decorations—stars with multicolored bulbs, circled in tinsel.
It wasn’t Christmas until I saw those stars.

Three red bells, with lights that blinked. Grandma would put them in the window, or on the front door.
It wasn’t Christmas until I saw those bells.

An electric candelabra with blue lights. We put it in the window in the house in Gallimore village.
It wasn’t Christmas until I saw that candelabra.

Grandma’s silver Christmas tree, blue decorations and rotating color wheel.
It wasn’t Christmas until I saw that tree.

Our own cedar Christmas tree, with the glass tree topper and silver icicles.
It wasn’t Christmas until that tree was decorated and I could see it, and smell it.

Away in a manger, no crib for a bed
The little Lord Jesus lay down His sweet head.

Christmas candy in Grandma’s red candy dishes—the ones I have now. Hard candy, peppermint sticks, chocolate covered nuts.
It wasn’t Christmas until I could sneak a piece, or two.

Christmas Eve dinner—turkey, ham, green beans, MASHED POTATOES!
Dessert—applesauce cake, fruit cake?????
Dishes to be washed, dried and put away.
It wasn’t Christmas until the dished were done.

Presents spilling out from under the tree, with all of us cousins waiting to dig in. The ensuing chaos, the piles of wrapping paper littering the floor, Daddy cleaning up the mess and taking it outside.
It wasn’t Christmas until the gifts were opened.

The living room filled with family, multiple conversations over coffee and more dessert. Cousins comparing gifts, trying on new clothes, trying out new toys.
Laughter.
It wasn’t Christmas until the family was together.

As children we waited for Christmas—waited for the decorations, the food, the gifts, the family to be together.

Until these events occurred, it wasn’t Christmas.

The world waited for Christmas and, in a most unexpected way, it came—in the form of an infant, born in a stable, the fullness of God contained in the tiny body of a baby boy, surrounded by shepherds and kings.

Until these events occurred, it wasn’t Christmas.

When I was 10, I talked to Jesus, asked Him to save me and live in me…
And my Christmas came.

And still we wait—for his return, for the redemption of our fallen world, for face-to-face fellowship with Him.

“I am still confident of this:
I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord;
Be strong and take heart
And wait for the Lord”
Psalm 27:13-14

I love “Phantom of the Opera”, at least the movie version of it. I’ve never seen the stage play. Anyway, there’s something almost spiritual about this story. It could be picked apart and used as a metaphor for the spiritual life; I’ve done some of that in considering using the movie as a teaching tool for teens. But this story, this music, touches me in a much more personal way. When Christine sings “Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again”, I think of my own father. When I hear “Prima Donna” I remember all the prima donnas from high school and college, and the ones I know now. “Think of Me” makes me wonder if anyone I’ve ever known still remembers me, or if I’ve been invisible for my entire life. And “All I Ask of You”, well, where do I start? It’s the relationship every girl dreams of when she thinks of her Prince Charming. I hear the conversation and think of the conversation between Jesus and His bride.

Then there’s “Past the Point of No Return”. Over in the Profundity Corner is the latest quote, from the series “Mars Rising” from the Science Channel. “Once you pass the point of no return, there’s no going back.” Really? Well DUH! Perhaps, just maybe, that’s why it’s called the point of no return?????

On the other hand, maybe there are points that we pass by, and then come back around to when we’re ready to accept what they have to offer. But then they wouldn’t be “points of no return”, they’d be “points of not-right-now-maybe-later.” I have some of those I suppose. The most obvious one is the leaving of, and the returning to, music. I left it so deliberately; I just don’t seem quite ready to return to it deliberately. I’m more like sneaking up on it, poking at it to see if it’s still breathing, if there’s some sort of musical CPR to be applied to bring it back to full life. Something to think about at 2:00 AM.

Another point that I keep poking at is the whole writing thing. Sometimes I can’t stop myself from putting words down; other times it seems to take so much more energy that I have to expend for what would become a less-than-satisfying result. My son, bless his heart, wants me to write, to join the local writers organization, to read something at an open mic evening. I, bless my little heart, want him to do the same, with one caveat: that he refrain from dark, morbid topics.

So, what to do? To write, or not? To play, or not? To sing, or not?

Think I’ll knit. Socks, anyone? Or a purple bear-claw lap warmer??

Yesterday I had an hour to occupy myself between appointments, so I sat in the parking lot and listened to the radio. I don’t know exactly where it came from, but one of those things that appears in my brain, already written and waiting to be transcribed, showed up.

Here it is.

A Virtual Life

Virtual conception, procreated in a Petri dish, possibly from virtual parents who’ve never met.

Virtual birth, broadcast live over the ‘net so that virutal family can share the ecitement of the blessed event without the inconvenience of travel of the annoyance of human interaction with real people.

Virtual childhood: computers teaching pre-schoolers their ABC’s and 123′s, virtual playments living in the virtual world of the computer game.

Virtual education, from pre-school to post-doctorate, with teachers, professors, students, colleagues from the four corners of the world, all gathered in front of cameras and computers, sharing virtual ideas and imparting virtual knowledge, without ever having shared the same space, or breathed the same air.

Virtual communication with virtual friends: voice mail, e-mail, test messages sent and received without ever having met the real person behind the virtual images and virtual words.

Virtual friends, virtual lovers, virtual marriage, virtual sex, virtual entertainment, virtual addiction, virtual crime…virtual prison?

Virtual death: online condolences, paid by virtual acpuaintances who have no time or desire to physically comfort those who suffer an all-to-real grief.

Perhaps we just live forever, our virtual selves floating in virtual reality, with virtual pieces of our virtual existence roaming from one server to another without ever being purged, “ghosts in the machines.”

George Orwell wrote of the viewscreen, of the power it would have over society. And here we are.

Is there a real cure for our common virtual disease?

Does it even have a real name?

Are we living a virtual life in a virtual world, or are we dead already?

“Facing the Music”….what do you think about when you hear that phrase? Taking responsibility, accepting the inevitable, going into the dreaded year-end performance evaluation??

I have a lot of music to face. I’m officially off the crutches (hot dog!), driving (watch out!), and dutifully doing my physical therapy exercises (ouch, that hurts!) My goal is to be able to hike from Massie Gap across Wilburn Ridge to Rhododendron Gap and back by next June. I haven’t set the date yet, but it will probably be late June since my baby boy graduates from high school on June 14. IF he finishes his silly “senior project” that our state educators are implementing, in phases, and he’s in the guinea pig class. Don’t get me started.

I’m not going to Cielo in January. At first I thought I’d still be hobbling on crutches until mid-December, but that’s not the case now so I can’t blame my knee for my having to stay here. The group leaves the day after my birthday, another bummer, but getting to go as a birthday present won’t work either. This whole thing is hard for me to accept, because it’s become so much a part of my life. I’m worried about Rosa, so I’m going to send her a letter, some pictures, and a small gift of some sort. Probably a crocheted head covering for her to wear to church.

I cleaned up my house Saturday, like banished tons of clutter to the nether regions of the basement to be sorted and kept or chucked or yard-saled. It was hard, I over-worked my knee, but it’s done.

As part of the cleaning effort, my freckle-faced daughter sorted my piano music into categories for me. I emptied the one bookshelf I allowed to stay above ground, and loaded the music into it, by category and composer. Now that I know exactly what (and how much) music I have, it’s time to return to playing some of it. I’ve always loved to play Christmas music, but for the past few years haven’t had the chance to play for anyone. Well, December 2 I will be playing a prelude at church. I do this fairly regularly, but not at Christmas for some reason, and I usually play something quiet, introspective, etc. Not this time. Nope, I picked something dramatic, with arpeggios and flourishes and crashing chords on both ends of the keyboard. I don’t know why, it just sort-of happened during a moment of insanity or something. And now I’m committed.

I’ve always been afraid of pages of music that have lots of ink on them. I like lots of white space on my music (think “Amadeus” and the king’s reaction to Mozart’s operas: “too many notes”) But for some reason, 25 years after graduating from college w/ music degree in piano performance, the notes aren’t scaring me quite so much. Isn’t it weird that my degree is in performance and I was afraid of notes?

I know one reason for that fear: having to face the competition. Music can be nasty business when it gets competitive. Always being compared to other students. How advanced are they? OMG she’s playing a concerto and I’m still on sonatinas, I must be hopeless, dare I say, “ritard”-ed. If you’re musically challenged, “ritard” means “s l o w d o w n”. I’ve come across a lot of technically gifted pianists, but sometimes it’s hard for me to call them “musicians” because I don’t hear music when they play: I hear notes. It’s not about the notes, it’s about the MUSIC. And it’s not just instrumentalists either. Singers have the same issues. The voice is just another instrument that be played with technical precision without conveying any emotion, any music. I like to understand the words when someone is singing in English. Italian: don’t care, just make it pretty. German: good luck making it pretty…..I’m digressing.

Back to the fear of many notes. My baby boy is trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life. He has too many options. He’s a gifted artist, a self-taught awesome quitarist, and a math brain. Oh, and he writes poetry too. So, I asked him “If you had a million dollars, what would you do?” According to the movie “Office Space”, if you answer that question honestly you find out what you really want to do with your life. He didn’t quite get it, so I volunteered to answer that question myself. I thought for about a nanosecond, and said “I want to be a conductor.” Talk about looking at bunches of notes, all at the same time! But it’s the truth. I want to conduct. I want to play and sing too, of course. But conducting…it’s like becoming one with the music and the musicians, like a dance.

Funny thing about conductors: they FACE THE MUSIC.

I received these from Mission Emanuel. The first ones are the same view as in my previous post. They need no further explanation, except to say that God was watching over Cielo to protect the people’s lives.

Here is contact information if anyone would like to donate money to help clean up and replace lost belongings:

Mission Emanuel, A Ministry of The Gathering/USA Inc.
1220 E. Concord Street
Orlando, FL 32803

Donations should be marked “Noel flood relief”.

This is Cielo, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. This picture was taken last January when I was there with the Women’s Ministry of Mission Emanuel. I’ve written about Cielo before. Since 2004 we’ve taken a group of American women to the Dominican Republic every January. The next trip is scheduled for January 19-26, 2008. A group of Americans just returned right before Tropical Storm Noel hit Hispaniola. Yesterday I received an update from Mission Emanuel, showing some of the storm damage from Noel. There’s a river about 1 mile away that’s not visible in the picture above. The picture I received yesterday shows water, everywhere. Cielo sits on top of a hill, on the western outskirts of Santo Domingo. The Haino river runs past there and empties into the Caribbean. When the river flooded, Cielo was cut off. Some of the families there lost their homes and posessions to mud slides. Thankfully there were no deaths.

I hope my sisters in Cielo are OK. I wish I could see them in January, but I can’t. I will miss them.

At night the words come out to play
Skipping along through my head, as I lay
On the pillow, awake, reviewing the day.

The price I will pay for these words in the light
Of tomorrow—frustration, fatigue, and the fight
Between words and myself that started last night.

In daylight, the words scamper and hide
In my brain, inaccessible, taunting my pride
In occasionally catching them, stemming the tide

Of the thoughts that tease me, dare me to chase
Them, hunting them down all over the place
To write them on paper, thus winning the race.

To those scurrilous words I say, “Taunt me no more!
I’m sleeping tonight; I’ve settled the score
Between you and me.”
I hope I don’t snore.