Somewhere, not yet

Sunny. Sunday. Summer. Afternoon, on a bicycle.

Nobody else on the sidewalk. You'd be wasting time to be in a hurry. If you're on just the right slope you can just coast...working the handlebars to stay aloft at times, and maybe moving so slowly the bugs have a chance to land on you. Look both ways, slide down the slope street crossings, will there be enough momentum to make it to the continued level surface on the other side and keep rolling?

Times like this you're glad to have nowhere to go. Not always the case.

Those who grew up in a family active at their church know that there are seasons of reflection and questioning, as does anyone at points in their life. As we mature from childhood to adults we realize things about what we were taught and that some things we'd always believed were now called to question, from Santa Claus to flippant remarks uttered by an adult that a young mind has no choice but to accept as fact. Likewise, when we draw close to God, that leads us to discover certain truths about what we had always believed. Some of these truths are purely theological, about God's nature and interest for humanity...others are less abstract, as they concern how men and women have reacted to Grace over the years.

We're at a crossroads. Science has opened our minds to the point where demons represent that yet unknown and beyond our control. Some had claimed that humans have conquered the universe...just a matter of time. Yet, how come our greatest telescopes reveal more to be seen without, and our latest atom-splitting endeavors uncover more than ever deep within? As soon as we prevent natural disasters we can start on war and disease.

So, modernity's answers failed to satisfy the collective human soul and so now we are once again rife with questions. Some of us like questions. Some of us thrive in a state of “already, but not yet”. Some of us are willing to step out of the familiar and into mystery.

Then again, others simply cannot.

For those of us who are hungry for the now, what God is up to in the present age, it could not be a more exciting time.

And uncertain.

Not to criticize those who remain in the established communities of worship, but just know, some of us simply can no longer take comfort there. Over time my senses have become tuned to ingrained attitudes within many congregations. It's been stated many ways, but it comes down to this, which I've heard reported almost verbatim:

“We won't let you change OUR church.”

Some of us have been participating in a local church for most of our lives, and those there are many reasons why we do. An obligation? A fixation? A staple of the usual week? Social needs? Could we actually be seeking God wholeheartedly every single week or is there some more accurate reason we go? Do we worship worship itself, finding comfort in the setting and accouterments because it takes us to a place of security we came to know at a past time?

None of us donned in flesh have perfect motives at all times, as sure as Christ was tempted, I just hope we're examining them appropriately...watching for what's over the horizon, even if it scares the hell out of us.

Call us rebellious, call us daring, call us sacrilegious, call us what you will. As always, internal conviction must overcome external persecution.

I may not have a church but I have been blessed with friends. We talk things out and ask the hard questions. We choose a measure of discomfort because it leads to a more meaningful life...hopefully teaching us to listen more than we speak, to think before we act, and to put others first.

Old-schoolers ask, “what about sin”??

We ask, “what about relationships”??

To put it simply, the Victorian social morality is now arbitrary, free-floating in a vacuum with no connection to reality for many people. We question institutions and the preacher is not always right. We won't tear them down but we won't blink if they implode.

God will not smite you with fire for laughing your buttons off watching Life of Brian.

Some of us don't easily find our place in traditional ministry settings, which are a perfect fit for some folks but a nightmare for others. We are convinced that God has purpose for all people, both individually and corporately. It's in these times we are thankful for an age that allows for innovation and provides many supportive mentors and friends who help each other out during the journey.

Yes, I said journey, and not always a summer bike ride in dreamy weather where we have no place to get to...well, maybe we want to stay where we are but that's not the best thing....and sometimes we want to be somewhere else, as vivid as we can dream but it's out of our means to get there.

For now.

Competition

“Looks like we're gonna make it -”

I startled and nearly dropped my bottle.

“Oohh sorry, I forgot you probably wouldn't hear me coming...”

“How convenient,” I offer along with a wry glance to acknowledge her poorly executed attempt at concealing amusement.

Our conversations are rarely without consequence. There are times when we simply convey textual information, following the script word-for word, but, hardly ever does it lack some sort of context...or is it pretext? Something, some sort of knowing that surrounds and transcends our words. Her eyes stay on mine forever and a day. Sometimes I look away, in disbelief, and she stubbornly beckons me to believe anyway.

From a lonely patch of paddock fence we have a side view of most of the action, stick figures in black velvet helmets, mounted and roaming about, some with game faces ignoring all but their sheer concentration, some constantly in need of a parent's or coach's reassurance and some with parents in need of someone to fuss over, most but not all are adolescent females. The horses and ponies catch a snack when their humans provide the leisure of standing still near fencepost weeds or slip the occasional starlight mint, otherwise heeding commands via reins and boots. This is the day. Fifth-wheel rigs have hauled man and beast to this place to compete for ribbons and honor.

“How 'bout your group? I just got here...” I ask after a couple sips of water in as many minutes.

“Not bad. Not sure how many placings to expect since they're a young group, but it's experience and they seem to be having fun.”

I take a deep breath of sweet summer evening country air and turn towards her.

“Remind me, did you ever train?”

She half-smiles.

“Thought about it, but...ihh...it's a lot.”

Another sip to buy time, or let her finish her thought, seeing as I'm not sure what to do with that just yet.

I glance back to find her in a slightly agitated nostalgia. “Seems you're just glad to provide rides for these kids.”

“I am,” she finally smiles convincingly. It's amazing how much that smile can say, and a little unnerving at how much of it is beyond me. Yet some things are beginning to make sense. Usually in a barn setting you have families who own horses that their own kids ride and some own more and let out ridership for a fee, or else the trainer owns and lets as such. But here's this gal who owns quite a number, at least a dozen, but never charges for kids to ride.

“May I ask you something?”

She turns toward me deliberately that curious smile. Whether I'm unnerved by that act or just by the fact that I'm pressing in to her life with the next question, I am still unsure.

“So...when....” which fades into a sigh as I look the other way.

“Yyyyyyyyyyyessss?” I can hear the smile. I take a deep breath and bellow it out.

“If this an appropriate thing to ask, how do you choose which kid gets to ride?”

Her smile brightens and brings her eyes into the act as a pair of luminescent blue hounds following a scent into my depths. She breathes deeply and looks away, into her head, as though life itself depends upon the accuracy of her answer, despite the fact that we had stood around and talked many times throughout the weeks, about the weather and our crazy schedules and getting called to work at all hours, and now we stood in a paddock next to a corner of the ring.

My 1984

The summer started with my first June VBS* as a “teen” and ended with a back-to-school-retreat right before I started 7^th grade and was a wonderful buildup to my 13^th birthday, well, except for when the whole family got a stomach bug on the 4^th of July.

Still the radio did everything right, well, at least once I had shed some of my inbred prudence and decided to live a little. As I rigged up the AM/FM section of an old console hi-fi in the garage I got my first taste of Springsteen as he danced in the dark (with googley-eyed Courtney Cox in the vid to boot) and then later on wondered why Peter Wolf was into the same thing as he belted LIGHTS OUT…UHHH HUHHH...and who can deny the foreboding edge of Billy Idol’s eyes without a face?

It's important to remember that my family never bothered to get cable when I was younger...so, instead of the MTV perspective that my peers had of the summer's hits, my imagination supplied all the visual interpretation, and in those days I couldn't have been more inspired by life all around.

On all those rides to and from teen activities I realized that not all popular music was really far out, as Cindy Lauper pointed out with her timeless time after time, which as my blonde-haired crush Jenny pointed out was the number one hit at the very moment he worked the controls of the church van’s crappy AM radio…countless boomboxes turned heads whenever Prince’s guitar announced that doves were about to cry, and then not long after that those funky drums calling us to go crazy. One time I was riding with Mom and from a nearby vehicle heard Steve Perry crooning to his Sherry about how their love holds on…I looked and this dude was cranking it up to get me to look so he could make a face or something, just to mess with some kid on a warm evening.

Then there was my special assignment…Mom decided to treat Dad to an early birthday gift and have me install a new stereo in the truck. Finally…not only the best system we owned (FOUR speakers!) but the cab seemed to resonate those songs perfectly, even with only about 10 watts total power and the fact that the word subwoofer hadn’t been invented yet. I'll never forget how good those Cleveland area stations sounded when we took a camping trip up near what was then Sea World. But most of the time I just listened in the driveway at home. Dudes from down the street would ride their bikes around and stop by and we would talk thru the window about our favorite tunes and artists…I remember telling Matt Goecke that I was into Billy Joel, an in the back of my head I was thinking of the all-vocal For The Longest Time.

Almost forgot about the time I could get Dr. Demento by fluke one Sunday night…see, in my home town we only had so-so radio until after I moved away and so the atmosphere (and God’s sense of humor…) had to create a path for anything cool to come through, in this case Rock 104 WXKE out of Ft. Wayne. So, even tho I had heard novelty acts before I had never come across a wealth such as the Doc, and thankfully I had a tape rolling for most of it…especially for a moment I could have never seen coming…Bryan Bowers' one and only Scotsman *sigh*. It was late at night and there I am in my room laughing the hiney completely off my body…thing is, telling the guys at church about it got wayyyy more laughs than when I let them hear the tape; chalk that up to experience.

Then there were the minor hits no one remembers…ever heard Glen Frey of Eagles fame talk about his hot female neighbor, the sexy girl? And then there was this silly bubblegum retro spoof thing called They Don’t Know which turned out to be my introduction to Brit comedian Tracey Ullman. ON Imeem.com I just found a gem I hadn’t heard in 24 years…Rick Springfield making light of how his name sounds like that of an aforementioned legend from New Jersey. Oh yah…

So, there were countless moments that highlighted my introduction to adolescence during that summer as I constantly adjusted my brother’s old ten speed and observed the fairer sex from a safe distance (especially the gal a couple doors down and a couple years older - she hardly acknowledged my existence as tho she'd actually invented that form of torture...). The music had a way of bringing out the things in life I didn’t really want to face, namely, romance…some of the more soulful numbers, as the late great Dan Hartman dreamed about her if he couldn’t hold her tonight…what’s a body to do when a chorus like that just kinda pulls it out of you?

After that retreat and my birthday it was on to a new year of school…as I sat on the bus one afternoon I pictured myself entering a tunnel that would be the teen years. I had heard people say they’re hard and confusing and I spose I was coming to terms with that.

Heh, one the rising hits at that time was prolly my all-time favorite from Hall and Oates, out of touch, out of time…there it is, just as sure as I’m writing a windy blog about it a million years later.

*Vacation Bible School - a staple of children's Christian education, mainly in Evangelical circles and usually conducted during the summer months.

An Ode to Gravity

Gravity pulls stuff tow'rd Mother Earth
The bane of folks with generous girth

Yet, gratitude we owe for such a gift
That God bestow'd to check random lift

This man and beast alike both do share
Bound to soil for which we take care

And floating o'er trees such ease would bring
O how men of all ages have dream't such a thing

Yet sans terra firma's unseen grip on matter
Waste on the outhouse ceiling wouldst splatter

Even that so would we ever adjust
When our senses on gravity lose their trust?

Gripping on handrails to traverse the town
A lady dons barrel 'oops: "These tame me gown!"

Still it seems we have little reason to fear
For, the force always comes 'round year upon year

And as long as the Roy'l Court pays the right fee
We shall stick to the ground, which is all right by me

fit

because it's a mixture of desire and disgust
because this is the logical conclusion
because we feed off each other
because we give more we take more
because we are
because we can never figure it out
because we get closer every time we try
because this is how we untie each other's knots
because it's nasty as a sour apple

The world is dead

As we pile into the truck cab on Sunday morning
You ask me how I'm feeling...are you sick?

I say no I'm not sick, I don't feel anything
I'm dead...the world is dead, all is numb

So we go on to church with all the other dead people
Some say hello and some go about their way

Later on you ask me why I don't talk to other kids
And I can't really give a good answer, not now

But if I could it would go something like this
Because there are times when the world is dead

Johnny and the other boys always seem happy
They play with other kids and don't know why

Most folks don't step away and take a look
But then, some of us are always a step away

Being a step away is a catbird seat when things go well
Yet a prison cell when you just can't get a groove on

It is the latter times when the world is dead, because,
People have agreed that being uninspired equals lonely

Especially for those who don't consciously become such
Although it has a way of leaving a cavernous void within

So the world expires and green foliage yields gray stone
The lush banquet table withers to dry cold toast

You can't stop it and you can't change it
Because the world is dead, until further notice

plasma

visceral eruption
all heaven exploding

fireball screams
consumes us both

lethal heat envelops
anion satellites

expelled from orbit
of planet atom

surging raging
passion devours

wild free unstoppable
yet so divinely ordered

life's very fluid
pulsing within us

molecules bombard
why don't we make some

new unique substance
radiant true love