Off on a Lark or Alone in the Bee-Loud Glade

Arden @ IKEA

2011-08-03T09:06:00.000-07:00

The Fourth of Arden

2011-06-30T08:31:00.000-07:00

This post is already about a month old though I am posting today 6/30/11 most of it was put together about a month ago...

Arden’s 4th has come and gone. He hasn’t made that complete transition to ‘underwear’ yet. It seems boys are always slower than girls in this area. Really I am not too concerned about it; Arden is very close to making this transition and I know he will with a little more time.

It’s pretty obvious he is probably going to be left-handed, or possibly ambi… I know the roots of handedness seem basically genetic but I can’t think of anyone in my family I knew was left handed. Really I am not ready to write about his 4th yet…

I have been in something of a funk or daze for the last several days. I was sick about a week ago- on Arden’s birthday both Michelle and I were not feeling well- I stayed home from work but when we finally got home from his party at Chuck E Cheese I had to take to the bed. I really felt bad. I couldn’t communicate how badly I really felt. I was having chills, my body literally hurt, my legs especially, and I felt on the edge of passing out from time to time. I had a fever some of this time.

Ever since that time- for the past week- I haven’t felt quite right. I haven’t been feeling well, my body, again my legs especially, being in pain- well I don’t know what really has been going on. Of course along with all this, my usual feelings of exhaustion were even more pronounced and I just felt like I was walking around, a zombie, unable to narrow my thoughts to any kind of focus, to anything at all.

The usual litany, lack of money, lack of time, lack of energy, arguments with Chel about just anything or everything, I have been yelling at Arden even more than usual, but I couldn’t articulate any of this, I just felt really, really bad, really exhausted, as if I needed a few days sleep, and where was the money coming from for the next week or so… all the usual stuff but magnified beyond my ability to handle.

Prayer, medication, and time here I am. I felt last night, before I went to my night job, as if I had woken up from some kind of stupor. I couldn’t do anything while I was in that stupor so my part of taking care of various things at home just didn’t get done. But usually I am removed from this stuff by my hours at work, and my normal exhaustion anyway; I never get enough done around the house. Michelle constantly complains about that, I always feel very guilty, but trying to push through my limits is often next to impossible it seems for me.

The pain in my legs, from walking around on my job @ Wal-Mart I surmised, but really I don’t know what was really going on, but the pain was enough to make me cry, it just refused to go away, and trying to tell Michelle I was in this pain, well she is constantly combating fibromyalgia, so for her it is a way of life right now, but for me something new, and something I didn’t know how to deal with… so I cried. Took medication, tried to rest, pray, reach some equilibrium, and thanks to Him, and Michelle’s forbearance, I came through something.

Now part of me is under this weird impression He is trying to teach me a sort of lesson, more than one perhaps. He wants me to understand a little of what Michelle goes through in fibromyalgia, and how taxing it can be to your spirit. I have to admit this seems like a long reach, yet I have the feeling that one of the things I should be getting from this has to do with her pain. I set up a counseling session today for myself through EAP, for day after tomorrow. I realized too I am going through too much stuff. I am seeing a Christian counselor but whatever the fallout from participating in these sessions I think it can only be helpful.

Of course to come back to Arden and his birthday. I think he really enjoyed his birthday. Really to be honest we couldn’t afford what we did. Again we are in overdraft. He really enjoyed the games at Chuck E Cheese- but he got to spend this time with Jacob too. I don’t want to go into the subject of Quinn right now… Michelle and Quinn had hit it off when they first met… but a lot of stuff has happened since on several fronts. I can’t keep up. Suffice it to say Arden and Jacob are still friends.

I feel this stupor I have been in betokens several things, all of which are far from transparent to me as I am writing this. We are at a crossroads of sorts. Michelle isn’t happy, I am not happy, we are both tired of arguing but as tired as we get we still seem to argue. Arden somehow is probably happier than either of us. But I know everything gets to him sometimes too.

Our perspectives are just not coming together. Michelle on the home front sees so many things not getting the proper attention. I know she can’t do everything. And being with Arden all the time is utterly exhausting. And I can’t properly appreciate all that. I have an understanding of the difficulties inherent in her day-to-day life. We are always short on money. So she ends up spending more time at home than she wants- more time than I want her to spend there or Arden to spend there- and it drives her crazy. Arden too it goes without saying… I know it actually makes it harder to get everything done- even though she has more time- it works against her. I know that. I understand something about depression.

And me… working all the time, I am so tired most of the time I don’t even feel like communicating. I just want to lie down. Arden can’t understand all these things. Daddy is tired all the time and doesn’t play with him enough is what he does understand and on top of that Daddy yells at him too much. So all that is wonderful isn’t it? And it is the tip of the iceberg.

We were watching Housewives of New Jersey last nite- and this Italian family was having a christening. There were hundreds of people there. The father and his sister had a huge row- the entire place was turned upside down from his anger. He didn’t want to talk to his sister… and their problems went back a little ways. But it brought to the forefront of my mind again just how helpless we often seem to be in front of our anger. Michelle and I are much the same.

The anger takes over, bounces us around, till we are a little worse for the wear, and we emerge with our scars. Sometimes just internal, but we may have some bruises. Michelle likes to hit and throw things, she gets this stuff from her childhood, from her Mom. And I often feel like I have to defend myself. I can go for a little bit, enduring her words, her attacks, but usually she doesn’t just stop but keeps pushing and I start to push back. And she always tells me how Brandon never hit her, etc, but Brandon was closer her size than I am. When she hits me it hurts.

Arden just received yesterday his present from Martina, some race cars, more tracks to put together, but I think someone else is sending him something yet too. And we still have a bicycle to get him… I am constantly thinking of money, Michelle just got a ticket, one more thing to take care of, I still owe my brother $140, on and on. Michelle is fed up with samo samo as I am myself. I want to protect Arden from the world, and from us. That seems ridiculous.

And then Michelle, among the other things she reminds me of, is how my communication with my Mom isn’t what it should be. Still just because everybody in her family is trying to keep up with all the holidays, sending Easter cards, and Mother’s Day cards, well most of the men are gone in her family so Father’s Day is kind of empty, but you get my meaning, it doesn’t mean our family is screwed up cause we don’t do that. And it just isn’t something my family has indulged in with any regularity but she constantly criticizes me for not getting my Mom stuff. Well my Mom probably doesn’t want stuff anymore, not anymore than I do. Mostly I don’t want ‘stuff’ anymore. ‘Things” are mostly empty of meaning for me now. Not like being a kid.

The Sixth Extinction has been on my mind as well, Derrick Jensen and his criticism of contemporary culture, that there is no peace to be made with it, A Language Older than Words, and The Culture of Make-Believe can be caught on Google books, well portions of those books. We are fooling ourselves. How much longer do we have!? Aren’t we in the middle of an apocalypse now…

The issue of anger is something I find I return to again and again. I think our understanding of what it is, really emotions generally, is crippled, a crippled understanding. People talk about anger all the time, about getting angry, the results and effects on your life etc, but stopping it, changing it often seems beyond our power. We have no insight into the roots of our emotions, particularly anger. And insight by itself may not be enough.

Most anger I think is misdirected. The origins and original causes usually lie outside the particular situation. Still the real origin is in us, not the other person. We are constantly placing blame outside us for everything we do. I am not the cause of Michelle’s anger. She is. And she is not the cause of mine. I am. The hidden trigger is in us, not the other person.

Yet when we talk about our anger we never talk like that. We always blame everyone else. You shouldn’t have done this or that. I wouldn’t have become angry then. That is faulty reasoning. The real fault is in us. Naturally if we continually take ourselves for granted in this process, not accepting the responsibility, we never leave the circle. Anger is often a circle and without insight and responsibility a circle it remains.

I think the real source of anger is not being at home in ourselves. Now I can see this is true of me. I am not at home in myself. I can’t just find a resting place in my spirit, just anywhere, I have to find places of solace and comfort within me, but just any old place won’t do. There are many places inside me where the ground is quite hard, and doesn’t offer me comfort. I am not home in myself in that sense. I haven’t become accustomed to those places enough so that I may find comfort even there.

And when I am led across one of these places by a situation, reminded of something I want to get out of my head, such as let us say, how little money we have, I can feel like I am walking on eggshells. But I can see for instance that the real issue isn’t not having money, or lack of resources, but really is one of security in myself. I don’t feel as if I can handle this. And then when I realize the real origin, often it goes back to just this, or something comparable, I am humbled. I realize I have left Him out of the equation as I so often do. And then I have to step back and let go.

And this letting go process isn’t easy. It should be, but letting Him take over, well I wasn’t brought up like that, it isn’t easy to admit I can’t do this thing, I can’t endure this thing, I can’t do this on my own, I need help. Admitting all that I still find myself clutching the situation, or emotion, or thing whatever it is… I don’t want to let go. Finally after a kind of tug of war I begin to give in… and something else happens. There is more room inside. I don’t feel quite so trapped. There is room for His grace. I had not made room for His grace.

I go through this again and again. I don’t ever seem to quite learn it but have to continually re-learn again and again. Sometimes it seems exhausting and I wonder why I am made like this… I want this peace inside me but it seems I am continually bartering for it.

The counseling appointment was yesterday afternoon. Everything- well most of the stuff in this post was touched on in the session. I was tearful, on the edge of crying, through most of the session. Did it help…? I suppose it did. Still it was difficult. I don’t know really what to say about the session I haven’t already said in one way or another here.

We talked about working two jobs, how exhausted I am a lot of the time, finding it difficult to think straight, financial problems, tithing, putting Him first, asking for help, letting go of anger, arguments, on and on. I did most of the talking. I have scheduled two more sessions. I don’t think I can measure the impact of any of this yet.

Our gas is off. They won’t be able to turn it on again until Monday. Michelle will be angry. Well I am angry. We visited Frisco Municipal Court yesterday to inquire about her ticket. She can take a course to take care of one of the charges but the insurance thing is going to cost us in the long run. All my fault but still cheaper to have gone this route in the long run. With the ticket and all… and truthfully it would have been so difficult keeping that insurance payment up. That is the truth. Jiminy cricket we are talking at least $200 each month. It wasn’t cheap.

I have had three days off from my second job. This is the last day… tomorrow I am back at Wal-Mart for 4 days. Because we have gotten back so late from running errands after I get home I have gotten next to nothing done at home. The book rack still isn’t put together. The vacuum needs to be cleaned so we can take care of the floors and the boxes in the dining room and living room are still there. I am not sure what Michelle wants to do with the TV ‘rack’… I know she ultimately wants to get rid of it but I don’t know if she is thinking to use it for a little bit longer or not. We need to get rid of that giant TV but she has been so busy with her business I don’t know if she has had a chance to re-post to Craig’s list…

The Sixth Extinction

2011-04-12T11:58:00.001-07:00

So much going on... this will be a sprawling post. All over the place. It’s been awhile... Arden is almost four years old. Most of that time we have had trouble making ends meet. Old news. And a part of our life... we still don’t have insurance for either Arden or Michelle...

Arden is nearing the end of ‘potty training’... he is still in the middle of this, but I think he has the idea and it’s just a matter of time until he succeeds. We sold his crib and he now has- well a real bed. We painted his room blue... it’s nice. If we can do something about the toys we will have it made. He has a couple small bookcases- Michelle and I are readers and Arden I am sure will eventually ‘absorb’ this from us. Both of us are too close to books not to...

These are enormous transitions, under are very noses, we have both noticed them, but I think- at least for me but I am sure for Chel too- they are too emotionally powerful for us to give into them more than just a little bit, otherwise they will sway us too much, we will break down crying from just the knowledge of the passing of time. He is growing up. Too fast. Way....

The more I think about leaving something behind for Arden the more my thoughts seem to turn towards cosmology and eschatology, and unfortunately apocalypse. Something about the so-called ‘Sixth Extinction’:

There is little doubt left in the minds of professional biologists that Earth is currently faced with a mounting loss of species that threatens to rival the five great mass extinctions of the geological past. As long ago as 1993, Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson estimated that Earth is currently losing something on the order of 30,000 species per year — which breaks down to the even more daunting statistic of some three species per hour. Some biologists have begun to feel that this biodiversity crisis — this “Sixth Extinction” — is even more severe, and more imminent, than Wilson had supposed. From

http://www.actionbioscience.org/newfrontiers/eldredge2.html.

http://www.accuracyingenesis.com/Holocene_extinction.html

More...

At first glance, the physically caused extinction events of the past might seem to have little or nothing to tell us about the current Sixth Extinction, which is a patently human-caused event. For there is little doubt that humans are the direct cause of ecosystem stress and species destruction in the modern world through such activities as:

· transformation of the landscape

· overexploitation of species

· pollution

· the introduction of alien species

And because Homo sapiens is clearly a species of animal (however behaviorally and ecologically peculiar an animal), the Sixth Extinction would seem to be the first recorded global extinction event that has a biotic, rather than a physical, cause.

We are bringing about massive changes in the environment.

Yet, upon further reflection, human impact on the planet is a direct analogue of the Cretaceous cometary collision. Sixty-five million years ago that extraterrestrial impact — through its sheer explosive power, followed immediately by its injections of so much debris into the upper reaches of the atmosphere that global temperatures plummeted and, most critically, photosynthesis was severely inhibited — wreaked havoc on the living systems of Earth. That is precisely what human beings are doing to the planet right now: humans are causing vast physical changes on the planet.

This is the world we are leaving behind for our sons and daughters. The sixties can be seen as a way of making peace with an awful knowledge. We can still do something... even now. But not much I tend to believe... I hope that estimation is wrong. Really I think we are talking miracle(s)...

From a review of the “X-Files” episodes with the same name:

Increasingly, The X-Files is about itself. It is turning inward, eating its own tail (tale?) in a claustrophobic story line that cannot be resolved, that endlessly frustrates, that holds no hope and frankly, no interest. Carter could dump his whole hand on the table and reveal every detail of this mythology, and by now no one would believe a word of it. I don't care any longer who is concealing what from whom. I don't want Mulder turning into a Martian--could he get any weirder than he already is? Mulder must remain an ordinary man, a character I can identify with as a hapless pawn of The Machine. But Mulder is turning into an Ubermensch, a man who can trade bodies and come out unscathed, who can be infected by black viruses and miraculously (and inexplicably) survive, who is now able to hear voices and predict the future. What next--will he leap tall buildings at a single bound?

This apotheosis of Fox Mulder is proceeding on an ever more obvious track. By the time we reach the end of "Amor Fati", Mulder is crucified, complete with crown of thorns, on an operating table. It is clear that Duchovny and Carter structured "Amor Fati" along the lines of Martin Scorsese's "The Last Temptation of Christ". The hero rescued at the last moment from death, the dream of a "normal" family life, the constant reiteration that he need no longer try to save the world, the revelation that his failure in his mission doomed the world and his best friend's (Scully) admonition that "this is not what you were supposed to do", are all derived from the novel by Nikos Kazantzakis. It is equally obvious that Duchovny and Carter missed the point of that novel. The whole intent of "The Last Temptation of Christ" was to show Christ as a true martyr, one who knew wholly and completely what life he was giving up, what pleasures and perils and ordinary events of a human life he would relinquish if he fulfilled his mission. At the end of "Last Temptation", Christ fully accepts his mission and consents to his death, dying in triumph. An unconscious man strapped to an operating table, no matter how vivid his dreams, cannot consent to his fate. Mulder is not a martyr but a victim, which makes him pitiable, not heroic.

http://www.munchkyn.com/xf-rvws/6thextinction.html...

http://www.worldandi.com/newhome/public/2004/march/writerspub.asp

In the middle too, of my pursuit of the spherical muse, another website I launched some time ago, but is meandering still, I came across a strange reference, related to the ‘phyllotaxic’ nature of the solar system, a speculation that our Sun is perhaps really a binary, with a brown dwarf for a twin.

And that the 5 or more ELE’s- Extinction Level Events- of the past millions of years- could be ‘hiding’ in its rubble our own past travels down the technological highway. That we have been here before- more than once- only to be wiped out by forces so far outside of our world we aren’t really even ‘players’ in that world, not even ‘pawns’, more like simply part of the scenery, if that.

Every 10 or 20 thousand years or so we are knocked back down- and trying to get messages across gulfs of time that large is next to impossible. So we never learn. We have been doing this for some time now. A rather grim fantasy, a version of apocalypse- well what version would be likable- not particularly to my liking.

I am feeling pretty lousy today. When this post will finally make the blog I don’t know... this is the 4^th of April... I have been sick for the past two days... the flu, a cold, I dunno... but it is difficult for me to focus on anything right now. I am about to make another transition... to working at the WalMart just down the street. Hopefully it will save a little gas. Oh I know something else I wanted to add... something from the Christian radio now... trying to imagine looking at this blog from 10 years after...

I was nineteen, you were twenty-one
The year we got engaged
Everyone said we were much too young
But we did it anyway

We bought our rings for forty each
From a pawn shop down the road
We made our vows and took the leap
Now fifteen years ago

We went dancing in the minefields
We went sailing in the storm
And it was harder than we dreamed
But I believe that's what the promise is for

"I do" are the two most famous last words
The beginning of the end
But to lose your life for another I've heard
Is a good place to begin

'Cause the only way to find your life
Is to lay your own life down
And I believe it's an easy price
For the life that we have found

And we're dancing in the minefields
We're sailing in the storm
This is harder than we dreamed
But I believe that's what the promise is for

So when I lose my way, find me
When I loose love's chains, bind me
At the end of all my faith, till the end of all my days
When I forget my name, remind me

'Cause we bear the light of the Son of Man
So there's nothing left to fear
So I'll walk with you in the shadowlands
Till the shadows disappear

'Cause he promised not to leave us
And his promises are true
So in the face of all this chaos, baby,
I can dance with you

Will all these links still be here.... 10 years from now?

The Escape of Sherby

2010-12-16T13:54:00.000-08:00

Last night Sherby was sitting at our front door waiting on us, it seemed, to make it home. Michelle had already tried bringing him back in earlier that night but he didn’t seem to want that; as a matter of fact he scratched her and she had to let go of him. He didn’t seem to want to come in when we finally got back home either… And last night, though he hung around, we couldn’t coax him back into the house.

Sherby had escaped and has been gone several days. Michelle called me at work several nights ago and had told me what happened… He was in the window in the bedroom, Michelle had left the window open, and Sherby managed to push the screen out. He jumped into the backyard and Michelle had quickly made her way back there to find him jumping over the fence..! I didn’t think he would be able to scale the fence but he did.

We have had so much going on but financially we are still in dire straits. We have had so much to deal with; really it is only with His blessing I think we have weathered everything. I had to borrow money from my brother; I am sure right now he thinks he will never see the money again. Things have been so tight for us I haven’t been able to send him anything yet; we have however sent Michelle’s Mom something… not much. That has been difficult too… but she has been having more trouble than us…. And the payday loan is still taking money out of my account to the tune of $100 each month… just interest. I haven’t even hit the loan itself yet. How wrong is this… they are making so much money off me it’s ridiculous. I agreed to it, I needed the money, still it is not right.

The rent check bounced. The brake job that cost us near 1000 dollars last month is partly to blame. The repair company has allowed us to split this payment into 4 separate payments but that really is more than we care bear... but we didn’t have a choice. We have to have a car… Michelle’s communications with Croatia added expenses to our T-Mobile bill that ran into more than a couple hundred dollars... she didn’t realize what the charges were but that hasn’t changed the fact we owe them. And of course the overdraft from last month… which in turn was a result of the other rent check that bounced. But the reason for that is because the landlord tried to deposit it before the first… something I had no idea he would attempt. But that left us in arrears and trying to make that work set us back. It’s been lots of fun…

I think it was Friday night, this past Friday night, something a little unusual happened. We had already gone to bed, most of the lights out etc. Well Michelle and I had gotten up for something, I am not sure how long ago we had gone to bed at the time but it was probably 2 or 3 in the morning, and both of us, when we walked into the living room, noticed the light out back was on, and Michelle had said she turned it out. Now this freaked her out a little bit. At first I didn’t think anything of it. Surely she just forgot…

A little bit later, we had gone back to bed, we heard one of the cats, really it sounded like Sherby, he has a distinct meow, and it sounded as if it came from just outside our bedroom door, but of course Sherby was gone and when I opened the door Araina was there. Now I started thinking about all this, laying in bed, and it seemed to me as if I noticed the light being out in the back and the door locked when I went to bed so the fact that it was on, and Michelle seemed sure she hadn’t turned it back on, well that seemed fairly strange. And it really did sound like Sherby outside the door. Araina’s meow is nothing like Sherby’s meow.

The more I thought about it the stranger it seemed, enough so I actually got up and went to the backdoor, turning on the light to look outside. Nothing. Still neither the light being on nor Sherby’s meow made sense.

Now, since we realize Sherby has found his way back home, and we didn’t know that Friday, it’s possible we both heard Sherby and thought it sounded as if the sound was coming from inside, but was actually outside. Still the light being on seems a bit mysterious. All I can imagine is either one or both of our memories are wrong or somehow the light was turned on again… uh really I have no clue how that would happen. Even if Arden did it well it doesn’t make sense why he would have done it… or if he can do it. He would have had to climb on the couch or his stool to reach it… uh all that not to mention he was in bed.

I am sure when Arden gets around to reading this, knowing all our financial woes isn’t going to be that interesting to him. I am not including as much as I should about Arden… still the point of the blog is not to justify me, or Michelle, or Arden, but to talk about our life, life in general, really if I could paint pictures in his mind… Here is something, a very little thing; still both Michelle and I were amazed.

Just a couple of days ago Arden helped me fill the gas tank… I think we have only done this together once. That was at least a month ago. The first thing I do, after paying, is open the gas tank. There is a lever under the front seat you pull up to release the door to the tank. Arden remembered this… it was the first thing he did! He is just over 3 years old… I was amazed he remembered to do that. I only showed him once, and it was a little while ago now, but he still remembers. What do you think of that baby boy?!

The Red Queen

2010-09-20T10:07:00.000-07:00

Well I wrote this sometime last month...

"Where do I begin? I cannot concentrate on anything. I have so far spent my day 'putting out fires' as they say. This morning I had to arrange payment with T-Mobile. The cable was shut off; I had to arrange that. The water went off... I don’t think its back on yet but it should be turned back on. Of course Michelle is angry with me. Who wouldn’t be... I am angry. Not just at myself but for our situation which seems to have gotten out of hand. I had to 'borrow' $600 this month to get by... but we are still having problems. Michelle wants a divorce. I think the prospect of being rid of me is one of the few bright spots in her life outside of Arden...

I feel like the Red Queen from Through the Looking-Glass, running and running, but staying in the same place. And I am afraid if I stop running an avalanche will descend on me... I don’t know what to do. I keep praying but I don’t think my prayers have much force... Michelle doesn’t want to put up with me any longer. If I lose Michelle, and unless somehow we turn things around I will, really I am not sure what I will do. I feel very much like I am failing at just about everything, and if our relationship ends in divorce I will feel totally worthless.

So much has been going on... most of it though... just repetition... SSDD ..."

I am drowning... we are slowly edging our way to a divorce. And it seems like the longer we are together right now... the further apart we get. I dont think either of us is listening really to the other. Each of us seems to have our own agenda and Arden unfortunately sometimes gets the worst of it. He has been privy to more than one argument and no matter what happens with us I know he will remember all this time.

We seem mired in financial troubles ... I dont know how to get out of them. If I were on my own... well I would just cut out everything I dont need. I would get rid of the cable, insurance for the cats (which we are planning to do anyway... but havent yet), the gym, probably I would hang onto the internet, and I think I would get rid of T-Mobile and go with pay as you go... all that would free up well at least $150, and I would drastically cut mileage in my car and food to what I absolutely need. At least another $150 there...

Well I cant do those things. I have 3 mouths to feed, I have to make sure Arden has enough, not to mention Michelle, I cant just cut the cable, and getting rid of T-Mobile, now that are minutes are unlimited, I am sure that would be anathema to Michelle, and so... what do I do?

I have had some exchanges with a couple of Christian financial counselors, who in addition to tithing, advise all of the above and more. Michelle is on the eve of starting a job, other than Avon, I dont know what that will bring... and right now it seems we have maybe $50 to get to the next check... not quite two weeks but to paraphrase Michelle, "You are crazy if you can think we can make it last until then.." Well I think she said "not living in the real world".

Probably I am both. Crazy and not living in the real world.

I am praying... and praying. Brian Zahnd has written something I find rather compelling for where I seem be at right now... What to do on the Worst Day of Your Life... and really I feel like I am going through the worst days of my life right now. But Arden is still here... and as much as she doesnt want to be, until the divorce is put in black and white, so is Michelle... I cant see beyond this time... I cant imagine Arden growing up with somebody other than me for a father... and really it makes me angry to imagine that happening.

Something from that book:

When you have been through the worst day of your life,
you need to reorient your vision and imagination. You need
to turn your focus away from the present crisis and toward
the alternative future of recovery. This is what hope is all
about. See yourself transcending your tragedy, even if you’re
not sure yet how to get there. See yourself recovering all,
even if it seems impossible right now. See yourself coming
out of your present trouble into a place of genuine victory.
Let hope paint a new picture on the canvas of your imagination.
Your vision will give you the courage to face tomorrow
with new energy and strengthened resolve. With something
as simple as a hope-oriented vision, you are on the road to
recovering all.

Just what it seems I cant do... you know I still love Michelle. More as a matter of fact than I did in the beginning. Somehow I fail at adequately communicating this; she tells me again and again that I have done nothing but treat her as a child. Indeed I see some truth in this, but what she interprets as being treated as a child, I see simply as protecting her from the outside world. I see that as part of my responsibility as a husband. But I also see in some ways I have trespassed a boundary, that I need to let her take care of things in ways I havent done.

Here is something typical: we picked up a printer for free through freecycle. Our old printer, relatively new, a refurbished Epsom from Fry's, a local 'discount' house, is languishing. Ink cartridges are expensive... anyway Michelle wanted me to hook it up, we could still use the scanning feature, the printer we have been using doesnt have that. The cables to hook it up cant be found. Now I said I would hook it up. I promised her that. I didnt think finding the cables would be a problem. Really I thought they would be where the printer was... of course we still have stacks of boxes we havent been able to unpack. No bookshelves etc.

I had thought, well I will buy them if we cant find them, but the cables themselves are over $20 altogether, and being on a shoe-string, well not something we can do. So from where she is sitting I am a liar. I said I would do something and still it hasnt been done. And I do this all the time. So I am a liar, not someone to be trusted. Now of course I didnt imagine things would work out like this. Really it seems absurd. We may have the cables in the house somewhere, but our place is in such disarray, we have over 20 or 30 boxes, and most of them arent that light, searching through them is no mean task. The only free time I have right now is Wednesday and Friday nights, and Saturday mornings. The rest of the time is eat, sleep, and work... and even the little time I have on those days is taken up with more pressing issues, like laundry, or spending time with Arden, which I never get enough of...

Well I want us to have enough money, I want to stop struggling, I want Arden to be proud of our efforts, and I want to be able to give him options. And I want Michelle and I to be able to use our native talents, to be able to express ourselves in ways that lie closer to our hearts... and to be happy. We arent happy now.

Last but not least... this Friday is Michelle's birthday. I have a long-standing reputation of screwing this up... looks like my reputation is going to stay intact. One more reason for her not to stick around. You know I cant blame her... I have made, even in my own estimation, not a very good husband, really I wanted to say a lousy husband, and being away so much, simply working, I am about to capture a similar award for fatherhood.

Dearest Heavenly Father I ask for your forgiveness in all these things. I know I have fallen short, I know I havent done my best, and I am genuinely sorry. I am asking not just your forgiveness, but to change me, bring about that change in my heart and soul to respond positively to these failures, help me become a good father, a better father, and if you make it possible for us to stay together, help me honor and respect my wife, help me show her all that I seem to hide in my heart for her, help me make it real. In Jesus' name. Amen.

From John...

10The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.

11I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.

Amen.

The Tour

2010-07-16T13:27:00.000-07:00

We still have, in the back of our car, a television; a gift from Pam and her husband. Pam is my brother’s wife’s sister; in other words our sister-in-law. She happens to live here in Texas, actually not only goes to the church we attend, Covenant, but works there as well as an event planner. The only relatives we have in this state, at least as far as we know; something of a coincidence really.

The television weighs a ton. Well not quite a ton but it’s too heavy for my wife and myself to do anything with by ourselves. It took three of us to get it into the car- myself, Jamie, and Pam; one of us a weight lifter. Jamie, Pam’s husband, would be that one.

Now in an effort to find some muscle and aid us in moving this television into the house Arden & I took a sort of tour of our neighborhood about a week ago. The outcome of that tour was rather unusual.

We visited 5 households starting with the house across the street. We knocked several times, I could hear something inside, and finally a man opened the door. He had struggled to the door in a walker. I immediately felt embarrassed.

He had been in an accident and was still recuperating, we talked just enough for me to discover not only could he not walk very well yet, and some of his vertebra were damaged, but his left leg was in a brace and he probably had some months left in recovery. He smiled when I had told him of our original intention saying he would like to help and was sorry he couldn’t be of some assistance.

No one came to the second door, just next door to the right of his, facing the row of houses, but at the third door, one door down again, an older woman came to the door with a patch over her left eye; I excused myself and Arden, again rather embarrassed at having taken her time.

We walked back across the street to the house next to us on the right; on the right if facing the street. A woman greeted us, someone I had seen before and waved to though I didn’t really know, but this time- was it her left arm..?- it was in a cast! Well I wasn’t exactly surprised… this time.

We chatted for awhile, as I explained the purpose of our visit, she was willing to help us, well if she could, and there was no one else there at the time, though she said she had a friend that visits sometimes and he might be able to help, when he is there. She also suggested we try one door down from her; they had teenagers and might be able to help out.

We did try that final door, the 5th household. A girl came to the door, very young, probably in her teens, and after we went through the explanation, and I introduced Arden somewhere during the conversation, she explained there were no ‘men’ living with them. And the other teenagers were out, but to be honest I didn’t think they would be able really to help.

Arden enjoyed the tour, though he kept wandering off while I talked usually, and everyone was very nice.

Arden aka Iron Man

2010-05-20T14:24:00.000-07:00

Arden Does the Impossible

2010-04-27T14:40:00.000-07:00

We bought, last Wednesday, a couple of bookshelves for Arden’s room. He has enough books now he needs bookshelves to hold them all. They were large enough it was a difficult exercise squeezing them into the SUV.

Michelle found them on Craig’s List and the family that had them for sale lived not far away at all but in our neck of the woods. He took ten dollars for the pair and it was a good deal.

Well transporting them home and getting them finally into his room was a chore. That night I had laundry to do as well, we are still looking for a washer & dryer, so I was a little pressed for time. Actually a lot pressed for time. I didn’t pay attention, when we loaded them into the car, to those ‘studs’ that support the shelves.

Sure enough when we got home, unloading them from the car, I heard what I took to be one of those studs rattling around in the framework, and when everything was done we were indeed missing only one. I supposed the one I heard, it had stopped rattling, so I thought it had fallen out somewhere between the car and Arden’s room. Both Michelle and I searched for it but we could not find it.

Sometime later, the following day, Michelle tells me, very casually, she had forgotten to mention it before when it happened, when she found it, but there was one in Arden’s car seat, I suppose just laying there.

Now Michelle has no idea how it got there, I don’t either, but she has a story about how it might have gotten there. Her story is Arden found it, perhaps in the grass or sidewalk, or maybe even his room- but more likely outside- and picked it up and kept it until he let go of it when he was in his seat in the car. Arden does have seemingly remarkable eyesight, he picks up details we miss. So it isn’t out of the realm of possibility her story is true. But I have no other explanation for how this happened. How else could it have possibly ended up there I can’t imagine... I don’t think either of us has tried to ask him but his response would probably be ambiguous at best.

I thought we simply wouldn’t find this ‘stud’, not only that but it would be next to impossible, without perhaps one of those magnetic ‘finders’... it is one of those ‘little miracles’, something that had seemed impossible, but I find now we have a son that does the impossible.

Corey Haim, David Vincent, and Others

2010-03-10T13:38:00.000-08:00

Corey Haim, Abraham Lincoln, Omnec Onec, Mac Tonnies, David Vincent, Paul Vigay

Vampires? Werewolves? Bigfoot? UFO’s? What is the story here? What is the truth? Sampling and surfing the windows on the internet you can find some really strange things. Without a solitary doubt one of the most unusual sites, bar none, and there are many strange things on the internet, is Lucretia Heart’s blog “Towards a New World” with the sub-title “Darkness before Dawn”. Not unlike a handful of other blogs, I find myself drawn to this one, coming back to find out what is going on in her life, a life very, very unlike mine. Maybe one more “very” would not be out of place.

Recently a link from Mike Clelland’s blog, from one of his posts touching on the phenomenon of ‘orbs’, took me back to her place, a very recent post of hers about something that occurred over 10 years ago. The post is called “The Doorway Painting and the Blue Orbs -- Summer/Autumn 1996”.

It is a long description of some unusual things that took place in her life some time ago, entered as a post finally @ Mike Clelland’s urging to provide more details re some of her ‘paranormal’ experiences. I can do no better than quote Lucretia:

“Several strange things seemed to happen during this time that indicated the membrane between realities was thinned (as I've often noted when "They" are coming around a lot.) We saw (and felt!) strange fairy-like beings in our bedroom and upstairs hallway. I know how that sounds, but I swear it's true. The only other time I saw something like that was during a wave in 1986-- I saw one for a few seconds just a foot outside my bedroom window in daylight. We had poltergeist events. Rattling doors constantly. Turning water faucets on. Rapping on walls. Oh, and the ghost of my cat who had just died, Sarah, came (apparently through my closet) every night to pad, purr, and lay down at the foot of the bed for several months.

[See--? This full disclosure is hard because it's sounds like absolute bullshit. I know it. But this is what happened. I don't expect most people to believe it, and if you don't just spare me the digs. I'm not writing this to convince anyone of anything. Just sharing it with someone who has similar events in his life and allowing the rest of you to 'peep in.']

The events seemed to climax in the late fall. That's when Gerick finished one of his last huge blue orb paintings. It looked like a portal flanked by a gate topped with a... blue orb. Gerick called it his "doorway" painting. We were running out of room to put all these big paintings, and he stowed this one under the stairs facing out towards the living room. That particular painting was the only one that wigged me out a little bit. I couldn't pinpoint why. Maybe because it lacked a human subject? Maybe because it was 2 feet wide and 6 feet tall and looked 3D enough to step into?-- from a very amateur painter whose other work couldn't compare?”

The stuff in brackets is to the point. It is fascinating reading, makes me think vaguely of a story out of the pages of a Lovecraft novel that was never written, but just who is really going to believe her? I’m on her side, I know there is some weird stuff out there, having seen some strange things myself (uh nothing anywhere close to her experiences… really her experience of this side of things is so far out I am humbled, amazed, aghast, and taken aback all at the same time), but I know the average person that might come across her experiences, if not dismissing them outright, which I think would be a common response, would instead come to one of two conclusions, it is meant as some form of absurd joke, perhaps an imaginative exercise, or she is, if not crazy, simply lying, and only she has the insight into the real reasons such a possibility.

What do we say if all this is true? The world is obviously nothing like the notion people may ordinarily have of it. The little knowledge, ‘real’ knowledge, we do have is so ‘lame’ as to border on a joke itself, told at our expense I think, and our technology, which we do pride ourselves on, is basically nothing more than a crutch, and I am being kind with that description, making us believe we have control when in fact we have none at all.

This ‘doorway’ from her post was in the back of my mind, jostling for attention with many other things this morning when I heard on the radio Corey Haim was dead. We used to follow ‘The Two Coreys’ and though I didn’t know Corey hearing of his death seemed to strike me somehow personally. I remember “The Lost Boys” and how full of life he seemed in that movie. Thinking about it now it strikes me as a kind of counterpoint to the ‘death-in-life’ of the vampires in that movie… on my mind too, besides that, is the stress we are going thru financially. How will we make it to the end of the month? And beyond… my prayers are offered for a ‘rejuvenation’ of our financial situation.

But his death also brings to mind Paul Vigay, a Fortean researcher that died last year. What really happened is still something of a curiosity to me.

And Abraham Lincoln? Vampire hunter… that is the name of a book on the stands now. Abraham Lincoln kept a secret diary. He kept his closely guarded thoughts there and his revelation as a vampire hunter is based on that diary. Sort of an original idea… I stood in Wal-Mart, during lunch the other day, reading parts of this fanciful biography.

At work today I noticed a diploma for one of our clients- his first and middle names David Vincent hark back to The Invaders, a series I followed when I was younger. He also appeared in the X-Files as someone with supernatural abilities and healed a man of some gunshot wounds in one of the episodes.

From the comments section to the Doorway Painting post:

uberreiniger wrote:

Mar. 8th, 2010 08:58 pm (UTC)
Re: mind control
I can only view the whole phenomenon from an outsider's perspective. However, is abduction, torture, and mind rape don't qualify as malicious in your eyes then I absolutely do not wish to fathom the entity that does. And so what if they're they're desperate? Junkies who kill elderly convenience store clerks in botched robberies are desperate, but no one gives them a pass based on that. The common picture that emerges from all abduction stories is that whatever the aliens might wish to pass themselves off as, they're actually nothing more than cowardly parasites skulking and scraping to take what they want from people who can't fight back.Unfortunately that means they've come to a world where they fit right in.

And Lucretia’s response:

lucretiasheart wrote:

Mar. 9th, 2010 06:26 pm (UTC)
Re: mind control
Firstly, I HEART your icon!!And don't get me wrong-- I'm not saying they are justified no matter how much they think so. You make the most obvious and difficult to dismiss point there...

I suppose because the aliens themselves would not object to being used (even raped) for an "obviously needed" cause. The Greys seem to be from a hive-like mentality where telepathic communion is the norm and so the concept of individual rights is totally incomprehensible to them. They are genuinely puzzled and stymied when it comes to such things. "You mean this hurts you? But how can that be-- it is just your body. One body is like another, so what does it matter?" seems to be their position. But then again, they're all clones!! One body IS like another when you're a CLONE!

So, it's not like they do harm purposefully. They even use mind-rape to "help" people to calm down, forget trauma, and not feel pain (you know, while they're in there making people see and do what they want.) In their extreme ignorance, most Greys honestly don't think they are doing any harm. Of course, over time, they start to comprehend otherwise, and once they do (there are many groups and sub-groups) they begin to switch into being more altruistic and less mechanically barbaric.

The result is that you run into some Greys who are very respectful and patient and careful and will stop if you ask them to and all of that. While others are "nothing more than cowardly parasites skulking and scraping to take what they want from people who can't fight back."

It's a mixed bag, in other words, kind of like humanity. "Unfortunately that means they've come to a world where they fit right in." -- Takes the words right out of my mind.

I should caution, though, that since I've been subjected to these "mind rape" things, there IS the danger that I myself have been brainwashed repeatedly to the point I am incapable of hating my captors-- which is way beyond Stockholm Syndrome! I may not be the best judge on this. Or maybe I don't like admitting I'm beholden to evil beings.

Cabin Fever

2010-03-08T14:10:00.000-08:00

The move has left us in a state of exhaustion. We are both exhausted, physically, emotionally, and, unfortunately, financially… the prospect of having to contend with a second move, and a third move, and by that I mean moving everything to its new place in the new house, and then finally contending with everything that has happened, not just the physical process of moving, but the fallout from that, the consequences, handling that mentally and emotionally, all of it will be difficult. I don’t think I am praying the kind of prayers I need to pray to come to terms with everything.

Again we are in financial straits. Dire straits as the saying goes in actual fact. The move was more expensive than we were really prepared for, though we didn’t think so at the time. Again I do not know how we will make it through the month. Even next week will be difficult. I was hoping to save something from these taxes but that isn’t going to happen, and I wanted so much to really be able to set something aside. Not possible.

You know outside of getting this new place, we haven’t spent anything on us to speak of, no new clothes really, no new ‘things’ at all really, we did get a bed, a couple of other things, but neither of us has much to show beyond the house itself. We had a couple of dinners out, really that’s about it. Hard to believe everything we had didn’t cover more than this…

Of course we have been in this position before. Usually it’s not quite as dire but still similar. We still have some bills to pay not to mention needing food and gas etc. You know it seems almost embarrassing to me to admit I work two jobs. When, even with these two jobs together, we still have problems making everything work.. I am so very tired of having to deal with these same problems all the time, to push this bill off to pay that one, to wait until money comes through to pay another one, constantly negotiating with the phone company or the electric company or whoever it may be, to get from one week to the next or one month to the next. And negotiating with Michelle too. I can’t ever seem to give her everything she wants, I mean that in more ways than one, really I am so angry at myself, not being able to make things work, it seems like I don’t really deserve a family. Why did He make this possible for me, and make it so hard to for me to keep together..? I know Michelle is not only thinking about cheating but leaving too. And there are several things interacting, going on at the same time… but I don’t blame her.

Did He open all these doors for us, to make this happen, only to lead us into something that may even be more difficult to handle..? I can’t believe that. I can’t see what He can see. All I can do is have the faith to bring me through this situation. That’s hard. Still how many times was Paul shipwrecked? What about Job..?

We have bills still to pay for this month, we desperately need a washer & dryer, and having just moved in we are still in need of a few other things, like tires, what are we going to do..? I don’t know yet, I can’t borrow against next month, not very much, I don’t know what some of our bills will be like yet. Somehow we will have to find the money to live on. I do have one more Wal-Mart check coming next week… it will not be enough to take care of everything.

You know if I was single I would spend as little as I possibly could, maybe spaghetti for the rest of the month, no driving unless absolutely essential, but with a family it’s more difficult to handle. Michelle has to be able to get out, cabin fever comes to call otherwise, and Arden needs time outside too. Of course Michelle is very angry with me. Well if I was her I probably would be too. What next?

House of Falling Leaves II

2010-03-03T09:07:00.000-08:00

Of course now- the third of March- this is all old news- but it was written a little over a week ago. This has been, emotionally, something of a roller-coaster ride... climb aboard our time machine and let's go back a few days...

... a lot is going on... I dont really feel like putting down here but it might be instructive, at some time in the future, to look back at this and what was 'really' going on...

We are at the end of our lease- at the end of February. Michelle and I really didn’t want to move into another apartment and Michelle has adjusted to the DFW lifestyle, I am shocked by this a little bit but even more shocked that her mother, if she could find a way, would like to move here...

Anyway we looked for realtors, and when I say we it was Michelle that spear-headed this effort, and finally, from the Omega site, settled on Jennifer. We- again Michelle did most of this legwork- did have some communication with one or two others but Jennifer actually seemed interested in doing something for us. The other ones, I think because we aren’t buyers right now, were simply not that interested. And their ‘tips’ to us were less than useless.

We have submitted a letter re our intent to vacate the premises by the end of the month, and Autumn, the property manager, waived the 60-day notice that would usually need to be observed, and we have been looking at places for about a month. Jennifer found us something close to perfect, not more than 20 minutes from where we live right now, in better surroundings, a duplex, but still a wonderful little place, bigger than where we are at now and at about the same monthly rate.

Now we have a monkey wrench. The taxes haven’t arrived yet. We are far from packed up and ready to go and as a matter of fact so much still seems up in the air it’s unsettling, even frightening in a way. We have barely enough money to do anything, we need more boxes, we will have to find transportation to move, we still have so much to do and there is barely a week left. We haven’t been able to give Jennifer the down-payment yet because our taxes haven’t come through, and though I think they should be here by Friday, the IRS gives a final date of March 2nd, but since deposits usually occur on Fridays, I would expect this Friday to be it now, still that is cutting it so close we don’t know what to do.

If we don’t make the down payment we may lose the place to someone else, but how do we make the down payment now? Without borrowing the money, and I don’t even know if that is a possibility, I don’t know if anyone I know has it and if they do would lend it to us for a few days, and the idea of even trying to find out isn’t very ‘inviting’, and getting a loan is the only alternative. The only kind of loan I can probably dig up is a payday loan, I really don’t want to go there again, and the last time I tried, I think because I still owe a bank, the particular place I did try refused the loan, so I don’t know what would happen. I don’t seem to have a choice.

Now because of all the doors that do seem to have opened for us, and my genuine ‘feeling’ this is going to work out, of course we have been praying and asking His help, well I think this is going to work out, but I don’t see the details of how that will happen right now. So for me this whole thing is like being raked over the coals, so to speak.

Michelle blames me for getting the taxes in late, actually I spent more time with them than I expected I would, trying to get us a little more money, but still they should have gone out earlier, so she is angry with me, I am angry with myself, the only resource I have right now is going further into overdraft, we don’t want to ask my mom for anything, she has already gone way beyond anything she should do to help us out, so we are stuck.

I am going to see what I can do about a payday loan today, after some prayer, and go from there. I know Michelle will never forgive me if we lose this place, we have already gotten rid of our bed, some bookcases, a TV, etc in preparation, but I am really looking forward to this move too, I know right now the whole process seems in jeopardy, but I don’t know what else to do.

House of Falling Leaves I

2010-03-03T08:13:00.000-08:00

Nothing since early December. I have some other posts to add but they aren’t ready yet. So far I have only split this site into two; the other one is Tormance. I have only added a couple posts there.

Lots going on… don’t know where to start. We are looking for a house to rent. We have the cooperation of a realtor Chel found on the Omega site; her name is Jennifer. She has already sent us prospects. We still have to turn the termination letter into Dana Point; unfortunately they have a 60 day notice included as part of our lease. Which means, since we aren’t really giving them 60 days we may be liable for another month’s rent beyond the last month we are planning on residing there, which would be next month, February. Our lease is up in February.

I have been in two auto accidents recently. One outside a neighborhood Wal-Mart- my fault- I backed into someone, I couldn’t see them in my mirror, they did honk but it didn’t help. I gave them my information, but they could barely speak English, and so we had some difficulty communicating. The second accident was today (the 26th) in the parking lot of my ‘first’ job. I stopped just in time, someone had just pulled into a parking slot, I thought they were parked but wasn’t sure so I stopped, and before I could do anything else he started pulling back out and scraped the back left side of his car against the front of mine. He took responsibility for it immediately. He actually is an agent for Farmer’s Insurance himself and runs a small office in the same ‘strip mall’ where I work.

Let’s see I have 5 bank accounts now. The ones constantly used, one at FC and the one at VP, are in overdraft, not a little bit, but a combined amount of over $500... NG has $200, approximately, the credit union I think has $20, and the second one at FC, to take the place of the direct deposit account at VP when I get to it, has maybe $5.

Right now, without some help from the Lord, I don’t really know how we are going to make everything work. Have I been there, in that place, before? Many times now as a matter of fact..! Somehow we make it, not by virtue of some universal panacea, but differently each time, still we make it, always with His help.

I can’t see how things are going to work right now, and because of my constitution, the way I look at things, it is really hard on me, not being able to see something ahead. I feel like everything is going wrong. I am betraying my family. I can’t give them what they really need. Really it is tearing me up inside.

I can’t really talk to Michelle about that; she doesn’t understand where I am coming from, she blames me for everything, and often, like me sometimes, instead of listening she simply offers advice, when I want sympathy and understanding. And it’s hard for me to understand some of the things she struggles with that for me wouldn’t even be something I think about; don’t ask me what those things are I don’t know. I know it’s one of our problems in communicating… It’s hard for us to understand each other’s styles.

I am pretty depressed right now. I don’t really want to be at either of the jobs I work anymore. I feel like my contributions to the lot of humanity, not to mention my family, are so meager. I know Arden isn’t getting everything he needs from me in more ways than one. Michelle either… I just have this feeling of falling short on every front. Not being able to make anything work. Of course the only change here really, because I have felt that way for some time now, is in the intensity. I can’t express it; sometimes it seems too much to bear.

Just received this text from Michelle’s phone: “I'm not feeling well. Think its lack of sleep and need my meds too. Ovarian cyst acting up or maybe uterin fibroid. Painful. Ttyl. Maybe u can bring me a treat. Slice of cake? On account of being off fast? No more after this tho. Luv u. Going 2 take nap w Arden.”

Just to be able to take care of her meds- I don’t think she has submitted the prescription yet- I am going to have to go deeper into overdraft. We won’t make it to the 1st otherwise. And the overdraft is going to almost completely wipe out the next check from my second job; when we desperately need extra money. Of course its tax season but I don’t have any of the forms yet.
I started this post yesterday the 27th. Michelle and I attended church last night. It was a relaxing quiet time for us, quite a counterpoint to our usual arguments. To which we returned once home.

The occasions and situations of our arguments are usually fairly trivial. The arguments themselves can become heated, even virulent to some extent. Michelle is usually more likely to become physical, of course that makes me very angry, I can’t hit her, though I have in the past, as response only, but it leaves me feeling … well impotent and useless.

The Presence of the Lord

2009-12-11T13:55:00.000-08:00

The previous post as well as church this past Wednesday brought back some memories of my experience(s) with the Holy Spirit. Just as the phantasy I had in the post before seemed to slide from my mind like a dream, without reflection, these ‘brushings’ with the Holy Spirit have gone by without too much thought on my part as to either their origins or meanings.

Of course there is information in the Bible about the Holy Spirit but strangely, at least for me, many details of His comings and goings are not covered in any great detail. This past Wednesday I again felt brushed by His presence and it reminded me of my other experiences and I decided to reflect on these experiences a little bit.

The ‘baptism of tears’ I experienced one Sunday left me strangely peaceful. I had questions of a sort floating about in my mind during the ‘experience’ but I think, somehow, they ‘suffered’ answers ‘of a sort’ and left me with an emptiness hard to describe. Human life, on its terms, confined to its cycle of birth and death seemed meaningless. The world, as we normally think of it and experience it, seems an empty husk, as if drained of life, as if it had never been filled with life…

Now I think long ago I had in some ‘intellectual’ and perhaps even ‘emotional’ sense, after a fashion, adjusted to this idea. The Holy Spirit may have been working in me even then… I don’t know. Still in this ‘baptism of tears’ He seemed to literally rock me at some deeper level, leaving me empty. It wasn’t depressing at all, I wouldn’t call it joyful either, and I wouldn’t even say the emotion was in that spectrum. Rather it seemed to leave with me a kind of peace, as if the tears and chord(s) they struck were answer(s) and answered the question(s?) they disturbed from my depth on their own. So I left church in a state of unusual equilibrium.

These words seem inadequate to the experience. I have recorded some details of another ‘brush’, after seeing Narnia the second time, an unusual place for the Holy Spirit to nestle… He seems gentle beyond the meaning of the word, He stills the inner voice, and instead there is a kind of chord ringing through you, not a sound, not quite physical, but a vibration, not a vibration either really, still it is a definite physical sensation and may be accompanied by a sort of tingling as well. Whatever tension is in your body- or your mind- seems to drain away and what takes its place is something different- again hard to describe but it seems to empty you of questions and leaves you simply at peace with yourself and with the world.

I notice in this state that argument of any kind seems to remain at bay. The words that come out of my mouth seem touched by His presence and seem created to instill a similar feeling in the listener. Really it is quite amazing. It is very different from my normal state and I can only imagine what it would be like to remain like that for any length of time; His presence doesn’t seem inclined to stick around for very long.

“When someone suddenly lifts up his gaze and contemplates the nature of existing things in a way that he had never done before, then he is filled with amazement and sheds spontaneous tears without any sense of anguish. These tears purify him and wash him in a second baptism, that baptism of which our Lord speaks in the Gospels when He says, ‘if someone is not born through water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.’ Again He says, ‘If someone is not born from above’ (cf. John 3:5,7). When He said ‘from above’, He signified being born from the Spirit.”

This quote is from Symeon… I haven’t read anything but this from him and only found this reference on the internet here. Still this description seems to be similar to my experience.

Here is another quote from this article that seems relevant here:

“When interpreting an author such as Mark, it is helpful to make a distinction between ‘experience’ (in the singular) and experiences’ (in the plural). There are surely many Christians who feel able to say in all humility, ‘I know God personally’, without being able to point to any single event such as a vision, a voice, or a concentrated ‘conversion crisis’ of the kind undergone by St. Paul, St. Augustine, Pascal or John Wesley. Personal experience of the Spirit permeates their whole life, existing as a total awareness, without necessarily being crystallized in the form of particular ‘experiences’. When Mark and other Greek Fathers refer to our conscious awareness of the ‘energies’ or ‘fruits’ of the Spirit, they may well have in view an all-embracing ‘experience’ of this kind, rather than any specific and separate ‘experiences’.”

Hmmm… It’s strange but one thing I think these ‘experiences’ have done for me is to open a window on another way of being- a way of being in the world that is possible for us- but one that is also beyond our usual experience. When I wonder to myself what this would be like, to be in this state all the time, to have always in your being, to be conscious of it, this resonance- and it seems like that to me- a sort of resonance with your Maker- I have no answer. I seem unable to normally live in this state. Yet these ‘glimpses’ seem to say it can be a reality.

I came across another reference on the internet here to experiences of the Holy Spirit but the comments, instead of tuned to one frequency so to speak, seemed to drift across a wide spectrum of feelings and beliefs leaving me to wonder how much in common these experiences have with those recorded in the Bible. In short there seem to be quite a lot of notions ‘abroad’ pertaining to this presence but, unfortunately, little understanding of the meaning or interactions of this presence with our lives.

Some Things About Arden

2009-12-08T13:59:00.000-08:00

Arden loves Scooby Doo with a vengeance! We can use that magic name to settle disputes and win him over when we are at wit's end. And what about Ghostbusters? Same thing...

We have the movies 1 & 2 but there are a couple of cartoons from the teevee's cartoon series that are included and, like Scooby Doo, he seems to never quite tire of watching them. He likes the movies but his preference are the cartoons. Michelle is to blame for these 'peccadilloes' of our son.

He loves spaghetti. Peanut Butter & Jelly... He loves music. Listening to music on TV, especially if there are people dancing at the same time, can leave him entranced.

Oh he loves pizza... just the name seems to whet his appetite. And cake... when we had that sweet potatoe pie for Thanksgiving though he would look at it and poke it, but something about it bothered him, he turned up his nose.

A couple of weeks ago we watched The Adventures of Sharkboy & Lavagirl on TV... the effects seemed to mesmerize him. He stood rapt watching the show... actually I was watching it too. The effects were neat.

Last but not least. Another thing he seems to like, he likes us reading to him, but he seems to especially like those 'dictionaries' with pictures and the words underneath.

In the Blue Painted Blue

2009-12-02T12:46:00.000-08:00

Recently, sometime this past month, I could no longer guess the particular day with any accuracy, I had one of those, well I am not sure what to call it, a phantasy, while I was driving, that included, in the population of drivers, not just those to my right and left, those in Cleveland and Vancouver, and the rest of the world, but included an intimation, a fantasy, of another group of drivers, unbeknownst to most of us, that were blind to visible light, but managed to negotiate the maze of streets with a similar aplomb to the rest of us, by means of a different kind of light.

This phantasy that settled on me as I drove one day, quickly evaporated, but left behind a lingering feeling of strangeness I attempted to target in the following ridiculous ‘poem’:

the lakes on Titan, a satellite of Saturn, are brimming with liquid methane. can you ever see the faces in passing clouds reflected on their surfaces?

a race of human beings, unable to see by day, except in wavelengths beyond visible light, have learned to prowl the city in broad daylight by the black light cast from souped up cars. where do they hide out?

i painted my hands and my face blue, but was suddenly swept up by the wind and started to fly, and in the infinite sky, i discovered the being Volare. how long has he been there, in the infinite sky?

Attempting to articulate the idea surviving my fantasy, in as few words as possible, was a frustrating experience. And for reasons not obvious to me I bracketed the expression between a couple of other rather ludicrous expressions of a kind of ‘far-away’ feeling. Today I was thinking how this attempt at poetry had so left my thoughts; I had almost forgotten even putting it together.

I went back and looked at the different parts of this creation out of curiosity. The questions are more or less unanswerable, perhaps even without real meaning. Strangely I discovered, out of a little bit of research on the internet, a kind of background to this mesh of words that really seems as strange to me as the fantasy itself.

There have actually been reports of people able to see ultraviolet light, especially ‘aphakic’ individuals, people who have had the lenses removed from their eyes. Strange to say but the eye itself, rather the lens, seems to help block perception of this light.

“An illustration of how ultraviolet appears is provided by the Impressionist painter Claude Monet. Following cataract surgery in 1923, his colour palette changed significantly; after the operation he painted water lilies with more blue than before. This may be because after lens removal he could see ultraviolet light, which would have given a blue cast to the world.”

See the full article here.

The final stanza includes the opening words to the song ‘Volare’. Now most covers of this song leave this intro out. Interesting but seeing ultraviolet light is a bit like seeing shades of blue…

Last but not least are the lakes on Titan. Recently confirmed to be liquid methane along with other hydrocarbons, ultraviolet light has a big part to play in their formation, breaking apart methane into other compounds that end up in the lakes as well. The lakes are very black, reflecting very little light at all, and seem as incredibly calm as a mirror. Reflecting clouds is probably something that may not happen at all.

"We know the lake is liquid because it reflects essentially no light at 5-micron wavelengths," Brown said. "It was hard for us to accept the fact that the feature was so black when we first saw it. More than 99.9percent of the light that reaches the lake never gets out again. For it to be that dark, the surface has to be extremely quiescent, mirror smooth. No naturally produced solid could be that smooth."

The complete article is here.

We have lakes without reflections, people that can see ultraviolet light, and a song about flying in the sky, painted blue, meeting one of its denizens…. Yet it almost seems as if there is a kind of story here, something behind the fantasy, trying to find expression… of course that seems equally as ridiculous as the ‘poem’ itself… the triad reminds me also of a sort of analogy test. This is to that as that is to something else etc.

The lakes without reflections seem strangely like eyes without their lenses. The fact that images seen by ultraviolet light are tinged with blue seems to find a sort of echo in Volare…. Here are the lyrics in English:

I think that a dream almost never returns:
I was painting my hands and my face blue.
Then suddenly I was coming, carried off by the wind,
And I was beginning to fly into the endless sky.

To fly, Oh!, Oh!,
To sing, Oh!, Oh!, Oh!, Oh!
In the blue, painted blue,
Happy to be up there.

And I flew and flew happily to the heights of the Sun
And higher and higher into the sky.
While the world slowly, slowly
Disappeared in the distance down there.
Sweet music sounded
For me alone.

To fly, Oh!, Oh!,
To sing, Oh!, Oh!, Oh!, Oh!
In the blue, painted blue,
Happy to be there.

But all the dreams vanish at dawn because
When it sets, the Moon takes them along,
But I continue dreaming in your beautiful eyes
That are blue like a sky dotted with stars.

To fly, Oh!, Oh!,
To sing, Oh!, Oh!, Oh!, Oh!
In the blue of your blue eyes
Happy to be there.

But I continue to fly happily to the heights of the Sun
And higher and higher into the sky.
While the world slowly, slowly
Disappears in your blue eyes,
Your voice is sweet music
That sounds for me.

To fly, Oh!, Oh!,
o sing, Oh!, Oh!, Oh!, Oh!
In the blue of your blue eyes
Happy to be there.

Comparing the blueness of the sky and blue eyes is I am sure literally ancient. But getting lost in the sky by painting yourself blue and comparing that with getting lost in your lover’s eyes is definitely surreal. The original name of the song in fact, in English, is ‘In the blue, painted blue’.

In the midst of our text it could refer to an effort to join that ultraviolet world, the world of ‘blind’ drivers, losing oneself in that world...

There is a network of associations this poem seems to want to explore, a network I know nothing about, only uncovering second-hand in this roundabout fashion, and what it may be fishing for in this network, perhaps Volare, but more likely something else, I simply don’t know. It seems to be trying to say something, yet does it really say anything at all?

I would draw yet another likeness among these lines: reflections on Titan’s lakes, if they exist, are probably quite unique, as is this ‘ultraviolet’ race of car ‘enthusiasts’, as is this song, in more ways than one. Again the text seems to be a comment on this uniqueness in some way, drawing parallels between- among? - these varieties of uniqueness. What do we make of these parallels?

Perhaps if we shift our attention just a bit we will see another likeness; protective coloration or camouflage. The word crypsis is also used in this context, to borrow from the vocabulary of ecology, and refers to the ability of an organism to avoid observation. All of the lines in this text are comments on protective coloration.

This other race of human beings, sensitive to ultraviolet, blending with us in the maze of roads, the lover painting himself blue to vanish in the sky, an allusion to losing himself in his lover’s eyes, and last but not least the lakes on Titan without reflections; the surface of still waters here on Earth being a perfect representation of the idea of protective coloration, simply reflecting their surroundings, on Titan they absorb most light. The blackness itself stands out but at the same time reveals nothing of what is underneath or surrounding.

Now what do we make of this common theme? Without a doubt when I first put this text together- I hesitate calling it a ‘poem’- I can’t say this was in my mind. Still the idea lurks behind this mesh of words. The text itself was, for me, as cryptic as its theme.

Of course- does this race of human beings making their way through ‘our’ maze of roads by ultraviolet light really exist?- I am sure this is nothing but an extravagant fantasy.

What would that be like, crashing into one of their cars only to discover the driver couldn’t quite see us, trying to exchange information on our insurance companies… a television movie maybe but reality no way. At least not any more real than Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

The fantasy itself was real. It was a bit of shiver down my spine. Where did the intimation originate? Who knows, who can answer that question? Still beyond those obvious questions the network of curious associations this text seems to plumb is something else.

People that are sensitive to ultraviolet light, the role of ultraviolet light in the climate cycles on Titan, Volare, in the blue, painted blue, and the idea of camouflage and protective coloration in species longevity, the use of ultraviolet dyes, to brighten clothing among other things, all of these things linked together through connections, sometimes a bit absurd, to ultraviolet light and crypsis, seems … odd?

“A camouflage garment laundered in typical laundry detergent laced with ultraviolet dye, added to brighten colors, may blend into the background when seen with the human eye, but the deer's eyes are sensitive into the near ultraviolet portion of the spectrum, and the garment will stand out as a brightly colored object.”

See the article here.

Sleepless in Dallas

2009-11-30T14:14:00.000-08:00

I slept in the car for about 4 hours last night. At the end of my shift @ Wal-Mart last night- it was 10 at night- I call Michelle, just letting her know I was leaving, and would pick up some bread, and before I can get two words out she goes into me about Omega, the credit repair company we are using to improve our credit ratings: that I didn’t tell her anything, what is this $50 for the credit reports, and another $278 or whatever for another two months, and then $50 each additional month, unless we no longer want their assistance, and must give them a written request to decline the services… “It’s my money too…” Why didn’t I tell her any of that? She found something, a letter, a document of some kind and only now is finding out…? She is very angry, suggests I stay outside tonight, and hangs up on me without letting me get a word in edgewise.

You know I am thinking, after she hangs up, I am going to have to stay in the car for awhile, and how cold it is going to be etc. I know I will go home, but will stay in the car, perhaps till morning if that’s possible. Michelle does things when she is really angry, she throws things, she yells and yells, she has to have the last word, she can get very physical, I just don’t want to be around that and will opt for the car instead. Not to mention not wanting to engage in the delightful banter of an argument after just getting off work.

Of course I did tell her. She may have found what I brought home to show her, which I thought she looked at, but even if she didn’t we had more than one talk about Omega. Now she claims I never told her anything, or almost nothing, she doesn’t know anything about all this…?!!!!! I don’t even know what to say.

It’s not the first time Michelle hasn’t remembered things I have told her, or that she has said to me. I still remember our conversation about that event from her childhood and the dead animal in the road, she doesn’t remember us talking about it or the event… gee I have another post about that… but she has had other ‘lapses’ like this that really don’t make sense to me. There have been other times I have told her things, we have conversed about something, that she seems later to forget completely. I don’t have a record of these lapses, I would be pressed to say how often this happens, but it has happened several times.

Should I worry about this...? I know there is a link between diabetes and memory loss. And I know Michelle needs better medical care… that has been an issue for some time now. See some of the other posts to this blog… I know I can’t really talk to Michelle about this directly, I have already tried talking to her about memory loss in general and her in particular, and that conversation didn’t get very far. She needs better medical care..!!! We need to find her something more reliable than those visits to doctor whatishername or the CCD alternative. We really need insurance for her, something cheaper than my employment will provide. Of course I have already been down this road; more than once actually. Looks like I will have to see what I can do.

I will have to talk with Michelle. I don’t look forward to our conversation about Omega. She wrote me two rather nasty text messages about all this… I think I will quote here …

“You are unbelievable. Ur son wolf up and asked about u and I have no idea. How responsible. Unless u change I’m packing and leaving on the 1st.”

“Thanks. If ANYTHING happened & I had an emergency I’d have no one 2 call. U r so irresponsible. This will not go down well, mark my words.”

So. Needless to say I was parked right outside our apartment, not in our usual parking place, I guess I wanted to give her a run for her money. I was very angry myself. But I wasn’t far away.

Reading these text messages leaves me with a sour feeling in the pit of my stomach. We cant seem to communicate very well in the first place, and on top of that the reactions we have to situations like this, especially when money is involved in some way, drive us further apart.

Finally, going on 3 am, I went back ‘home’. Everybody was asleep. Of course at last Michelle gets up and tells me not only couldn’t she get to sleep but Arden kept tossing and turning. At least we didn’t have yet another argument. I ended up back in the bedroom trying to sleep. I didn’t get much in and was late to work today. Just tried calling her to let her know Quynh called but I wasn’t able to get her on the phone for more than a few seconds. I don’t if our phones are the culprit or she just didn’t wanna hear anything from me.

The Great Silence

2009-11-16T10:50:00.000-08:00

When I put this site up- it was over a year ago now- it wasn’t meant to bring readers. I tried, for the most part, to keep a low profile, and mostly I have been successful. I think very few people see these posts, and that’s all to the good. Even my wife, though she knows the blog is out here, rarely visits these pages. Michelle has read a few of the posts but the site, as far as readership goes, mostly has fulfilled my wishes and expectations. And I haven’t encouraged her… the site is meant for Arden at some undetermined point in the future.

Now when I finally split the site up, which I will do sometime in the near future, things will probably be a little different. Still I know I will want one of the sites to remain mostly private. Now I thought about protecting this site in the beginning with a password- but I truly didn’t think that was necessary- and in fact it really hasn’t been.

Stace however is one of my very few readers… and she makes comments from time to time. We share some interests- crop circles, the Ufo enigma, the paranormal etc. - and it was Paul Vigay’s death that I think opened the communication. ( Actually I just sent the person behind his Book of Condolence an email- people are still adding comments!- no response as of yet- not only re the condolence site but if there was ever an autopsy. I haven’t heard anything about that. You know a Book of Condolence for Mac Tonnies might not be out of place…)

I had posted a comment on Stace’s site and left a link to mine; sometimes I leave a link but I know, almost always it seems, people aren’t curious enough to look or if they do don’t leave comments, so I often don’t leave a link, but once in awhile leave one, more out of curiosity on my part I think than anything else.

Stace comes back every once in awhile- and sometimes makes comments. I didn’t even see the comment below until last week. She made it in response to one of my early posts- my third post actually- one in which I talk about the more or less unrelated topics of married life and being alone, and being filled with the Holy Spirit, and tear bottles, among other things. From her last comment:

"Your description of your need - your need to be alone, to find yourself in the whirlwind of life that surrounds you - elicits empathy in me. I do know what you mean, though I'm usually alone, and sometimes I experience sort of the opposite of needing to be alone - more like needing to be around someone. But my two cats keep me company.

And given the two choices, at this point in my life, I'd rather be alone anyway. Now that may change tomorrow.

Your description of the girl in apparent supplication and the woman in the choir crying, I absolutely feel your words in pictures. This is why reading your posts are so enriching; good writing feeds the soul. And the depth of the experience feeds the writing. So you've come out with some important revelations which I'm sure resonate with more of your readers than just me, surely. Thank you for sharing; I'm glad to have heard.

Stace

September 8, 2009 5:03 PM "

I remember when I first came across her site- some time back now- I was struck by her seeming ‘casual’ encounters with ‘the unknown’. I have since come across a couple of other sites equally … unusual? Mike Clelland’s site and Larissa’s site definitely stand out but of course this path is more well-trodden than the average person might think. Whitley Strieber has been down a similar path, and literally hosts of others. I thought at one time of doing a site devoted only to the high profile contactees, as a beginning I was going to restrict it to this country, and there haven’t been that many ‘high profile’ cases over the last generation or so.

Of course there are many, many more that don’t reach headlines. George Adamski is old hat now. Did George really have the contacts he claimed..? His claim the far side of the moon was inhabited, and included cities, trees, and snow-capped mountains, surely makes his claims now look even more ludicrous. Still there may be something there; sometimes it’s too easy to throw out the babe and the bathwater. Strangely, maybe not so strangely, I think like George, the Moon is inhabited. I don’t know by what but there have been enough sightings of unusual phenomena there that I think there is someone or something there. Still I draw the line at cities, trees, and snow-capped mountains.

Reading my post from back then, I still think about that experience in church, I haven’t had another like it, as intense, I even remember, well it seems part of that same experience, the pastor’s son’s message had been about children’s concepts of love, and how we should place more value on their emotions than we often do. He referred to a study but I haven’t been able to find the study he might have been referring to...

I have gone back and read some of the older posts, ‘Interregnum’ too, which is the one Stace responded to… the whole thing about tear bottles I find really intriguing. I find my experience with the Holy Spirit then still very much accessible to me now and indeed it seemed the beginning of something back then. Beyond its often too gentle tugging, and intimations, I have nothing further to add to this experience however.

Fermi’s Paradox, the so-called Great Silence, to return to a perpetual theme of this site, is one of those things contactees would have no trouble with: there is no Great Silence. They are here, and some of them among us. It has always seemed to me that if in fact they were trying to truly communicate with us- even with everything going on I find myself uncertain of this- but if they were trying I have often thought they would not do it in any of the ways we would normally suppose. If they were in advance of us- and for communication purposes they would probably have to be- I wouldn’t really expect them to use radio waves, signs in the sky, or landing on the White House lawn, just examples from among all the possibilities maybe available to them.

How advanced would they be? I think that is the question along with how different they are from us. Before real contact perhaps we would have to be taught and before even the teaching could begin we would have to be brought into an emotional place we don’t often visit. So initially contacts would be subtle, paranormal fingers pointing us and leading us in certain directions.

Maybe this really explains the sort of contact taking place. I don’t know. I really think our species is not in a place to sustain this contact for very long emotionally, spiritually, even physically, if it were attempted now. Without promptings and experimental provocations to bring us into a new place emotionally where we can receive the reality of their message the contact can’t be made. How long will this phase last..? Who knows..?

Maybe, the contact strangely like this site in some ways, they have been around for some time, ‘posting’ messages on the fringes of our consciousness, waiting for us to realize their meaning before real dialogue could ever begin. Maybe more and more of us are coming to that place and trying to explore that reality, biding our time for the eventual dialogue, and trying to prepare in the meantime as best we can.

Without a doubt it will be a crossroads for us when we acknowledge the reality. And without a doubt, in the beginning, we will not want to accept it for what it is but will make something else from it, until we come into the emotional place allowing us to receive the truth of contact. I think those of us in that crossroads will be different, not ‘merely’ human, but at last coming into our full humanness.

Of course this is a very fanciful idea, the EBE's or their counterparts, whatever they may really be, as paranormal 'bloggers', to stretch the term beyond its point of no return, not caring about 'converts'- and in my mind the parallel between mysticism and the heart of spirituality and even the attempt at contact is very real- in a sort of 'holding pattern' until we take the bait, so to speak.

Some parts of the contact process may indeed be 'automatic', there may even be a 'monolith' of some sort, not the genuine article as in '2001', but something with the same function, something we have perhaps already uncovered, and it may not be a 'thing' at all, but a concept, idea, or even emotion. I do think when we think about contact our concepts are already out-moded and can't begin to compete with the reality whatever it may be, and whatever it may hold.

Stace's comment to my 'Interregnum' post may in fact be a metaphor for the extraterrestrial stance:

"Your description of your need - your need to be alone, to find yourself in the whirlwind of life that surrounds you - elicits empathy in me. I do know what you mean, though I'm usually alone, and sometimes I experience sort of the opposite of needing to be alone - more like needing to be around someone. But my two cats keep me company.

And given the two choices, at this point in my life, I'd rather be alone anyway. Now that may change tomorrow."

However the difference would be, for 'them', this is tomorrow. The 'two cats', perhaps their machines or artificial life forms, or something further out, that have aided them during their vigil, and a vigil is the perfect term, are no longer enough. Contact is nigh.

Sea Change

2009-11-09T11:44:00.000-08:00

Here is the post I wanted to enter last week but never did… just a short comment about taking Arden out to the car one day last week. Michelle was going to use it that day and I usually take him out and sit him in his seat in the car to give her a little extra time. And on our way out there, on noticing the sun, he simply waved at it. I was just really struck by that. It was such a childish thing to do and yet it seemed somehow profound as well. Adults don’t generally wave at the sun. Yet the gesture seems to carry with it something … gee I am not sure how I want to fill in this blank.

Right now it seems nothing is going right. Michelle is sick. She has been for several days now. She can’t seem to stop coughing and I am going to leave work early today to take care of her and Arden. We may end up in the emergency room. Maybe not. I don’t know. We don’t even have money for a prescription. Our accounts are in overdraft.

Really this goes back to Emelda’s visit last month. Trying to get ready for her arrival, purchasing the futon and various other things, and then trying to make sure we had enough money on hand during her stay put us further into overdraft than usual. And of course that was covered by this month’s funds; leaving us over $400 short what we would ordinarily have.

Of course Michelle always wants to blame whatever happens with the finances on me; we should have gotten a gas card from Sam’s. We should have taken money out for this or that… If we had done any of that this month we would have really been in trouble. And with Omega taking their chunk out to improve our credit ratings… what we shouldn’t have done is go the distance we did in preparing for Emelda. That was over the top. Oh well. Now we are paying for it. I have a check coming from Wal-Mart but by itself it’s not going to be enough… don’t think we have left prayer out. Still it’s one of those things we don’t do enough.

And I am trying to take care of both Michelle and Arden. This is Monday. I worked all day yesterday at Wal-Mart; I just kept on thinking about the day off I don’t have, that today I would have to be at my other job. And I was so tired last night after getting home, but I had to do what little I could to take care of both of them.

Michelle and I put a dinner together that turned out to be really pretty good: tuna sandwiches, French fries, and some broccoli. Arden devoured the tuna sandwiches, he didn’t finish all his fries or broccoli, but he is kind of finicky these days so when he finishes anything we are happy with it, but Michelle and I ate everything and I finished off Arden’s fries. Michelle did the frying and prepared the tuna; I made the sandwiches and peeled most of the potatoes. I know even though Michelle and I were hungry we didn’t feel like doing any of this.

I was doing a fair to middling job of taking care of everything. I was so tired… I know Michelle was even more tired… Michelle had to go out to get some oil just to fry the potatoes. Unbeknownst to me she wanted me to stop her; I don’t like this kind of thing. Where she deliberately places me in a situation as a kind of test and then afterwards proclaims “You don’t care about me. You should have stopped me from going…” What is that!? I asked her more than once to let me go… I guess she wanted me to physically stop her from going… this stratagem for gauging my emotions drives me up the wall!!!!

I have like a matrix of emotions against everything going on now. Writing this Santa thing, McClelland’s Blog, and a couple of others I continue to follow, some of Lucretia’s stuff is just so completely weird I don’t really know what to make of it. Of course I suppose it to be the ‘unvarnished’ truth but the world she lives in and the one I live in are a bit removed from each other. The inhabitants of the Moon, perhaps Mars as well, the pyramids on Mars, the DNA code, its resemblance in details to the way computer code is structured, orichalcum, a word I picked up from a novel on Atlantis that has gotten stuck in my head, it’s a name for a metal they used and appears not only in Plato’s tale of Atlantis but in some other ‘ancient’ texts as well, the vision I had long ago, the green sphere, just this whole side of things that seems to be pretty much swept under the rug by our modern era.

Maybe this is all escape for me right now. Thinking about our finances, everything all of us seem to be going through, really it is overwhelming to me. All I can do is place it all in His hands. Still it’s hard for me to let go… and I am thinking about making a trip to Fort Worth to see that painting of Jesus by Glenda Green.

You know I have literally changed my mind about the theory of evolution as well… to follow yet another tangent. Nowhere does it seem as ‘scientific’ as its proponents want to make it out to be. It’s interesting but there isn’t anything to go in its place really, except that we were created, as being opposed to ‘evolved’; but evolution to my mind has always placed the real question at one remove. Rather than being a ‘real’ answer; where did the original stuff, what evolution had to work with in the beginning, where did that stuff come from anyway?

Now I think evolution to some extent is sleight-of-hand. It purports to answer some questions without really doing so. And without doubt something in the nature of evolution does take place. The distribution and characteristics of species and genera etc. do change over time. But to my mind the big questions evolution was meant to answer, the origin of mankind, and the origin of life, are basically still the big questions they were, and in some sense perhaps even more mysterious. This whole question has been, because of evolution’s trespass on so-called sacred ground, been politicized and some obfuscation of the little knowledge we do have taken its place.

There is a part of me undergoing a bit of a ‘sea-change’… more and more it seems to me even the things we ‘know’, the so-called knowledge that most of us might agree on, is fragmented in a different way than that ‘unknown’ knowledge that might encompass these other … uh ‘things’… such as the pyramids on Mars.

There is some speculation abroad now that our DNA, especially the so-called ‘junk’ DNA, may contain information pointing to another intelligence. How strange would that be..? There are characteristics of this part of our DNA that suggests an underlying pattern, perhaps even a language, but these characteristics are nothing more than suggestive. Our SETI program scanning the skies for just a glimmer of intelligence and here, in literally the root of our being, a strand of that root, is the ‘answer’. Of course just the notion seems provocative, not to mention metaphorical.

What would knowledge not fragmented look like? Would it be like evolution’s ‘tree of life’? We would have awareness of an immense structure, we would know something about the ‘heartbeat’ of the universe, but the details would be left to be filled in by science etc? Or would this unity manifest in some other way?

Arden and the Guitar

2009-10-20T11:34:00.000-07:00

Arden and I were watching 'Ghost Busters' last night. Arden, as his wont, during 'musical interludes' of the movie, would take his rake, its a toy rake he uses primarily as a replacement for the guitar he doesnt have, and pretend to be playing it, as if he were a mime playing it against the music (well actually he has a toy guitar that plays its own music but he seems to prefer the rake, and when he uses the 'real' 'toy guitar' prefers the sound to be shut off...). He plays the guitar left-handed.

Now here is what truly amazes me: his acting out of playing this green rake with a handle on the end, his imaginary guitar, is simply incredible. It is so real, his holding of it so much like he was holding the real thing, it left me speechless. Where does he come by this feeling for holding a guitar? He has seen, for instance, the Jonas Brothers, but who else has he seen? Wherever he gets it from its so right on its eerie.

Same thing with the piano... there used to be a piano in one of the halls in our church and one day, a Sunday, I was waiting with him for Michelle, and he started playing it. Well the piano didnt make any noise, but Arden was pounding away at the keys in a startling simulation of the real thing. A woman walked by and couldnt help remarking on the similitude herself. Where would he have seen much of this to have become so adept at his 'mime'?

He seems to have a link with music anyway, he sings to songs on the radio, you can hear in his voice, even if you cant always understand his words, that he seems to be getting the key. And music always seems like a kind of magnet for him. Arden is just over two years old. He has gifts evident already that we will have to help him express.

The Age of Miracles

2009-10-08T10:46:00.000-07:00

Sometimes it seems to me the idea of balance holds the key to everything… but what is the meaning of that word balance? What kind of balance is it…? My life is in a peculiar state of equilibrium, a different state than it was just 5 years ago, but that movement, the changing from one state to the other, has been going on all this time, this past 5 years.

In that time Michelle and I have moved twice, traded in our car for something newer, roomier, brought Arden into the world, adopted two cats, how many part time jobs have we gone through, how many arguments have we had, the counseling, and let’s not forget the marriage itself, also in this 5 year period, my ‘fortune’, the little retirement nest egg I had, has dwindled to nothing, being swallowed in the day to day and month to month rounds of needs and desires, in short we have gone through many changes and upheavals. The ones just recalled being some of the most obvious changes.

I could not have foreseen the situation as it exists now from my vantage point 5 years ago. It was unimaginable. I didn’t think I would ever have a son, and if I had ever thought about it, and it was close to an impossible thing for me to think about, I didn’t think it was in my future, but if I had tried to imagine it I could never have imagined one as beautiful, handsome, wonderful, and smart as the son I now have. It is hard to imagine something more miraculous to the me I was than Arden. The mere fact of Arden has changed everything, and the potential inherent in that fact has changed everything else. Nothing is the same. The things that might seem to an outsider to be the same are different…

Michelle however was also next to impossible. Just as miraculous… and without her miracle the miracle of Arden would not have been possible. She was in my prayers but Arden was so unimaginable to me even prayers couldn’t hold him. Michelle is beautiful, even magical... We must make room in our prayers for the unimaginable!!!

The balance we have now is fragile, dynamic. Our situation cannot stay the way it is… neither of us is happy enough, I know I cannot continue to work the hours I have, if I continue to work two jobs those jobs cannot both be what I have now, we have outgrown our apartment, sooner or later we will have to move… all of these things, and yet other considerations as well, make this balance we ‘enjoy’ very fragile, makeshift, transitory.

Where will we be in another year? If I let my dreams and my prayers make room for the ‘impossible’, the unimaginable, I have no clue. We want to be in a house, starting a business, a different job no longer simply ‘in the wings’ but accomplished fact, we want our interaction to be different, I know Michelle wants to have lost weight, and to successfully keep at bay by that tactic some of the medical problems she currently has to deal with on a day to day basis.

Well we do have a different picture in mind… He may have something even more wonderful and challenging for us than we can even imagine. We may not know how to make room for it now. Maybe we don’t need to know everything right now! A subversive thought … to some generally held notions about planning for the future.

People seem often to believe they know how to arrange their own lives, they know what is best for them. He knows what is best for us, He knows what we really need, and knows our hearts better than we do ourselves. I think we often end up colliding with His arrangements, continuing to believe in our own, not able to look deep enough to see the truth, it seems, especially when it is staring us in the face.

When I let myself try to imagine Arden reading this ‘journal’- you know Michelle has a place on Facebook and MySpace too and even though their explicit purposes are something different it’s conceivable he may read those too at some point- what will he make of all this? Is this a good thing…? I know how diaries are… no matter what kind of diary it is- and this is a diary of sorts- there are always things that don’t get in- lacunae that are excluded either on purpose or without even thinking.

For instance I know one thing I haven’t included enough of yet- if I were Arden looking back at this record I would want to know more about me, what I was like- I want to include his likes and dislikes, the kind of person he is, of course he is only 2 years old but he has a very definite personality.

No matter what Michelle and I are like Arden seems very good natured, actually I wouldn’t describe either myself or Michelle like that, so where does that come from..? He has his tantrums, and days he isn’t up to par, but on the whole, he seems happy, he has a smile that literally lights up a room, I think this is something that will stay with him and will draw people to him. He is winsome. If he gets this nature from either of us it’s Michelle, it’s not me. He also has a native intelligence that picks up all sorts of things- although I can’t understand everything he says yet- Michelle is better at deciphering some of his speech than I am- he understands a lot more than he can communicate now. He makes inferences and notices details that simply amaze me.

I wrote a post some time ago, ‘The Age of Miracles Hasn’t Passed’, just over a year ago, that’s how long I have been at this now, and I talked about our situation, about Arden reading these words at some time in the future and trying to get my head around that. I realized, reading it now, things haven’t changed very much over that time.

Still there are changes… My part time job has changed. I no longer work with Google. It seems though we are still caught in a sort of catch-22; our situation engenders certain reactions, financial and emotional, and these reactions tend to keep us tied to the situation. Breaking out of patterns can be difficult.

A foggy day in London Town

Had me low and had me down...

How long, I wondered, could this last

But the age of miracles hadn't passed

For suddenly I saw you there,

And through foggy London Town

The sun was shining everywhere.

(from 'A Foggy Day in London Town'...)

“In all my life I have met only one person who claims to have seen a ghost. And the interesting thing about the story is that that person disbelieved in the immortal soul before she saw the ghost and still disbelieves after seeing it. She says that what she saw must have been an illusion or a trick of the nerves. And obviously she may be right. Seeing is not believing.”

This is a quote from the preface to the book by C.S. Lewis entitled ‘Miracles’. I think it goes to the heart of the question. Our understanding and interpretation of things depends on where we draw the line separating the possible and the impossible and that in turn depends on what kind of system we believe is our reality. The truth may be literally, or even metaphorically, pounding us over the head, staring us in the face, but it may not seem to be the truth, but something else entirely.

The boundaries I had drawn in my life made Arden seem impossible, and Michelle a very difficult ‘proposition’ at best, the fact of their happening would not strike anyone as miraculous- but me. Now, though I consider the matter logically, I cannot shake the feeling of them being miracles, and it isn’t a logical thing, I can see clearly, logically, there is no reason to believe that, but personally, emotionally they can only be miracles, nothing more, nothing less.

Arden and More Arden

2009-09-29T12:49:00.000-07:00

Oz and Back Again

2009-09-28T14:36:00.000-07:00

I picked up Michelle and Arden at the airport last night. My calendar at work shows they returned late on the night of the 18th, last month. I have lost track of that date... The flight was over an hour late and we didn’t get home till almost 1 in the morning. I haven’t felt like talking about this trip very much. Michelle wanted to come home after the first week was up. She and her Mom don’t get along when they are that close… Our finances did not allow the possibility. The trip was meant to be several things for her- and for us- but probably the most significant was its role as a ‘trial separation’.

We were getting sick of arguing with each other; what we don’t have much of, since we have been married, is time of our own. We have started to try and give each other that. But when you are always in each other’s space it seems to me argument is inevitable. We don’t have anyone, here in Texas that can look after Arden once in awhile, so he is always with us. All of us need time apart- even Arden needs his own time with children his own age.

Naturally one of the things we thought was her trip to Baltimore would allow someone else to look after Arden a bit, and Michelle would have some real time to herself, not just a smidgen, so it would be something of a vacation too. Never happened. Not even a real smidgen. As a matter of fact it was worse than being here- I try and give her some kind of break every week. Her mother positively refused to look after him- though our impression from her, before the trip, was she would be willing to do just that- and Crystal was too busy herself. So Michelle was basically with Arden the entire time she was gone. I know it was driving her crazy.

The whole trip was a ‘hellcation’ as Chel put it. She came away with a different point-of-view on both family and friends and how they will- in this case mostly won’t- fit in with our lives. We are still planning on moving to the Baltimore ‘environs’ but not as close to her family as perhaps she had wanted to be in the past, and with a very different set of attitudes and expectations. And it has I think changed the way she looks at our life here in Texas too. So it was money well spent perhaps.

Have we changed? I think we have a little but not enough to jettison some of the habits that keep causing us to collide. Arden it seemed hardly recognized me at the airport. It has been a month though and you could tell looking at him he wasn’t feeling well. And we have been nursing him thru a fever that comes and goes all this week. He is obviously feeling better now.

I think Michelle has really changed a bit. But we still can’t seem to navigate past those arguments very well. We have already passed through a couple of them since her return. And it seems as if our viewpoints haven’t changed very much- though I think Michelle has thought about some things- changing them is something else. I know while she was gone I have thought about some things.

Its already September now and I have never finished this post. Late September... Michelle’s 9/14 post from MySpace about this time is insightful:

“So I've learned alot of lessons and I've grown up ALOT from one trip to MD. Makes you realize who your bonafide buds are and weeds out the...well...weeds, who only weaken your beautiful garden. I'm firmly planted, putting down roots, and making the best decisions of my life. It's so totally awesome walking in God's Will and living life to the fullest. The Bible tells us to know those who labor among us and to come out from among them... I SO didn't want to do that because I thought (get this) that I was missing this whole other life that, in essence, didn't even exist. Just as Martina constantly tells me & Quynh and I constantly use the phrase as our mantra: "The freakin' grass is SOOO not greener on the other side." Like...my side...TOTALLY ROCKS and I'm staying in this pasture for a long time.”

Gee whiz that’s Dorothy’s lesson from ‘The Wizard of Oz’… Still and all there is a lot of wisdom in it. And the older you get the more you can see in this simple idea. Really, and it is a strange thing, it can map out a whole new world.

Dreams of Flying Saucers

2009-08-13T10:43:00.000-07:00

I have been going thru some old papers. Michelle is coming back from Baltimore soon and I am trying to begin to bring some order back to our place. I think I will only succeed in beginning. Our place is too small for all of us; we are 5 altogether including the cats and our place isnt big enuf. But until we do move we are going to have to go thru some changes.

I came across some old diary entries, its interesting what you forget and what you remember, I hadnt forgotten about this dream, and that is actually interesting in itself, but I didnt remember all the details either. I had a much, much longer entry covering Jacques Vallee and my reading of 'Forbidden Science' and may include that in here at some point too.

I have almost completed a post re flying saucers and three blogs I have come across and this dream seems to 'sharpen to crystal clarity' an aspect of this subject, another piece of the puzzle, that I see only as that- how does this fit? It seems to belong here somehow but how does this dream material fit in with this subject... how do the 'synchronicities' fit in...? A lot of this borders on the completely absurd, at least from any 'scientific' standpoint, yet it seems in some way very close to the heart of this subject matter, whatever that heart really is I try to imagine, but come away from this material with another conundrum.

I have had many dreams in which flying saucers play a role. Often they remain distant in these dreams and merely contribute a wrinkle to its atmosphere, even if the dream is just a sighting it seems less about the sighting and more about the 'resonance' it brings to the dream. I have had many more sightings in dreams than in reality. The quote is complete.

A dream from 1-26-2003.

Another dream. Usually, since I've started this record, trying to remember my dreams, I find myself writing them down immediately. I know how they evaporate. But this was different. I knew I wouldn't forget and instead just turned it over in my mind, thinking its been awhile since I dreamed- or at least remembered I had dreamed- of these flying things...

Sunday. Don't remember having one of 'these' dreams- well it seems like a long time. Talk about communicating with aliens...Still there isn't much to it. Seems like I'm in that house in Florida- in Melbourne. Where I went to high school etc... Well a version of that house. The landscape is a little different. Almost like a forest isnt far away. The inside of the house is different too- but I don't remember enuf details to give them. Still it reminds me a little of that place.

Now for some reason I have some expectations something might happen. Anticipation, a slight thrill almost. I cant remember where this comes from in the dream- still its as if I've kind of forgotten when it happens, that it's going to happen.

I was wandering around in the house- thinking about things I can't quite remember now. And then it seems I'm trying to close the front door or lock it- there is a light in the corner window behind me that's on as I'm trying to do this- but there is a stiff wind making it difficult. Then it hits me- maybe this is it! Maybe I should go outside- see what's going on. Its dark outside now.But I look up at the sky- peeking from the doorway- and think Im seeing something- so I rush out there!

I had seen a huge shape up above the house- not more than a couple hundred feet probably. It had a kind of 'mesh-like' quality when I first saw it but when I run out- down into the front yard almost to the street- and all this is bigger than where I live- looking up at the sky- I'm surprised & shocked & excited too. Wondering whats going to happen. There isnt very much light up there, not much color to this thing, almost as if its 'smoldering', waiting to come alive.

Now that Im outside it looks- well it resembles a figure eight pattern- two large round shapes touching each other- still the impression is of a single craft- and some further structure I can't remember clearly now. No sound. And I shout out- not to anybody- just out of excitement- "It's here!"

Now this is about as far as it usually goes... these dreams I see something and there is an atmosphere, a feeling associated with it that I don't forget. But usually not much more... I remember one being downtown in a city and seeing these huge shapes kind of 'skulking' about in the air...

But I'm almost in the street looking up at this thing and I notice some commotion in the darkness off to my left. Seems like the edge of a forest there. And these things- well at first I think maybe they're children- but see almost immediately they arent children- and they are coming toward me walking quickly. There are maybe 5 or 10 of them and they have a very definite elfin quality. They have dark burnished green skins- almost like they have been dyed it seems so unusual to me- dressed in some kind of dark suits- but I'm kind of studying their skin so Im not noticing how they are dressed really. And they are saying to me "Come with us... hurry... we're leaving..." It seems like these aren't the exact words but the gist of the meaning.

Something like that... and I know we're going to the ship. I wont be coming back. And I don't mind. A little like that scene in 'Close Encounters' where Neary is getting on the ship... And then for some reason I wake up...

And in the dream- at the end- in my thoughts I'm going over what's not going to be happening anymore- the people I will no longer be seeing... not coming back etc.

I have thought again about this dream. Now its interesting to me I didn’t think twice about the green skin of the ‘visitors’... Of course the phrase ‘little green men’ is widely used these days, most often in a sarcastic vein, to disparage those of us who attach something more to this phrase than mere sarcasm. The currency of this expression is interesting. It goes back at least a hundred years and probably longer; Wikipedia has a long article on the origin and usages of this phrase here. So the phrase has a long history. From Wikipedia:

“...exactly when it first got applied to aliens in flying saucers or aliens in general has been difficult to pin down. Folklore researcher Chris Aubeck has used electronic searches of old newspapers and found a number of instances dating from around the turn of the 20th Century referring to green aliens. Aubeck found one story from 1899 in the Atlanta Constitution about a little, green-skinned alien, in a tale called Green Boy From Hurrah, "Hurrah" being another planet, perhaps Mars. Edgar Rice Burroughs referred to the "green men of Mars" and "green Martian women" in his first 1906 science fiction novel A Princess of Mars.

However the first use of the specific phrase "little green man" in reference to extraterrestrials that Aubeck found dates to 1908 in the Daily Kennebec Journal (Augusta, Maine), in this case the aliens again being Martians.

In 1910 (or 1915), a "little green man" was allegedly captured from his crashed spaceship in Puglia, Italy.”

Interestingly the Wikipedia article never mentions the Green Children of Woolpit. An extensive summary of this mystery can be found here. From mysteriouspeople.com:

“At harvest time during the chaotic reign of king Stephen of England (1135-1154), there was a strange occurrence in the Suffolk village of Woolpit, near Bury St. Edmunds. While the reapers were working in the fields, two young children emerged from deep ditches excavated to trap wolves, known as wolf pits, hence the name of the village. The children, a boy and a girl, had skin tinged with a green hue, and wore clothes of a strange colour, made from unfamiliar materials. They wandered around bewildered for a few minutes, before being discovered by the reapers and taken to the village. Here the locals gathered round and questioned them, but no-one was able to understand the language the children spoke, so they were taken to the house of local landowner Sir Richard de Calne (or Colne), a few miles away at Wikes (or Wakes). Here they broke into tears and for some days refused to eat the bread and other food that was brought to them. But when newly-shelled beans with their stalks still attached were brought in the starving children immediately made signs that they were desperate to eat. However, when the children took the beans they opened the stalks rather than the pods, and finding nothing inside, began weeping again. After they had been shown how to obtain the beans, the children survived on this food for many months until they acquired a taste for bread.”

Wikipedia has its own article on the green children here.

What is this dream about? On the most superficial level its about getting away from life, leaving everything behind. Is that all its about?

I don’t think so. A wind seems to usher in the experience. There is some sort of craft in the sky, it must not be very far away because of some detail I can make out, or else it is so huge its ridiculous, but the feeling in the dream is that its close. This other world, or other life, is always close to us... Without a doubt the craft resembles the symbol for infinity, a figure eight. The origin of this symbol is usually attributed to John Wallis, a mathematician from the 17th century. From Wikipedia:

“John Wallis is usually credited with introducing as a symbol for infinity in 1655 in his De sectionibus conicis. One conjecture about why he chose this symbol is that he derived it from a Roman numeral for 1000 that was in turn derived from the Etruscan numeral for 1000, which looked somewhat like CIƆ and was sometimes used to mean "many." Another conjecture is that he derived it from the Greek letter ω (omega), the last letter in the Greek alphabet. Also, before typesetting machines were invented, ∞ was easily made in printing by typesetting an 8 type on its side.”

So their craft is associated with infinity, or eternity, and the atmosphere of the dream suggests adventure. Getting away from everything is obviously a component of this dream, but it seems to me to be a mere tangent to what the dream is really about. In some sense the dream is about dying, at least a kind of dying, being transported to eternity. I have no fear of this in the dream, not only that I seem to see it as a fantastic adventure.

Now the fact of the matter, and I cant tell you why this is, but I don’t know that death has ever held a great deal of menace for me. I know all of us find our way there sooner or later, and I don’t say I look forward to it, but I don’t feel any great fear associated with the idea.
The dream really seems to be saying something about death and new life. Even perhaps forgiving and forgetting from what was going through my mind at the end... but more about something beginning than something ending.

Of course the color green has been associated with fairy folk- uhm since time immemorial? The ‘aliens’ in this dream seem closer to ‘the gentry’ than life forms from another planet. Of course Vallee wrote ‘Passport to Magonia’ about this complex relationship. A long, a bit desultory, exposition on the symbolism of green, from Folklore, can be found here.

And its also Vallee, among others, that long ago abandoned the ‘extraterrestrial’ hypothesis in favor of something closer to home. Where does that leave us with the abduction phenomenon? Of course the fairy literature includes a version of this phenomenon as well... we are replaced by changelings. The likeness seems too close to simply abandon but the nature of fairies seems to be a complex topic in itself. The origins of ‘the good people’ are quite various in the literature; fallen angels, demons, elementals, spirits of the dead, or a hidden race, being some of the better known. Some expositions on these origins can be found here and here.

From an an Alternate Perceptions Magazine interview with Jacques Vallee (see the full interview here):

"Editor: From your pioneering Passport to Magonia (1969) to Revelations (1991), your books have tackled a wide-range of controversial and complex aspects, taking in a comprehensive global, cultural and historical perspective on these reported events, looking at paranormal, spiritual, folkloric, occult, and shamanic accounts. In Revelations you presented alternatives to the popular extraterrestrial hypothesis (i.e., the Earth Light Hypothesis, Control System, and the Wormhole Travel Hypothesis). You've stated something to the effect that you'd be pretty disappointed if all of this activity recorded down through the centuries turned out indeed to be simply E.T. visitations.

Please explain.

Jacques Vallee: When you begin to study this phenomenon the first-degree ET hypothesis, (namely the idea that we are visited by aliens from another planet in our galaxy that have just discovered us), seems like the best one. With the passage of time and the accumulation of reports, including those from people reported psychic effects, it becomes clear that it is too limited to explain the facts. As always in science, when such a situation presents itself, you must go back to basics and re-examine the data. We need to open the full spectrum of potential hypotheses instead of simply selecting data that fit our preconceptions. As you know, I have done quite a bit of study of psychical research and of older traditions, including Rosicrucian and esoteric literature, in search of related material. And it is all there, although modern adepts of these traditions seem to have forgotten all about it! Perhaps your magazine can reawaken them?"

Arden Asleep

2009-08-13T09:15:00.000-07:00

The Gift

2009-06-10T12:29:00.000-07:00

Well this is a stumbling block for us. I can’t talk to Michelle in the detail I would like because it is too close to her. She has had experiences she would rather not- how do I put this? - I don’t think she really even wants to remember them but she does- so the next best thing is simply not to attend to them. Don’t try to recall them.

Most of these experiences have to do with her ‘dabbling’ in witchcraft when she was younger but some of them come from other places; abuse by her father being the main source. Some of them, I believe, are just her nature; she is open to them in some way.

She told me once about something that happened to her when she was a child. She was in a car with her father; I don’t really remember if her sisters were there but it seems as if she said they were. They came across an animal in the road that had been killed; I don’t believe they had run into it but I think they stopped.

Most of the details about this event I am not really certain about now. I can’t remember how many details she talked about when she first told me. But now whenever I ask her about this event she usually tells me that not only does she not remember it but she doesn’t remember talking to me about it. And this exclamation usually comes with enough emotion I drop the subject altogether.

Now I have never had this experience with anyone else; that they would relate something that happened to them, especially something of seeming significance, only to tell me later not only do they not remember it now, but don’t even remember talking to me about it. On the face of it this seems pretty strange.

I don’t know a lot about witchcraft. I have read about it. And to be honest, for the most part, I have regarded the subject as an interesting page from history but without much substance in the sense- well did any person ever fly on a broomstick? Casting spells is generally a waste of time… but witchcraft and sorcery are basically of the same cloth. Again I don’t know a great deal about sorcery, Don Juan being my main introduction.

Michelle has had some experiences I would describe as psychic, for example, knowing who is on the other end of the phone before they call or speak, hearing voices in other rooms when no one is there, or steps, she has told me the story of how her guardian angel picked her up when she was younger and I believe saved her from a bus, she has seen things too but I can’t recall any details at the moment, and she had some experiences when ‘practicing’ witchcraft that involved casting spells on people and the aftereffects etc.

She has had some unusual dreams- and visions I think- she believes are prophetic. Some of these at least are about the end times, and leave her not simply wondering, but in a peculiar anxious state. Still the point is simply she has had some unusual experiences which to me mean she has been blessed with a gift to discern things in this realm.

But I can’t talk to her about any of this in any depth without our conversation going off the deep end and her either telling me I don’t know anything and don’t understand or simply refusing to go any further. I have been interested in things like this for the longest time from a scientific standing, having wanted at one time to enter the field of parapsychological investigation, so I have read quite a bit about some of these things. But Michelle doesn’t have a lot of respect for science and is not terribly logical when it comes to this topic- any topic really as logic isn’t really part of her nature. So our conversations usually don’t get very far.

But this does play out in our relationship and leads again to difficulties in communication. For instance just last week I talked to her about the word psychic. Because I use this word differently than she does. It is typically used in the literature to reference ESP related occurrences but to her the meaning is basically negative and Biblically refers to experiences or events one should part company with… so when you do talk about someone having a ‘positive’ psychic influence- well to her that doesn’t make sense. It is something of a contradiction.

So those ‘psychics’ out there- maybe ‘sensitives’ would be a better term- those that really have this gift become a little bit more difficult to talk about- how do you tell the difference for instance between a psychic that wants to put a hex on you, let’s say, and someone that simply has a divinely inspired gift and has a word for you? How do you talk about the difference, unemotionally..?

So it has always been difficult to talk with her about this subject- if I say the word psychic at all she is already negatively predisposed towards it. And a lot of her experiences if not downright negative have been scary… so how far should she want to explore these things..? Our discussion about the word ‘psychic’ pushed her into an emotional response, as I knew it would, and didn’t get very far. And after seeing how emotional she became of course I only went so far in my discussion with her and then stopped.

Well the occasion for this post is really the film Knowing. I had the opportunity to see it last night and found it both interesting and a wee bit disturbing. Now again our communication is involved here. Michelle had seen this movie first; probably some 2 weeks or so ago now. She had called me after she had seen it and wanted to talk; I am sure about the movie and her reactions.

We never really had that conversation. I was taking care of Arden, and I was either putting him to bed or what I don’t know, but she had called me more than once and couldn’t get me. When I finally realized she had called and got hold of her she wasn’t happy and needed to talk- then, when she first called- and angry enough afterwards we never had the discussion I imagine she wanted to have.

Now, as I mentioned, Michelle has had some prophetic dreams about the end times. And I know this movie probably frightened her a bit and brought her back to some of those things she has talked to me a little bit about. I know she wanted to talk about some of these things. But we didn’t talk. It’s not unusual Michelle will simply become so emotional about one thing or the other our conversation breaks down. Of course she usually sees me as the trigger; I am the one causing all the pain. Not seeing the real trigger is in her.

But at that point the likelihood of having a conversation that is sane and reasonable, without name calling, or further emotion, well it’s infinitesimal. It’s best if I drop the whole thing; if I try and pursue it the attempt will only increase her anger. This post will undoubtedly go through some revisions. I would like anyway to include some comments on Knowing - from the same director that did Dark City- I only discovered that after I saw the film.

Knowing is about, not so much about the future, but about faith. And knowing. When John Koestler first deciphers the code, unearthed from a time capsule and given to his son, he can't believe it. The pattern isnt something possible for anyone to know, not in his scheme of things. Literally it is a listing of major disasters, each disaster coded by date and time and number of lives lost. But he comes to believe its truth in spite of his complete lack of understanding of where this knowledge comes from or how it was transmitted. He doesnt come to this belief all at once.

Of course this knowledge isnt a little thing, literally it involves the end of our world. He discovers the list extends into the future... John has no real insight into what is going on; and seeing mostly through his eyes we are in the dark too. When the final cataclysm approaches he has some inside knowledge from research he has been part of in the past, but its not enough to change anything. He does succeed in saving his son.

The depiction of the 'aliens' leaves a great deal open to interpretation. It does seem they come from another world, and they are here to save some of us, seems mostly children, and Knowing definitely reminded me of Clarke's Childhood's End- another work of fiction involving children, the paranormal, and the end of the world. As a matter of fact Knowing seems to be a version of that novel. As John is left behind in Knowing, his son taking the journey without him, so the Overlords oversee our transformation in Childhood's End, not able to take part in the transformation themselves.

Flour

2009-06-05T14:31:00.000-07:00

Arden in the Morning

2009-06-03T14:41:00.000-07:00

Second Thoughts

2009-06-03T14:35:00.000-07:00

When I set this blog up I expected it to diverge into different streams. I had set up in Wordpress what initially was a ‘mirror site’ but what I intended to become at some point one of those streams. Now looking at this blog I am not sure what I want.

I have posts about my marriage, some of my interests, my son, links and comments on a variety of topics. Do I want to tease these streams apart? Do I want to create several blogs, devoted to a few core topics? What do I want to do…? This blog is finally meant to be read by Arden one of these days. But do I want a network of topics, several blogs perhaps, or just one, just for him?

Michelle and I had a major argument over the weekend. I don’t really want to talk about it; same issues again and again. Money is the biggest one, sex is probably tied with that, and the other issue is basically respect. Both Michelle and I feel way under-appreciated in our relationship with each other. Whose fault is that? Gee whiz it’s our fault! I know both of us are trying to do something about it; Michelle is a little more proactive in this area but I know both of us are making efforts. It doesn’t seem to be enough. Money is another problem… I could cite, for example, her account being in overdraft; my fault. It swallowed some $150 of her money… Of course I owe her that. Plus some on top of that she has used to cover our expenses for different things instead of her airline ticket(s) to visit Baltimore.

All three of these issues are really one. It seems to be hard for us to work together. I know part of that is the language problem. She is a ‘responder’ and I am a ‘contemplator’… and I know we still don’t take account of the differences these modes make in our hearing and speaking to each other. I say something I mean to be taken in a neutral, logical way, and Michelle, basically a-logical, and emotional almost always interprets in a way different than I ever meant. And vice versa. She will make an attempt to communicate with me on an emotional level and my response will be cool and unemotional. We are continually at loggerheads in this area. It makes it difficult for us to make the connections we need to make. So we are continually blaming each other for doing something we didn’t mean or simply not doing what we asked. I think we continually misunderstand each other. I know I don’t always hear everything Michelle says; but instead of taking this calmly she always takes it emotionally. I am not listening to her because I don’t appreciate her; that is her take. If I cared I would hear what she says. Now isn’t that logical? But that is the extent usually of her excursion into logic.

THE RESPONDER LANGUAGE™

RESPONDER: Compassionate, Passionate, Sensitive, Warm, Reactive, and Verbal.

“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.” Matthew 5:7

Those who don’t know how to weep with their hearts don’t know how to feel joy either. — Golda Meir

Responders tend to be feeling-oriented, creative, sympathetic, affectionate, people-oriented, and not controlled by time or schedules. They may tend to blame themselves and others. They can become overly emotional at times. High Responders desire to help and relieve the emotional pain of others.

THE CONTEMPLATOR LANGUAGE™

CONTEMPLATOR: Inquisitive, Reflective, Sensitive, Peaceful, Calm, and Complex.

“Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser; Teach a just man, and he will increase in learning.” - Proverbs 9:9

I think and think for months and years. Ninety-nine times the conclusion is false. The hundredth time I am right. — Albert Einstein Contemplators rely on reasoning, logic, and process orientation.

They are loyal, good listeners, and thorough researchers. They tend to think before doing anything. They are not overly time conscious and often are mentally preoccupied. They tend to have unique spatial needs. They may be passive - aggressive when wronged. High Contemplators generally have very high IQ’s.

The above are thumbnail descriptions of us from…
http://www.personalprayerministry.com/page7/page7.html...

How in the world do we learn to respond to each other in a way more befitting our different styles of communication…? I don’t know. The counselors when they talked to us about these languages simply glossed over this aspect- as if now that we were aware of a large part of the problem we could easily correct it. Well it has proven to be not that simple or straightforward. We don’t listen. She doesn’t hear me the way I mean it and I don’t hear her the way she means it. And though we have tried trying to talk to each other with more deference to our language styles that has proven more- problematic? - as well.

I do think we are doing better- and worse. At the same time. In some respects we are doing better- I know we both have been trying- but I know we both feel like we are failing each other. So right now our efforts seem to be somewhat in vain… we are continually arguing it seems. She can’t stop calling me names. And that really gets on my nerves. I have never had anyone in my life do that. Just continually call me dumbbell, stupid, asshole, a few of her more polite names, oh, and idiot, a favorite. I have taken to calling her names off and on, usually after she calls me one. But I don’t feel comfortable with this style of communicating; and I do it only because I have reached a blank wall. I don’t know what else to do. I can’t make her stop. She calls other people these names too when we talk. I don’t like that either. She is used to this name calling. I know Arden has already heard these names now. There is no doubt he will copy.

Our last counseling session… Jerry talked more than either of us did… I know they are Christians and I think they have been a big help to us but I know we both need to talk too… and because I am ‘head of the household’ it seems like he is laying a lot of the responsibility for what is happening at my doorstep… No doubt I have a huge amount of responsibility in all this… I don’t know what to do anymore. Nothing seems to be working quite right… we need more prayer… to be honest we are both so close to throwing in the towel… if things don’t change that by itself will push us into separating.

She wants to go back to Baltimore for a visit with Arden but she will be staying with her Mom… and they get along well long distance but in close proximity not so good. Her Mom has a lot of criticism… (gee could that be where Michelle gets her nit picking from I wonder…) so she isn’t exactly crazy about that part of the visit…

Here is an example of something that happened last night that seems ridiculous to me: Michelle had gone to a movie night before last. I think it was Race to Witch Mountain… when she got back she wanted me to watch for her and meet her a little ways outside. I think she went on a little drive after the movie- she called me when she was at Wal-Mart and I thought she would be home soon- so I had gone outside and was waiting but she didn’t make it. I called her again and she said she had gone on a little drive… Well she finally got home and I met her outside. I was dressed in a shirt and boxers… I hadn’t even thought much about it- well I didn’t feel like pulling on some pants I would just immediately remove again for the short time I would be out there and the shirt was just long enough you couldn’t much see what I was really wearing. Michelle wasn’t happy that I wore this outside- “Would you want me outside in just bra and panties?” I understood her point but it didn’t seem the same thing to me. Men routinely go around without shirts if it’s warm enough… and it was comfortable outside that night. Women never do; well not here in this country. Still there was no point in going on about it. She was plain angry.

Well she brought it up again last night. We were just sitting almost ready to go to bed and she brings this whole issue up again. Why does this bother her so much? And I say something about not feeling like going thru the effort of dressing up to go outside- especially when it was likely almost no one would even see me. I have a robe but almost never wear it and didn’t even think about it last night… I don’t remember quite what I or she said but she was angry enough about it to march out of the living room to bed. Angry enough to want to throw something at me; she gets this angry often.

Now I know this anger is mostly not kindled from this incident; at least I hope not. That is the thing about anger. It usually comes from a different place than where it may seem to come from; the other thing about anger is that it’s your responsibility. It is your anger. Michelle wants to hold me responsible but I know she isn’t seeing things clearly.

The anger is her response; no matter what I do it is still her responsibility. You can’t blame other people for your anger; things will never change. The root of the anger isn’t other people it’s you. But I know this- I have been around anger a long time. It’s taken me awhile. When I get angry it’s my response; I have to take ownership of my response before things change. Whether someone else knows the triggers that might make me yell etc; well it’s still my responsibility. Michelle I think knows this in her heart of hearts, we have talked about it in the past, but when you are dealing with it on an everyday basis like both of us are right now it seems easier to lose sight of the truth. For the same reason it doesn’t seem like it’s the right time to address this issue of responsibility either. She isn’t going to hear me.

Mantis and Others

2009-05-08T14:17:00.000-07:00

This morning, after showing off some pictures of my son to someone at work, not someone I know well, but as a matter of fact someone relatively new to the position, I decided, on a whim, out of curiosity- I have always been cursed, like the cat, with a huge measure of that disturbing potion- to show her a picture of the pyramid on Mars, one of the ones I had blown up via that site on the web Picnik.

She accepted it a bit too matter-of-factly, but added an interesting comment, something leftover from her childhood. She used to imagine human life was but a television show and the show, unbeknownst to us, was really for the benefit of a race of giants, on another world, perhaps in space, perhaps another dimension.

What is the effect on us of crop circles, ufo’s, all the varied sightings, hunches, intimations we have of- let’s say ‘a different order of things’ than we normally imagine to be the truth about the structure of the world..? Another world is perhaps not quite as encompassing or to the point as the phrase I am looking for and a different order of things seems of more service to the basic idea.

The layers of coincidences triggered for some people by their interaction with crop circles as well as other unusual events has been documented in many places- see Keel among others- and it has pushed my wondering and speculation into another frame of reference. I found myself thinking about Laurens van der Post’s ‘A Mantis Carol’... here is a quote from ‘Jung and the Story of Our Time’ by that same author:

“Coincidences have never been idle for me, instinctively, but as meaningful as I was to find they were to Jung. I have always had a hunch that they are a manifestation of a law of life of which we are inadequately aware and which in terms of our short life are unfortunately incapable of total definition, and yet however partial the meaning we can extract from them, we ignore it, I believe, at our peril. For as well as promoting some cosmic law, coincidences, I suspect, are some sort of indication to what extent the evolution of our lives is obedient or not obedient to the symmetry of the universe.”

Coincidence is but one aspect of these events. How often do we play a part in some of these scenarios only to have nothing to show for it; I’m thinking here about the lack of pictures. In truth we now have plenty of videos and pictures of all kinds, many of which are fake, but many of which are not; but still it seems as if there is a plague of some strange sort that hinders keeping records of some of these events. Crop circles of course stand out from this plague- we do have pictures of these glyphs, plenty of them, but telling the real ones from those created by human hands is another story.

What I really want to tackle is something about how these incidents affect us and what our responses to these events are and how those things change us. Strange but this is a topic that, at least in its generality, I find rarely approached directly in the vast amount of material not only on-line but everywhere.

Often the interaction seems to unbalance us in some way. The stories of abductions for instance often leave the person confused, sometimes with a host of physical ailments they have never had to deal with previously, and sometimes with a new-found attitude comparable only in its intensity to a species of religious conversion.

The experiences, or even the desire for these experiences, seem to inspire an attitude of search, the kind of search we don’t simply let go of, but each of us continues and confronts in our own way. Sometimes that involves joining an organization like Mufon, sometimes it means going public in ways we would never have imagined before, sometimes it isolates us, or we isolate ourselves, not knowing what to do with this information.

I don’t think the question here has to do with evidence. I think we have plenty of evidence, often not the kind quite acceptable to the scientist, maybe not always admissible in a court of law, but I think there is enough evidence to sway us. Things are not as they seem.

The world is not like you or I imagine it. I think that is first thing we can learn from whatever is going on. The experiences, and the evidence, seem to take us to a place where uncertainty reigns, where we don’t know the next step to take. They seem often to leave us only with questions, more and more questions, and the kind we don’t even have the beginning of an answer for, we don’t have an outline for that ‘order of things’ where such things would neatly fit.

Science takes us to something like this place sometimes, it is filled with counter intuitive notions, but this isn’t science or religion but something akin to these areas without fitting either; it has a spiritual center and it often seems to me the quest of the disciples of Jesus have more to do with these questions than, for instance, a study in some remote discipline of science.

There is literally so much crap online, offline, everywhere on this subject, and by this subject I think Forteana is perhaps the best descriptive term, that wading through it can easily get you lost. The best guides have been around the longest and include Fort himself, Keel, Vallee, Coleman, and a few others.

What is the real import of these shenanigans, these observations, and even the missed opportunities that sometimes lead us down similar roads? So what if it isn’t like we imagine it…? Do we take up the question as a cause célèbre or our cross, like Mulder of X-Files fame, or again simply leave the whole subject alone, an unanswerable question, a sort of impossible object we can speculate about but something that can’t exist in the so-called real world…. Or do we become investigators… or does the experience itself change us so much that we align ourselves with a new set of priorities? And this new set of priorities changes our life… or does the experience(s) change our life in little ways, not easily noticed by anyone on the outside but perfectly plain to us with the inside dope?!

What if in truth, ‘everything we know is wrong’..? By that what I mean really is that ‘order of things’ we imagine to be true is in fact so far off the mark- well it would be laughable if we knew better. Of course we don’t know better. That is the situation. Perhaps the real question then is why don’t we know better? Why do we not know the truth?

And that question opens another Pandora box, not the one addressed by this post.

Where do I fit in this spectrum of skeptics and believers… because it is something like that spectrum… I don’t really know what to do with the information. It seems to lead somewhere but mostly to more questions I have no answers for… I suspect that what we call our ‘history’ is such a small chunk of the reality it borders on being a lie. But what do I do with that sort of information… nothing I have or know would ever by itself convince anyone of anything… How far would a demonstration of Pythagorean’s theorem go without the entire subtext of geometry?

It seems to me somehow the ‘subtext’ that would inform our attitudes and beliefs and ‘truths’ with the real truth only exists in fragments now- not enough to convince but barely enough to enliven a sort of debate that takes place on the fringes of our knowledge. And in spite of everything that has been written, conversations down through the ages on the many threads of this fragmented knowledge, it has never been woven back together.

We are stuck with a kind of secondary light that seems more to haunt and plague the little knowledge we do have than take us back to that unity, a kind of universal knowledge, something we might once have been knowledgeable of, participated in, enjoyed.

A postscript. Yesterday I talked with an acquaintance from my Wal-Mart job about a number of ideas that touched on this post. He ended up telling me about his experience(s) with shadow beings, shadow people. He pointed out it isnt the kind of thing he talks about; as a matter of fact he doesnt usually tell people. He knows they arent going to believe him. His experience of these 'things' was both scary and disorienting. There is almost a note of dis-belief in his own voice as he talks about them. But the experience now has him questioning a whole gamet of 'mainstream' 'facts' and ideas.

This is the real thing. The real thing is all that: scary, disorienting, and unbelievable. And it subtly alters your frame of mind. You are prepared for the next step; but the next step is only mystery.

The Last Hurrah

2009-05-06T13:36:00.000-07:00

I feel like I need someone with the vision I don’t seem to have to come into my life and re-arrange the various departments so they are functioning properly. What I really need is Him; we need His blessing! Lord I ask for you to bless our family, give us the knowledge and abilities to become the good stewards of our household we need to be, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

It’s like I can’t even think straight anymore. Nothing seems to be really working quite right. And I don’t know how to make everything work… our apartment routinely looks like some sort of bomb has gone off inside… it never looks comfortable but on the contrary too lived in: You want to move just looking at the mess! No matter what we do it seems we never have enough for everything. We squeeze by each month but have nothing left over and often by month’s end I may be in overdraft…

Last Thursday Michelle had to take me to the emergency at Presbyterian. I had a temperature, I was literally shaking because I felt just that cold, coughing, my appetite is only now gradually returning, I felt faint as if I might pass out, I felt maybe the worst I have ever felt in my entire adult life. I really thought it was some kind of flu but turns out I had pneumonia. They had difficulty bringing my temperature down at the hospital. I lay there for about 3 hours or so… but finally it dropped along with my blood pressure and I began to feel better.

Michelle and Arden came into the room for a few minutes before leaving me there for treatment. All of us had ‘breathing’ masks on. I wonder if Arden will remember this when he grows up. We went to see Daddy in the hospital and I had to wear this mask etc…

You can’t always tell what you are going to remember or why. For instance even now I have this memory of my father- easily accessible- not one of those memories that slip away and require some coaxing to retrieve- of him standing by himself, off to the side, we are at some kind of fair or carnival it seems, and he is standing there clipping his nails, by himself it seems. The memory goes no further than that… I don’t know how old I was; and I do think it is a real memory not something left over from a dream.

Why do I remember this? The one thing about this memory that stands out to me is his separation from us, standing off to the side, it seems as if for most of the time he was with us he wasn’t quite there, as if he was always off to the side in some metaphorical sense. Of course many fathers were like that back then; they worked and simply weren’t there and were only expected to be there so much... So the memory seems emblematic of that separation to me but is that why I still have this memory or is it some other reason, long forgotten…? I don’t know.

It seems I can’t do anything right. Michelle seems to constantly remind me of my shortcomings; I didn’t do this, why didn’t I do that? Talk to the cats, talk to Arden, talk to me… so on top of my own fading image of myself I have hers. I know she doesn’t have insurance, I know the cats need to be seen, I know we need to get rid of the fleas, I know the apartment needs to be cleaned, I know we need food, I know Arden needs his own room, I know the car needs more work, we really need two cars, on and on and on. Nothing is ever right; somehow I always seem to be held responsible for everything… I haven’t given Michelle enough money for this or that. If we lived in a bigger place… if we were in Baltimore… if we had more money. If we had better credit… nothing ever seems quite right.

You know one of things constantly on my mind now is will Arden be proud of me… it seems to me right now as if I haven’t done much for him to be proud of… it doesn’t even seem to me as if I am taking care of him as well as I should be. I know he doesn’t have enough of my time… he needs his own room. He needs more friends. And just exactly how will we begin home schooling him… we need to look into that. I still haven’t set up a trust fund. And all of us need more insurance… and Michelle needs insurance… yes I constantly remind myself of this.

Texas has zip for people without insurance. I have looked into individual private insurance but the costs are competitive with what it would take to put her on my insurance at work… you can get cheap stuff but the benefits are barely worth it. Now she is going to Christian Community Action- something I found- definitely better than nothing. Now Michelle realizes how much care she really does need and how much I am screwing up by not being able to provide this… at least I feel like that about it.

Last night I had to clean the cat litter. Boy the last thing I felt like doing when I got home from my second job- going on 11 at night. I had no choice… it should have been changed a week ago. The smell wasn’t good… of course this is something else I am doing wrong. Much as we have talked about it Michelle almost never voluntarily does anything with the litter. It has become basically my responsibility. And I don’t like doing it. But it has to be done. Still she blames me whenever there is a problem with the litter; she never takes responsibility for this at all. Though we have talked about her helping out, scooping stuff out if not daily then a few times a week, somehow that doesn’t happen, neither of us want to do it, but with the amount of litter I now add the litter boxes are usually good for at least two or three weeks without our intervention.

Anyway after I had finished this task, which took me over half an hour, and I emptied the diaper genie, swept the porch, took out the trash, and finally I am relaxing a little bit having a bit of dinner, she decides it’s time for my third degree and starts in on letting me know I don’t talk to the cats, I don’t talk to Arden, I don’t communicate with her, statistics show that marriages without some tongue kissing every day or two are doomed to failure, on and on while I am trying to eat my TV dinner, Mexican, and trying to forget about the litter etc.

She wouldn’t let me eat, I didn’t feel like talking to anybody right then, especially the cats, finally she goes to bed, I feel like crap, and wonder why while I was doing all that cleaning etc, she didn’t at least pick up her coupons and put them somewhere. The table in the living room looks like crap. But I can’t say something about this; I know somehow she would turn it back on me and it would become somehow my responsibility. I was the one that picked up in the living room. In the middle of doing all this other crap with the litter and the trash. Why didn’t she at least do that? I know she was tired… and I know her fibromyalgia has been acting up. And I know I don’t understand a lot of the time how that really affects her… but I just wanted to eat my dinner.

She wanted me to pick her up today so she could take the car and run a few errands. She is of course almost never ready when I get there- sometimes she is almost ready- but about half the time it’s not even almost. This was one of those not even almost. I was 10 minutes late getting back. I had to apologize to Dana for my tardiness. But we had a huge argument in the car; she called me names and started hitting me. She can’t seem to stop calling me names- no matter how much we talk about it- and I actually said ‘damn’ a couple of times. Something I really don’t usually do. We promised each other a divorce. I hit her in the leg after she hit me several times. So I feel pretty bad having done that. But if you had seen Arden’s face while we were arguing… Made me feel like a worm. I know if we can’t stop arguing the effect on Arden will render our marriage useless.

Why is it she can never be ready on time..? I know how useless this question is… and I can’t believe I even bothered to ask her… Of course she started listing the reasons- and as I knew it would- finally it was my fault. I never did get her that car I promised. So of course, because of that, it is my fault. Well that money is long gone. Spent on her and our marriage and me; on making it from one month to the next too.

I feel pretty lousy right now, remembering that look on Arden’s face. Michelle is so angry- really I am too- I am so tired of struggling from one month to the next and having next to nothing to show for it. It would be different if I was making everything work- if Michelle had that insurance, that car, we were paying all the bills but just had it tough- but it seems like I’m struggling for what I don’t know- I have nothing to show for it!

We have had worse arguments but with Arden right there… we can’t make that up to him. We can make a better marriage but how do we change how our argument must have made him feel… we can’t take his feeling back or get rid of it. She hit me hard enough my arm still hurts a little bit..! Where do we go from here? Even if we apologize I know we were hitting below the belt. She is ready to return to Baltimore; well she is always ready to go back. I don’t know what to do. I can apologize but how do we stop doing this? We still aren’t really paying attention to the difference in our languages. So I know we aren’t really hearing each other right anyway.

Yet one more thing to make me feel how little I am really contributing to our financial development: seems Crystal’s gross is about the same as my main job. Boy that makes me feel so good! Of course taxes there aren’t what they are here- her take home isn’t mine- still just knowing she is making about what I am makes me feel like crap. I have been working 30 years and have nothing better to show for it… well gee that sounds like a whiner doesn’t it! And it is whining! Didn’t I start this post off saying I can’t even think straight anymore?! Oh well.

A Study in Weirdness

2009-04-15T13:49:00.000-07:00

My wife and I were parked outside a place we used to live, an apartment complex, I think this was just before our son Arden was born, and we had just moved in or were about to move in, so that makes it about 3 years ago. Anyway my head was stuck inside the car and I was busy doing something, rummaging around looking for something I think.

Michelle had called to me several times but I didn’t hear her at first and when I realized she was calling my name I wanted to finish whatever I was doing before paying her mind; but she was very persistent and finally I pulled myself and my head back out of the car to find out what was going on.

She had seen something… unusual. And I had completely missed it! She was looking up at the sky and as she was describing it to me my eyes were searching the area she seemed to point to but I didn’t see anything. It was a rather cloudy day, and late in the day but not twilight yet, and what she described could easily have been lost up there.

It was transparent. Composed of three connected circular chambers of increasing size. And it disappeared very quickly. Michelle was definitely startled by its appearance. You could tell from her demeanor. Knowing my interest in such things she was trying hard to communicate and I was not responding.

I was struck by the fact that now I didn’t have to go on and on about this subject, I think she had seen something in the past, but now here was something very different; I didn’t have to convince I wasn’t a crackpot, though I imagine she wouldn’t have married me if that had been her thought. But I think since she has dismissed it as some sort of experimental craft our government, at least some branch of it, knows everything about.

I discovered the following on Stace Tussel’s blog:

“The next thing I know this craft of unimaginable proportions is flying diagonally across the median from left to right, passing directly overhead while I continue focussing on keeping the car on the road, and at the same time quickly noting that this thing is HUGE and tilted - and Sky leans forward and she and Sonya are looking up through the windshield screaming, “It’s a flying saucer! Ohmygodthat’saflyingsaucer!!!!” as I grip the steering wheel and pull to the side of the road, looking out the rear passenger window to see the thing rapidly disappear into the distance.

Both Sky and Sonya are hyperventilating, breathing in an entirely different world than they’d ever seen before. They had just watched a huge disk, low overhead and bigger than they could explain, rotating and revolving, tilted to reveal its underside - which they both described as a display of many small, white lights flashing in a synchronised pattern.

I missed it. I suppose I was being punished for driving when …. well, like I said, I shouldn’t have been driving. I do regret that, more than I can say. But a saucer moves in so that Sonya can see one - and she does, her first! - and Sky gets quite the visual treat, too. Me? I’m taught a hard lesson.”

Much more dramatic than my missed opportunity but still basically weird. Strange how close you can be to an event and yet completely miss it; and not simply the event itself but its true import.

Here is something from an interview with John Keel, forteana expert extraordinaire, about his escapades with Mothman:

"I never saw the Mothman. But I saw people minutes after they had had an experience with it. And they were in a state of total terror. Just happened to be in the vicinity at the time."

The effect of even a missed opportunity can sometimes be difficult to fathom. Without a doubt this event has stayed with me because I missed it; it was so close, and I was right there, simply looking the wrong way... We still talk off and on about this unidentified object. We never get much nearer its meaning.

Circles I

2009-04-07T11:03:00.000-07:00

I never really knew Paul Vigay. But we corresponded several times via email about the phenomenon- or should I say phenomena? - Of crop circles. He had an extensive site on the net and had made an attempt to catalog their many appearances. I think he wanted to get to the bottom of the mystery- but he was interested in what was really going on- an answer that fitted all the relevant details.

Paul is dead. “The body of 44-year-old Paul Vigay was discovered in the sea at Eastney on Friday morning.” The Friday referred to is February 20, 2009. I have a link to his circle site on this very site. Here is a link to some comments on Colin Andrews site- another circle researcher. There is a Book of Condolence on line that as of this writing contains some 400 entries from around the world including my own:

“I didnt know Paul really. I had communicated by email with him several times on the subject of crop circles and had only recently ‘re-discovered’ his site. But his site and his emails to me had left me with an impression of him I haven’t forgotten. He seemed warm, intelligent, creative, and his mind seemed open to untold possibilities. I didn’t really know him, but I knew a part of him, and about him, and cannot believe he is gone… His contribution to the crop circle phenomenon seemed unique! Its obvious he left an impression on many people! His passing has left an effect on me and I hardly knew him!! The quote on his site, about losing sight of the shore, from I think ‘The Counterfeiters’ by Andre Gide, seems emblematic of his intelligence and strangely prophetic as well. You are missed Paul!

I had made the above comment on the blog Inter-Intelligence Communications ...

I really didn’t know him very well. But it’s a testament to the kind of person he is that still I remember him. I kept a link to his circle site on one of my pages. His views on the crop circle phenomenon were an effort to take account of its many faces, all of the details- something by itself that was unusual. He was refreshing to communicate with: I think he was one of those people that truly believed nothing was impossible!

It was a shock to me to learn of your passing... I am truly sorry you are gone Paul and share the feelings I think of many, many others who will miss you. I wish you peace and my prayers are with you!”

There isn’t much information on the web right now as to the circumstances surrounding his death. The little there seems to point to it being a suicide. Knowing him in the way that I did, and not in depth really, this seems shocking to me. It seemed to me, from the distance I was, not only that he had everything to live for, but Life itself seemed to be his Muse. So that he would take his own life still seems a little bit strange to me.

A lot of people have dismissed the subject of crop circles, in part because of the hoaxers, it is obvious the hoaxers are out there and are not limited to Doug and Dave, but I think also simply because the idea seems a little ridiculous; how could there be much to these strange glyphs woven in crops? But if you look into the subject at all you will see it isn’t so easy to dismiss, that there a lot of different things going on, that the hoaxers are just a small part of what is really a complex phenomenon, or a family of inter-related phenomena, the ultimate purpose of which is not clear at all. Are aliens involved in this artistic enterprise? I don’t know but am inclined to think they are at some level.

But Paul had a wide ranging intellect and the subject opened many doors for him. The intro from his site:

“I believe that throughout the universe we meet many wonderful and unique individuals, each travelling on their path to happiness, insight and knowledge.

We are all souls who have spent time on this Earth in order to learn lessons and share information with our fellow beings. Before we depart this three dimensional existence we give back a little part of the universe in the form of love, knowledge and conscious awareness. The planet as a whole will benefit from our love and caring.

Crop circles have had a profound effect on thousands of people who have witnessed and studied them through the years. Irrespective of origin, they have acted as a catalyst to learning, understanding and spirituality as we strive to understand the meaning and purpose behind the genuine crop circles.

I created this web site with the aim of sharing information and creating a forum by which people of like-minded souls around the planet can communicate with each other in order to spread love, light and positivity to the planet.

There is so much pain and sadness in the world at the moment, we need to send love and understanding around the globe, in order to heal the planet and send inspiration to those who need it, whoever they are and whatever their agenda.

Together we can make the world a better place.”

Losing the Way and Finding it Again

2009-03-30T12:42:00.000-07:00

You know this working two jobs is for the birds. I feel like crap- that’s the polite version. Michelle laid down her law last night- well the usual complaints plus a couple more. Basically in addition to the way I feel physically right now I feel pretty lousy in my head too. And it doesn’t make any difference whether she is on the nose or wide of the mark with her assessment because the fact of the matter is she feels pretty bad whatever the reason. And a big part of that reason is me. So knowing that makes me feel even worse. Rotten.

The woman I wanted to raise up to improve the life of to show my love for and all that instead feels like she made a big mistake, she is drowning in debt, and there is hardly a day goes by that some part of her body doesn’t hurt. We don’t have her on insurance so the medical care she gets here is when we can afford it and because I haven’t had a part time job in a couple of months we haven’t had the money. So the most we have done is get a refill on her prescription. As a matter of fact right now my account is in overdraft... something that happens too often.

Now I did get a raise, and as I mentioned at the beginning I have a part time job again, so we actually should have a little more money available but I know it will still be difficult. I know she is tired of struggling and doing without, it goes without saying I am beyond tired of it. I can’t give her or Arden the kinds of things I would like to be able to give them and working another job will make it difficult for me to even give them the kind of time I would like to...

To Michelle I am a liar, beyond frugal, not sensuous, I don’t give Arden enough of my time, I don’t share the finances with her in the sense of letting her pay any of the bills, I don’t listen to her... I think the only things I do right are the dishes and I help put Arden to bed... when I am there... and I do take care of the bills...

I am a failure at everything else. I am a failure as a father, a husband, not so good as a breadwinner, the few things I shine in don’t seem to matter that much. I had a seizure at work last week, was it Wednesday, and I came home early, Michelle didn’t have much sympathy for me as I was out of my medication. The truth is I thought I had been healed, I thought I would never have another seizure again. No use trying to explain that to Michelle.

We are still in counseling. What do I do? How do I change this situation? She isn’t the only one not happy. How do we change things...? Faith and hope are the answers.

Cesura II

2009-03-19T14:02:00.000-07:00

One thing I have noticed about making posts to this blog: it is a lot like keeping a diary. Now that really shouldn’t be; this blog is a little different. But I used to keep a diary for years, adding to it irregularly, I still have it somewhere, but most of the readable entries were made out of negative moods, frustration or depression, or simply discontent being common backdrops. Now it seems for this blog I add something when the weight of my daily burden seems to pass some threshold I can’t measure exactly but feel inside; most of these times I have no solutions to the ‘predicament’ but, probably because of that in part, and other imponderable factors, feel driven to make some sort of statement.

Today for example, after speaking with Michelle on the phone a couple of times, I felt a kind of numbing frustration I can’t really talk to her about, and really have no one to talk to about, including Dawn... well I have no one except Him.

Some of the issues in our relationship, in our situation, have become ‘chronic’ complaints I can’t help but return to again and again. Our lack of money, the lack of availability of real medical care for people without insurance in this state, Texas, these particular topics seem to undercut everything else in our situation as it exists right now.

Let’s talk a little more about money. This month we did something we have never done before, I have never done before in my life; we tithed the full amount to our church. Now let me rephrase that; its much closer to what our real tithes should be but not exact. We tithed $200. Right now, without my mom’s assistance, we wouldn’t have a dollar to our name.

Finally I have found a part time job. My orientation is this coming Saturday and I will start the following week. Wal-Mart; $8.40/ hour. We are still praying, and have faith I will get picked up again for the Google job! I do have misgivings about working at Wal-Mart but thankful at the same time I have something! The pittance I will be earning will make it necessary I work at least 20 hours a week. And that time I know will cut into the little extra time I have for Arden & Michelle. It is going to be more stressful. The extra money coming in will probably not be decent recompense for the added stress. Still without another option available right now I feel like I have no choice but to take the bull by its horns and make the best of what isn’t a great situation.

Hopefully we will be able to take care of some of our financial issues, or at least begin. Medical care for Michelle is directly related to our finances. It’s only because I don’t make enough at my usual job that I can’t afford to put her on my plan at work. I can’t afford the $200 it would take... You know I just got another raise at work but it still doesn’t allow me this luxury.

A couple of years ago I did some research looking into possibilities for medical care independent of insurance. There aren’t any very good alternatives in the state of Texas. Michelle’s mom doesn’t understand this lack of medical care here because there are move avenues in Baltimore for people without insurance to take advantage of medical care. Her mother has no insurance but visits a clinic there whenever she is sick and as long as it’s not serious the cost is minimal. So Katherine doesn’t get it.

Here I am doing the same thing again, looking into options for medical care for Michelle, without insurance, and basically coming up empty handed just as I did before. There are clinics in the area you can go to and be looked at but their fees start at around $50 a visit and even those that have sliding scales, well I make a little too much to change that figure much. The Martin Luther King clinic, on the other side of town, before we stopped going there, and they had a sliding scale, was costing us in the neighborhood of $90 per visit...! The doctor she has been seeing for a while charges I think $60 a visit now. We don’t have excess funds we can draw on to take care of these costs. I was using what I had in my ‘retirement’ account for things like this- of course that’s gone now.

Michelle is always talking to me about what we should and shouldn’t have done with our money. The tax money should have taken care of this or that; we have had enough before that this should have been paid for or that item bought... we did what we could with that money for Heaven’s sake! Wherever it went most of it went for stuff we needed not luxuries of any kind at all...

Here are the luxuries we have: we have an occasional meal out, I can’t even remember the last time all of us ate out right now, it hasn’t been recently, we go to the ‘dollar’ movies... the only other luxuries we have are mostly time. We try and spend weekends as family time; and generally this means we don’t spend anything, except gas, or our expenses stay under $10! Oh... we have cable and cell phones and internet. I guess those are luxuries... though the internet wasn’t a luxury when I had the Google job... it was a necessity. That’s it!! Everything else we spend money on we need. Now we do have a gym membership for Michelle that’s not getting a good work out right now but that can’t be helped.

So our welfare is in His hands. I do have a bit of knot in my stomach from talking with Michelle. I know she is depressed. I know we have fallen short of both her and my expectations. I have a better feeling about the future; I think He has great things in store for us. Still that knot is there. I know I don’t know how to let things be, get out of the way, and let Him do what I know I cannot. Dear Lord I beseech you can you teach me how to let go, how to let you take care of things, in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Arden

2009-03-19T11:44:00.000-07:00

Cesura

2009-02-25T09:49:00.000-08:00

Michelle and I have been sick for the last day and a half. I left work early on Monday and when I got home, thanks to Michelle, just went to bed. Finally after several hours in bed, and I think she gave me Excedrin, and later some hot tea and lemon, I started feeling a little better. My body was aching, I had a fever when I came home, Michelle took my temperature, it was something like 101, my stomach felt queasy, I felt like throwing up but never did, but I have had almost nothing to eat for the past two days. I tried some chicken noodle soup last night but only finished about half the bowl.

Michelle however did throw up, several times, she did have a slight fever too I think, but she was in more pain than I was, aggravated by fibromyalgia, and rest is about the only thing that really seemed to help us though even when resting, because your body is aching, you just toss and turn. Both of us feel a lot better than yesterday, but still not quite well. Arden of course, but thankfully too, wanted to play the entire time... we were literally too sick to do much of anything and when we finally started feeling a little better too tired to play much at all.

You know being sick opens a different window on your life. Sometimes that’s a good thing. It’s a different perspective. This time however it just seems to have made me painfully aware of all my shortcomings. How much we want to be in a different place, in Baltimore, closer to family, how far away I seem to be from the kinds of things I wanted to be and do when I was young, what a poor job I feel I am doing providing for my family. Money, money, money... Right now it seems more of that would solve so many things. But I know, to some extent at least, that is an illusion.

Michelle has no insurance, she does manage to remind of this, and she definitely needs it more than I do, the cats do need to see the doctor but though we have insurance for them we still can’t always afford some of their needs beyond the insurance, we have a terrible time saving anything still; I had set the ING account up as a savings vehicle and had over $100 stuck in it, but we have already had to draw on that. I still don’t have another part time job. Until I do it’s going to be tough going...

How do I tell Arden I really wanted to be a radio astronomer, or an astronaut, a writer, or a poet, an archaeologist or anthropologist...? Somehow I never made any of that, I think I might still have a shot at being a writer, one or two of the others aren’t impossible, though they may be unlikely... is Arden going to be proud of me...? I don’t have a lot to show for my time here on this planet but him. I haven’t done great things... the greatest thing I have taken part in outside of Arden (and my part in that was a minor one), is to marry Michelle.

The seizures I had in my twenties sent me on a detour... maybe things wouldn’t have been so different anyway... but without a doubt the seizures made me look at everything differently. I am in the job I now have partly because of them. I might not have thought of pursuing anything in the field of rehabilitation without that background. And it was only by virtue of being in a job club at the Dallas Epilepsy Foundation that this job even crossed my radar... It is at the same time the root cause of our financial problems- and of mine over the last several years. I was barely making enough for myself after I first took this job and without a doubt if I had not already been on unemployment I would not have taken it. It was a step down from what I had at UT Southwestern. But for the last- well 20 years really- I have felt a bit like a fish out of water. Not quite where I belong.

That’s a long time... where do we- it’s no longer I- where does my family go from here? That is the big change... Now we have to think of all of us. What is best for my family..? Without a doubt I think relocating to Baltimore will have a positive effect and will be good for all of us but making this shift has proved a lot more difficult than I had thought. It has taken so long now- it’s been in our minds and hearts for over 2 years- that Michelle sees the virtues of living here in Dallas more clearly than in the past. Its true our are does offer economic benefits-you can live more cheaply here and maintain a better lifestyle here than a comparable version in Baltimore- the trump card is still family and they are in Baltimore.

Right now we are working with Jerry & Jessye in Redemptive Christian Counseling. They are located here in Dallas. We have only had two sessions so far and haven’t covered too much ground yet. We have spoken about our life languages and how our lack of knowledge of our different languages gets in the way of our communicating effectively. This I think is at least in part the source of many of our arguments... we don’t communicate the same way. I don’t hear her quite right and vice versa. Trying to change that is difficult. I think we both are more aware of this problem but now not quite sure how to alter our communication in ways that will work for us.

Getting Back Up Again

2009-01-13T14:28:00.000-08:00

Where to begin again? I haven’t added to this blog since the end of October. Last year. A lot has happened but not much has really changed. Still @ DARS. The Google job ended a little bit earlier than expected but not much: November. I picked up a telemarketing job which lasted a couple of weeks until they put me on commission; and I couldn’t make enough that way so simply quit. Our expenses are basically still too close to my income to make a part time job unnecessary. Right now I am in between part time jobs and financially we are in a very uncomfortable position- as always when I am without part time work.

We are living on a shoestring right now. Our cell phone bill hasn’t been completely paid up so until it is taken care of we can only receive calls. If it’s not taken care of by this Thursday our services will be completely suspended. The electric bill can be put off till later in the month- it’s almost $200. I don’t know where that money is coming from at this time.

I had other options that have fallen through or not yet come to pass. I applied for a position taking the census- a perfect score on their test- but nothing from them yet and an online job I thought was going to materialize has since turned into a weird scam.

I can’t process the rest of our tax return without w2’s and I probably won’t have those until right at the end of the month or even later so that money isn’t available... So I still feel like I’m drowning... neither of us is happy about the situation. Arden isn’t getting everything I want him to have and neither is Michelle. And Michelle needs a dentist... how are we going to manage that..? I have put everything in prayer again and again it seems.

Something I had thought was going to create huge changes in our lives- the group I joined from the 30 Day Challenge- has mostly dissolved. It isn’t what it was when I joined. My site about Bali- though the domain name is mine and the content mine as well- the template etc belongs to the group- or James I guess- the head of our little group.

Seems like the whole thing- our group etc- was built on sand. I haven’t actually quit yet- I am trying to salvage my blog as best I can before I do that- but I feel I can’t trust James now. I feel like I don’t really have a choice. Of course none of the blogs had been ‘monetized’ yet so we haven’t made anything.

To be honest part of me feels like I am close to some kind of nervous breakdown... not being able to pay my bills- and everything going on with Michelle- all this together is killing me. I feel like I am coming apart. If something doesn’t change in our situation I don’t know how much longer I can go like this....

I had included the following in an email to Dawn about our situation: Its kind of funny.... one of the reasons I wanted Michelle down here to begin with was so she could be taken care of better than seemed to be happening in Baltimore... I wanted her to have medical care etc... I was still working at UTSW when we first started talking and thought I wouldn't have problems making everything happen... I always had more than enough money.... but when I left and ended up with this job here I starting going into overdraft every month... and it was still just me then!! When she finally came down I no longer was in the same boat... we have struggled off and on ever since... sometimes we have had more than enough... she worked off and on when she first came down and had one or two really good jobs... and things were working... but since Arden I have had to work 2 jobs to really get by... and depending on what I am making we have something or we don't.... but it never worked out the way I imagined.... because of this damn job I have now... and how little I bring home... I am making more now of course but it’s still a problem... and I have this feeling every day that I am not doing right by Arden or Michelle. That I am cheating them because I don't have enough money to make things work smoothly and when Michelle really needs some kind of medical care I feel so much worse... like why did it happen like this... I suppose He has a reason but I don't know how long I can go the way I have been...

Something else from another email to Dawn: You know there was a woman at the telemarketing job- her name was MaryAnne I think- I wasn’t there long enough to get to know very many people but I ended up sitting next to her- she would make comments on her calls about what she had been thru. It helped establish a connection with people. She had lost her job several months ago- she was selling medical supplies of some kind I think- something like that- but she has been doing this- telemarketing for the last 5 or 6 months. I don’t know how she survives on that unless she does have something else...

...one of the things she would tell people- you picked up phrases and approaches by listening to everyone else do their thing- was how you look for relief when things are bad literally everywhere. She didn’t put it like that but even the smallest compliment- or maybe just a picture hanging on the wall with a scene that somehow comforts you- the smallest things become a sort of refuge. I had meant to talk to her about this observation- well I never got the chance but I find myself doing that. Arden no matter what seems to smile at everything. I know his smile has become something of a refuge to me. Sometimes the weather is like that- the temperature will be comforting- or a photograph will seem to hold out something to me and for a moment I will feel stronger. Or a movie... The Holy Spirit will do that too- but I don’t often feel that presence.

Seems like we haven’t moved far. Over two months but things aren’t really much different... we both want change so badly. We seem stuck. My prayer: Dear Heavenly Father we want to thank you for all your blessings and ask your help in moving us on beyond ourselves to a new place in our lives, a more nurturing place, where all of us can have space to breathe and room to move and your Peace to enable us to treat each other and everyone with the kindness and reverence all Your life deserves. In Jesus’ name amen.

A Haven from the Storm

2008-10-30T11:08:00.000-07:00

Just this past Sunday Michelle and I made a real effort to arrive at church on time. We were still late and they no longer had room for Arden in their ‘daycare’ so we were trying to decide whether we should sit upstairs in the overflow or whether I should simply take him and let Michelle sit by herself; Arden can be a handful, especially so at this age.

Well we were talking about this when one of the ‘ushers’ came over and inquired if they could help us. We explained they had run out of room for Arden and were trying to decide where to sit. The usher directed us to a room, upstairs, near the top of the flight of stairs, a small but comfortable room, the ‘Crying Baby Room’. There was a TV and three benches and enough room for several children but not many. We have been going to Covenant for some three years but no one had ever shown us this room. We probably have passed it by many times without really ever noticing it.

Now we had a place to sit, an area for Arden to play and move about, and we could see and hear the service from a comfortable location. And I thought if all of the families in the congregation with children, forced as we were to bring them into the adult service because they had no more room in the daycare, knew about these rooms (there was another room on the other side of the church the usher said), there probably wouldn’t be room for everyone if they all decided to make use of it.

The existence of these rooms, and our ignorance of their existence, seemed to open a door in my thoughts to a whole range of ideas. How does it happen in all this time of being part of Covenant, and Arden is almost 18 months now, in all that time we didn’t hear about these rooms? Accident... serendipity... or something else? Is it our own fault, that we haven’t looked further, that though we go to Covenant regularly we don’t really have friends there, we aren’t even ‘technically’ members, in the sense of having gone thru the ritual of membership? Or is it all of these things... or none of them?

Recently I struck up a conversation with someone at work, the conversation covered a gamut of topics, from dna and research into the ‘mechanism’ of memory, to speaking in tongues, chemically transferring memories, out of body experiences, pyramids; all this during break times while attending a meeting at the office. He recommended a book to me, “My Descent into Death”. And I mentioned the NASA photograph that shows a pyramid on the planet Mars.

One of the things we talked about was the church milieu, and how unusual experiences had in that venue often seem to remain tied to that context; how if, for example, you tried to talk about the inclinations and anointing of the Holy Spirit in a different context, as a matter of fact almost any context outside the church milieu, it falls on deaf ears. Somehow switching the context is like a game of three card monte; you can’t find the subject in the new context, people don’t want to hear about it outside of that context, bringing a different viewpoint on the subject seems to cast it into the shadows.

I have been going thru some changes this month. I still haven’t put a picture of Arden on this blog. There is actually a short video Michelle made of Arden and I circling around in a train at one of the Fall Festivals they had at a church here I would like to include on this blog.

One of the original topics for this particular post was to have been about desperation and the Holy Spirit. I have been overwhelmed with desperation and worthlessness recently; not being able to provide everything your family needs can do that. I have been desperate to feel the touch of the Holy Spirit and one night not long ago, it was a Wednesday night, my wife had gone to church by herself. When she talked to me later about being there, and feeling that touch, I felt jealous. Her capacity for receiving the Holy Spirit seems greater than mine; often I only barely feel the presence but the longing and need in me go down to the bottom of my soul. And especially now, with everything going on with our family, I need that even more and feel as if I am being shortchanged.

Now I am going to completely switch topics... it’s been hard for me to focus on anything for the past couple of months; it is probably one of the reasons I haven’t posted to this blog. I am in dire straits financially. I keep slipping into overdraft. I am in overdraft right now. Michelle is very unhappy; she wants a respite from our situation, to travel to Baltimore to visit her family. Her mother isn’t happy with what she is going through right now. She needs to be seeing a doctor on a regular basis, with both diabetes and fibromyalgia to manage. I know she is very depressed. So am I. I am stuck right now in a situation I don’t know how to find release from... we continue to pray but we definitely need to pray more than we do.

I need more income, but at the same time, we need a budget. I have spent two months tracking our expenses, not to mention visited a consumer credit counselor as well, who put things into a depressing perspective for me, but I have a good idea where our money goes. I know for instance without a part time job our expenses outstrip my income every month by something like $300. That’s without the payday loans. Continuing to make payments on those loans more than doubles that figure. With the part time job I am only just making it, my ability to save anything is severely hampered. I can sock away $10 here or $20 there but I can’t do any better than that.

To Be Continued

New Creatures

2008-08-27T11:29:00.000-07:00

I can remember, from being touched by the Holy Ghost, it is not my usual state of being. When He is there, and you are with Him, you have in truth left your old self behind, you are as it says in 2 Corinthians 5:

17Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

Its true. You no longer have a place for anger. It is your old life. Negative emotions seem to have found a new home and that new home is your old self. In your new life they have no presence. Your old self is without repentance and without real understanding of the meaning of that word. Your new life knows you are the battleground. Your old self only knew the battles. With the Holy Ghost comes a gift of peace you cannot properly convey to anyone if they have not had the experience; if you have only a taste you still have the meaning.

Going to church is what the old self might have done. When you are new again the taste and experience of the Holy Ghost, of Christ in you, bring you back to church for more, more of His word, more of Him. My upbringing did not bring me to church on a regular basis. And, agnostics and atheists alike, church was a place for hypocrites and liars. Not for those who knew the truth.

Strange. I see the same thing now, church is the place for hypocrites and liars, and thieves and adulterers, and all manner of such backward things, but I see that old truth in a new light. Of course! It can't be otherwise. In all the world the only place for such people is the church. Here they can become free again. Here they can come to know their true selves. Here they can learn how to live the life of a new creature. So I see the same thing, as I did when my sight wasn't so acute, but I see with a different light. Of course it is the only place for those who know the truth. There is no other place in all the world that can take the place of the spirit-filled church.

Why is it, even with all this help, and Michelle is a new creature herself, she has I know, on more occasions than I have, been filled with the Holy Ghost, but we are both so close to giving up on our marriage its not funny. We argue all the time, but all those times the Holy Ghost hasn't been there, our mediator, helping us understand each other. We need His peace, we need His perspective, we need Him in our relationship.

We had another argument today, over the phone, she mentioned divorce, as well as calling me 'a big fat liar', Michelle resorts to name calling when she doesnt know what else to do, and she is usually the one mentioning divorce, but I am having trouble just concentrating... I feel sick of my life. I have that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach and wish I could go on a long sea voyage and think things over, enjoy life again, whatever that means. If I knew how I would slip back into my new self, but as it is that seems like a distant memory I have trouble completely believing in right now.

We may be new creatures but our old selves still torture us. I think torture is a precise word in this context. Does it ever happen that we will find our time spent mostly in the place of the new creatures and not always fighting the battles for our old selves? When does that happen? How long does it take?

The Age of Miracles Hasn't Passed

2008-08-25T13:06:00.000-07:00

The idea of imagining Arden reading this blog one day, one day in the not too distant future, still probably at least a good 10 years from now, makes me second guess everything. My horizon, when it comes to time, needs to be adjusted. Will Michelle and I still be together... a thousand other questions chase after that one, on the heels of its last syllable so to speak…

We aren’t doing very well together right now. I know neither of us really want to be in this situation: we don't want to be in the marriage, we want a house not an apartment, we are tired of struggling with our finances, we no longer want to be in the state of Texas but in Baltimore, in Maryland, with her family, and I don’t want to be at my job anymore- when your job doesn’t pay your way its like what’s the point? I just got a raise: it is meaningless. I think we are being strangled; I want to say we are strangling each other. I think it’s truer to say the situation is strangling both of us, our welfare, our safety and security.

The funny thing is- and really its not funny at all but strangely tell-tale- I think not only do we love each other we want the same things. We both want to live in a house, not an apartment. We both want the best for Arden, we have talked about home school because neither of us has a high estimation of public shools in the United States, and private schools, on average, aren't that much better. We want to travel, we want our financial picture to improve, we both want to write, Michelle wants to go back to school, I want her to go back to school, I am even thinking along those lines myself... We want and need two cars, not just one. We both want a business, something constantly on my mind, we want our sexual life to improve, we both want another child, but we also want more time for ourselves and our family. We also want the church to be part of our lives; we are both Christians.

It is very much harder for me to thing of the things we don't quite see eye to eye on; I know for instance I have more appreciation of the 'scientific method' than Michelle. We don't agree on evolution; to her the idea is a lie plain and simple, to me it holds some truth, but the outlines of the the truth it does hold I dont think are clear to us yet. Our science has so many puzzle pieces missing from its picture and I think when it comes to evolution we are missing a big one. But I don't think it diminishes the truth that is there. That basic truth is simply all life on earth is connected. What else do we not agree on... I would have to think about it.

I don’t think we can stay together much longer in the dire straits we seem to be in right now. Some of that is imagined. We are making it from month to month; but we have to do more than that. Michelle complains endlessly about not being able to go to the hairdresser, not getting her nails done, it seems like a million and one other things; its probably only a million. I know she is very unhappy and feels like she is drowning. How do I know that? I know from what she does tell me, from her blog on my space, but also because I feel like that too. It seems like I don’t have enough time for anything… with the second job every day of the week is taken up in extra hours committed to something only indirectly benefiting my family. My time would be directly benefiting them... I don’t have enough of that to go around right now. I need more time to myself, Michelle needs more time from me, and Arden definitely needs more of my time.

Meanwhile I am trying to look for jobs in Baltimore, trying to find a replacement for the Google job, that looks like it will end mid December, what a perfect time of the year for it to come to an end!?!! I have been trying my hand at writing again… but there is a part of me that simply wants to give up. I am praying for a miracle, a sort of ark, something to see us thru this time till we can plant ourselves on firmer ground. But I feel like I’m drowning, floundering, useless, a failure to all of us, not just in my son’s eyes, if he could see the situation as it really is, but definitely a failure to my wife, to myself but to my family most of all.

Medical insurance is the tip of the iceberg. Michelle needs this more than I do; diabetes, fibromyalgia, an irregular period, an ovarian cyst, a host of other complaints, depression among other things, and memory problems, but whose root underlying cause(s) is unknown, that may be related to her weight, or any of the other maladies already mentioned. Covering her with the insurance I have available at work is $200 more out of our pocket each month… I am struggling right now with making that decision. Michelle advises against it as that is money some of which might be able to contribute to the trip to Baltimore but I know whatever she advises she will be complaining about not being covered if that happens and if we do go ahead and take care of it we will have to be that much more cautious in our spending. The fact we can’t seem to make this work makes me feel, basically, like crap, and makes me very angry at the same time, at the system that makes such a state of affairs possible.

How do I get from where I am, where we are, to where I am not, where we are not? How do I make that journey? Is this what He wants for us? Does He want us to split up? He has managed to keep us together this long, and believe me it hasn’t been easy; we both brought a lot of baggage into this marriage. Can marriage really be this hard? We are planning on home schooling Arden; the way our relationship is right now we couldn’t home school a dog much less a human being. Michelle and I are smart and creative enough to home school Arden, and do a better job than either public or private schools might, but not if we are at each other’s throats.

Now I don’t even feel like trying to talk to her. I am so tired of her name calling, ‘retard’ and ‘dick’ are two favorites, as well as the more common 'idiot' and 'jerk', and even more tired of trying to deal with her when she gets physical during an argument, and starts hitting and throwing things. I still remember her throwing a hamburger and tomato sauce at me. I thought the shirt was destroyed but I still wear it, you cant tell it went thru that ordeal, but every time I do wear it I cant help but remember her doing that. We had an argument last night that involved her name calling. I simply walked out calling to her just before my departure, “F#$% you Chel.” I was very angry as it seemed to me mostly undeserved. Michelle has a very changeable mood, she even talks about it a little bit in her blog, one moment she can be happy, seemingly carefree, and almost the next moment, depressed, even suicidal, and angry on top of that. I have to deal with the fallout from these mood swings. Neither fun nor an easy and simple thing to do.

Let me end this entry with a prayer: Dear Heavenly Father I ask for your help and favor, even a miracle, to keep us together, help us to make our marriage work, to listen to each other, be the good stewards over our destinies you meant for us to be, to be the best parents anyone could ever be to Arden and all our children. Please help us to forgive each other and ourselves all of our transgressions. In deepest gratitude for all your blessings, Amen.

Brave New World

2008-08-01T14:50:00.000-07:00

When I was young my heroes were always idealists of one sort or another. Some of that changed a little bit as I grew older but even now the people I look up to arent usually on everyone else’s radar. Astronauts were bigger than life, they seemed to me modern day renaissance men, they were poised on the edge of technology with a pioneer’s thirst for a new world, and a disdain for the ordinary that of course seemed to me to make them poets of some unusual calibre too. Astronauts, test pilots (race car drivers were much too grounded), scientists, mathematicians, and later on various musicians, Beethoven included, and writers, the author of A Voyage to Arcturus but one example. Whatever their differences they all owed fealty to the country of the imagination.

All of them seemed to me in the vanguard of our human destiny, whatever that might mean. Jesus, once I finally read the Gospels, was someone so far beyond the ordinary he could be nothing less than our Savior. But all of my heroes were, or seemed to me, to be committed to some incredibly brazen hope, or brave new world.

My parents had separated, and divorced, long before I started trying to really ‘clarify’ these ideas to myself. Neither of them fell into my ken as being mentors or heroes. They were my caretakers, or at least one of them took the role, but that seemed a paltry thing to me when I was young. I think I felt more as if they were holding me back from my real place in the world instead of launching me into great things. Really, I know now, that wasnt very clear-sighted and not even half the truth, but being young is being without history.

My father, however much I wanted him to be one, was not either mentor or hero. Once my parents separated I dont think I ever saw him again. He called once but I wasnt in the mood to talk with him. I know now how deeply the divorce really hurt me, or at least how deep an impact it left, but I didnt know or understand then what was really going on, and waited in vain for someone close to me to explain, to tell me everything would be all right. I have at last, I think, put that waiting behind me. I never did hear those words.

Now I am looking to complete that change my marriage invited into my life. Michelle and I are having major problems, we may very well end up separating ourselves, and my blog turn into a sort of message in a bottle for Arden. I sincerely hope that doesnt happen. I think I do have things to show him, to teach him, and want to be there for him. Still I can see the writing on the wall and know without some major changes in our situation a separation is inevitable.

I am trying to collect mentors now. To aid me in my transition into something new, a better life, not just for myself, but family too. Ramit, Tim, Josh, you can find links to them on this blog, they are a few of my mentors. But I still have the astronauts, Newton, Beethoven, Jesus, Lindsay, among others. But Jesus is out front of this assembly, and my prayers are with Him.

Interregnum

2008-07-25T12:12:00.000-07:00

Some parts of my old life, my life alone, I still miss. Being alone with my thoughts, for instance, not simply since Arden, but since getting married, is just not something that happens too often now. I think being alone with your thoughts is important, that you lose track of things in some sense if you aren’t able to do that once in awhile.

I have found it very difficult to begin this blog again, to begin again. I don’t know where to begin. At least a sequel to number one... I have several drafts for other posts but none of them seem to fit the role of sequel.

I had an experience in church recently I wanted to include here. I suppose its what people, in the know, refer to as being ‘filled with the Holy Ghost’. The effect on me, superficially, if anyone had noticed, was simply I could not stop crying. Why was I crying? The easy answer to this is to simply say I don’t know. It may also be the most honest answer.

I remember standing there- and I stood most of the time I was going thru this experience- and part of me was trying to figure this out. What was going on? But the other part of me just felt empty. I felt a huge emptiness, like there was nothing left inside me. Strangely I think I felt as if I was crying for everybody, for the world, but in what sense it would be hard for me to say. As if everything was somehow hollow. Now I have had similar experiences in the past but never with the ‘clarity’ this experience seemed to hold.

Next to me, not more than 5 feet away, a little girl had knelt down on the floor, I don’t think she was even 10 years old, and seemed deep in her own prayers. I had never experienced this as a child and can only imagine what that might be like. I kept noticing a woman on stage, part of the choir, who also could not hold back her tears. She had been going thru this longer than myself. The atmosphere did seem to have a sort of presence, to be charged in some way, and it was that presence taking the tears from me.

I remember an episode on the TV series ‘Tales from the Dark Side’, The Tear Collector, everyone tells Prudence to ‘stop crying’. She runs into a ‘somber but handsome’ man, Ambrose who:

“shows up and tells her that he is a tear collector and he wants to collect her tears in a small glass vial shaped like a swan. She agrees to let him collect her tears and then as she is leaving, Ambrose thrusts some money into her hand, telling her to come back soon. She does... This is a strange episode that leaves unanswered questions. Yet the atmosphere and characters are wonderfully somber and enigmatic.” (from the above referenced link)

And the feeling noted in this summary of 'The Tear Collector', that it was somber, enigmatic, and left unanswered questions, and I might add, a sense of wonder as well, all these feelings were pervasive in this experience. Again as if the experience is somehow not an end in itself but a sort of beginning. I had no sense when I began this description of the experience that I saw it like that. But that is very true. I had that definite sense of it leading to another place. What kind of leading and what kind of place is only mystery.

History Lessons

2008-05-23T14:34:00.000-07:00

... so now, its late in the game, dont really have anything to show for my time here as far as money goes, Im trying to change things, but I feel like Im starting all over, starting from square one.

There are reasons Im in this place, they dont really matter much anymore, but there are reasons. Ive had epilepsy since I was in high school. Most of my twenties were spent learning to cope with this disorder. My seizures are well under control now but back then it was no piece of cake. I didnt know if I would ever be able to live like a 'normal' person, if I could ever drive a car, really take care of myself, or if, on the other hand I was going to end up in an institution for the rest of my life.

People that have never had any major health issues dont realize the quantum shift in your world view that engenders; insurance problems are the least of your worries. The real difficulties, and they are traps, lie in attitudes and psychology. I didnt know what was really going to happen. I have been, in the past, depressed and suicidal, have struggled with these feelings; my wife and I, with a friend put up a site online to help others deal with similar issues. But it was also to help me come to terms with the emotional baggage.

I found jobs, I have a degree, but have never made very much money. I have married late in life, just three years ago now, have a son, Arden, he is incredible, a beautiful wife, and am in a place, in my life, I didnt think I would ever be. I work two jobs that amount to about 60 hours a week, but havent been able to save a dime over the last year. I do have some debt... my credit isnt where it could be... What retirement I had was gone after the first two years of marriage, and now I have no savings, no financial resources to speak of, nothing to fall back on really.

Our marriage is far from idyllic, we argue too much, but we are struggling financially right now, and that complicates any other issues that may be on the table. I have had tax problems in the past, primarily from not reporting, but also simply not being able to pay, and only this year have finally resolved my tax problems.We need to completely restructure our spending patterns. We need to be able to save something. So one of the things Im doing, with my wife, is looking hard at the budget. I could use a better paying job, my wife doesnt have insurance right now because I cant afford to put her on my plan at work; that contributes a certain amount of anger to my situation and a feeling of helplessness as well. Still I will probably have to find a way to work this out. I have thought about going back to school but have no idea how I would squeeze that into my 60 hour work week, still spend time with my family etc. I have thought about developing another site online, my second job right now is spent online. My wife and I would like our own business... with money the issue it is right now gas itself is slowly becoming a major consideration too.

Still I am blessed, I have come a long way from that time in my life, and it still doesnt seem far enough away, thinking I might not ever be able to drive a car, take care of myself, much less a family, and thinking I would never have a son. I am a long way from that. Prayer is important to me now. And hope. I think you have to have hope that things can change. No matter how little it is nourish it! It will get you from where you are to the place you arent yet. If you dont think things can be different the chances of your situation changing are slim.

Life is not fair! Its something else, something other than that... But everything does change. Its a fact of life. You can change. Things can get better! One person can make all the difference. People say that all the time without really believing it. Still its true in spite of everybody: You can move from the situation you are in to something better. You may not be able to see the way, imagine how it will happen, but thats ok. Just keep knocking on the door. You will finally step thru that doorway into another life, one you cant imagine from your vantage point now.

Let's Go Fly a Kite

2008-05-19T13:02:00.000-07:00

Lets take some time... a little time. Fly a kite, walk in the rain, watch the sun come up, or go down... start over. Start over again. Turn everything upside down. Watch the stars come out one by one. Spend some time with the people and things you love. Go fishing. Skip stones across the water.

Part of me is drowning.... I am working two jobs and it seems like Im still swimming underwater. I have never had this problem before... it is incredibly frustrating. And when I do get a little air, and I can sit back and get a little more perspective, I cant see the future. So I am beginning to rely on Him more than ever before. And thats new. I dont know how... I cant hear Him very well.

Where are we supposed to be? What am I supposed to be doing? Arden changes everything. He is still a baby but in just a few years he wont be and in that time I am praying for a surer foothold in the scheme of things, if not for me, at least for my family.

How do I get from here to there...? I dont know. Im thinking about going back to school... right now I dont even know how I would squeeze that into my schedule. I work about 60 hours a week- I could use 80 if I could take it. Its hard enuf with 60. Thinking about going back to one of my first loves: Astronomy. But after looking into job prospects in this area thats already sliding out of the picture.

I feel like still there is so much I want to do and see. Want to share with Arden and Michelle. And I feel stuck right now. Almost like I cant move. The apartment is always in a shambles. But it isnt just Michelle- or us- or Arden. We need a bigger place now. Somewhere we can move around. And Baltimore... He still hasnt found us the bridge.

I want to write. I want a business. I want to be able to make everything work. Seems like I am failing on so many levels right now. Its time for a new beginning. Time to start over. A new leaf. Still have the remnants of kllngyrslf on the net. I would like to completely recast it.

The Google job is not something I would even have guessed at finding. Its more of a blessing than I can communicate. And its interesting. But trying to squeeze 20 hours in is difficult. How much more so if it had been an ordinary routine job.

How do I make room for everything I want in the future? The economy itself seems more precarious day by day, with the looming oil crisis, global warming, oh, and the coming "Singularity"... How do we make plans? Life itself is outside of plans, its going on right now. Catch a breath of fresh air. .!

Those flings, those escapades, those larks- flying a kite, skipping stones, fishing, letting a clutch of balloons sail into the air, watching the stars come out- speak directly to me. Remind me that we are, in some small way, here for the ride. The ride is important but how we take the ride is what counts.

Seems like Michelle and I argue every day. But I think we are beginning to understand each other a little better. The arguments can still be bad but they have less significance. Because we have weathered the storm? We have a stake in this, we are committed. But we are still getting on each other's nerves in a way that isnt always healthy.

This is the most I have written in over two years.... and that image of a stone skipping across the water, or the wind in the trees, or a balloon dancing away into the sky- somehow those images make everything all right. I feel a lightness lodged in the depths of my being somewhere that seems to be the only thing of any real value right now.

Michelle and I seem so exhausted most of the time. We are spending ourselves up and not getting the renewal we need. We need more prayer, more time to ourselves, but more time really communicating, trying to understand each other. We need more poetry in our life, more life, for Arden's sake even more so than our own.

We never seem to have enough money. We always need something else for Arden. Something for the apartment. Food. Too bad we cant get by without food and gas. That would be a tremendous savings. Or rent! As it is now we havent been able to save a dime over the last year. My expenses are too close to my earnings. What are we to do? I am already working two jobs and its not like Im getting paid poorly for either of them. Do I look for yet another stream of income? Do I manage what I do have and make do... I need to tackle both of these prospects.