Best trip of 2005

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A picture of our family at the San Diego Zoo while we visited California on our summer trip of 2005. One of the best stops, and one we all recommend, was our camping in Big Sur State Park amongst the Redwoods. We had our tent next to a river with the Pacific Ocean about a mile away.

I don't know, but he might.

Today, right now, it is just Caleb and I. Everyone else is at parties. We have just finished a little sprucing up for others who will visit us this evening.

We were done. So, I said to Caleb...

"Hey, I want to play you a song." (This was while he was in mid-stride up the stairs to play the Gamecube).

"O.k.," he said with that little raised inflection at the end of the "k" that reeks of indulgence.

"It is my favorite Christmas version of any Christmas song. Remind me later and I will tell you a little story about the first time I heard it"

So, the song starts. It is "Stille Nacht" or "Silent Night", the version by Mannheim Steamroller.

The song begins. So I said half-jokingly and half not, "One day, Caleb, years from now you might remember this day, the day your dad made you listen to Silent Night while we sat drinking our Diet Cokes. Often, small-thing days like this you remember."

"Yea, but it doesn't seem like that right now."

"I know. Just trust me and keep listening." And he courteously listened and then retraced his steps up the stairs.

I dare you.
Do this for you.

This Christmas, maybe Christmas eve, after everyone has slid into bed and slid into sleep, find this song and play it. Play it in the dark of the night and the dark of the house, the only lights those from the Christmas tree and from above the mantle. Find a spot best by a fire. Close your eyes. Listen. And when the song is done, stay there still.

I don't know if it will happen. I don't know if he Caleb will ask me to tell him the story about the first time I heard the song though I will be sure to tell him anyway.

I don't know if Caleb will remember this day amidst his own children, his own house, his own whatever, when the song plays. But right then, he might just pause for a moment, be still, listen, smile gently.

Kindness

"The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shriveled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime was on his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low temperature always about him; he iced his office in the dog-days; and didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas.

External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth cold warm, nor wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he, no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no pelting rain less open to entreaty.
Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looks, "My dear Scrooge, how are you? When will you come to see me?" No beggars implored him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him what it was o'clock, no man or woman ever once in all his life inquired the way to such and such a place, of Scrooge. Even the blindmen's dogs appeared to know him; and when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into doorways and up courts; and then would wag their tails as though they said, "no eye at all is better than an evil eye, dark master!"

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

"And they made their hearts like flint so that they could not hear the law and the words which the Lord of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets; therefore great wrath came from the Lord of hosts."

Zechariah 7:12

"...being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their hearts; and they, having become callous..."

Ephesians 4:18-19

"For the heart of this people has become dull, and with their ears they scarcely hear, and they have closed their eyes;"

Isaiah as quoted in Acts 28:27


Darkened, calloused, hardened, dulled hearts. We know these people. There are examples from works of fiction, from Holy Scripture, from next door.

And, of course, we know when we do something, say something, see something that darkens our hearts. We are smart like that. There is a moment when we know.

Kindness is an interesting attribute because of its power over the receiver. It seems that it is necessary for the hard hearted to be softened prior to a pricking that leads to God. Kindness does that, and most likely in an unseen way. Maybe like this. When traveling to higher altitudes, like Colorado for a ski trip, you pack your tube of lotion. When you arrive checking your little diddy bag for your lotion to beat back the dry mountain air, you take it out, turn the cap, and are squirted with the lotion. Perhaps you opened your bag and saw that the explosion had already occurred, maybe around Walsenburg. Pressure had been building up, making its hidden presence known only when it could stand it no more. I think that is what kindness does to the calloused heart. The acts lavished upon a hard heart has a softening effect. Soft hearts are required for repentance. Soft hearts are required for confession. Soft hearts are necessary for compassion. For empathy.

Tonight we strolled a street and sang Christmas carols, and it felt good to do so. I wonder if any hearts were softened not by our, or certainly my, great singing, but by our picking their house, stopping and gathering by their front door step. I wonder if any of those who came to the front porch to listen were dulled. I think it might have been a sweet sound and have a tendering effect to a hard heart.

Pining

So, I remember when I was a child that the lights on the Christmas tree were big bulbs, and they were an array of colors, rainbow colors not pastels. Tinsel, long thin strands of silver the size and shape of fettucini, we draped over the boughs. Ours, the kids, were in clumps like the imaginary ice represented by the tinsel all fell on a couple of branches. Amazingly, by morning, the ice storm was more evenly dispersed. I know how that happens now because when our children put ornaments on our tree they are grouped in bunches on the lower half, but by morning we have worked the same magic.

Also, the trees held the lion share of the lights. We might have had lights somewhere else in the house like a mantle, or a staircase, or around a window. Maybe an electric candle centered in a window. And the tree was placed in a front living room where passersby could see the tree. We drove to look at lights and what we meant was that we were looking at our neighbor's trees in the window, usually a large pane window in the front of the house.

I walked our neighborhood a couple of nights ago, and while I saw a lot of lights, I saw two trees. Our tree is not in the front of the house because the front of our house, that portion fronting the road, contains a foyer and two bedrooms. The trees are in the back of the houses now because that is where the living areas are. The trees, our living areas, have recessed themselves into the deeper bowels of the house now.

I wonder if the architecture contributed to people's detached lives or if the lives demanded the architecture.

There is entrepreneurial intelligence behind the start-up, small businesses that will put up and take down your Christmas lights for you. I think that is smart. And sad.

In a list of good things and good times, sitting with your children as they watch The Little Drummer boy, one wearing full Batman regalia and another in pajamas and a cushy robe, and sucking on Freezoni's from QuikTrip, is way up there.

Christmas

The thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn,
Fall on your knees
O hear the angels voices
O night divine

I played my drum for Him pa rum pum pum pum
I played my best for Him pa rum pum pum pum
Then He smiled at me pa rum pum pum pum
Me and my drum

The Child, the Child sleeping in the night
He will bring us goodness and light
He will bring us goodness and light

_________________________________________

Jeb - He wears blue checked flannel pajama bottoms with a yellow shirt that says "Dinos Rule." Carrying Batman on the Batcycle, he vrooms across the kitchen table. He sings and laughs loudly, already enters a room making an impression, not subtle. He will rise up and save his people. I put Christmas lights in the front yard. On the bushes there is a string of white, then green, white, red and white again. The string of white in the middle is the only blinking set. That is Jeb.

Erin - She is a blanket, pink and soft, sweet-smelling. A breeze that cools the cheek when everything else is warm. The feeling of a hot-water bottle at your feet after getting back in bed from walking on the cold, tile floor at night. Erin is like all of this and an especially good book in which you want to underline every sentence.

Caleb - Where does the time go? There, Dad. You always told me the time would come when I would understand. We hug him chest to chest. He stands tall as his little brother reaches for his hand. Caleb is constant, calm, pensive, yet draws your attention. A perfect setting for Caleb is a smallish, campfire that cracks floating pieces of light into the night sky with a plate of Spam cooked over the fire to eat and I.B.C. Root Beer to drink.

Leslie - There are significant moments that make up a family's life. There are important events, but mostly there are moments. She is our souvenir for all of the moments that have made us joyful. She is our connection to every moment that lasts still. And there are little insignificant things that stick in your mind that are unique to her. For example, a styrofoam Sonic cup, straw, diet cherry Coke, extra ice. "Whither thou goest, I will go."

Brian - I live in this blessed house with these beautiful people...and I have a double chin.

Just in case you see what I see.

December 10, 2005

First post. Ever.

I will add a counter once I figure out how to do it. Then I will be able to see how many times I viewed my own blog although Leslie might view it compassionately.

I have been talking to Caleb about empathy. Feeling with someone. A important Christian trait.

This morning, the teams were dressed in their representative colors with head and wrist bands, knee pads, goggles to protect the eyes. The energy displayed by the high fives and chest bumps was good to watch. There were score-keepers, line judges, and very enthusiastic fans. At the end of each match, the players would line up and slap hands.

It was the Area 11 volleyball tournament for Special Olympics, and I was there with Caleb, Erin and Jeb, my three children. It was held on the campus of Fort Worth Christian School.

I went because I wanted my children to see. To watch. To think.

There were two gyms, two levels. One gym had good volleys. One gym's competition was made up mostly of serves.

I watched my children watch. I had given them a little preview of what they would be watching, and then I just made the viewing available. I wanted something to happen, but wasn't sure what it was.

"Awesome"
"Excellent"
"Good luck"
"You go girl"

There was a tremendous amount of that.

Then, she was standing there. She must have been in her thirties. The two youngest children were huddled on the floor watching intently and Caleb was standing next to me, and then she came up on the side of us within an uncomfortable closeness. I couldn't understand much of what she said, but it was clear that she had won a gold medal. She was holding it stretched from her neck for us to see. I could make out from what she said that people were surprised that she hit it. I told her that they shouldn't be surprised anymore since she was a gold medal winner. "There are more gold medals at home," she said. We talked some more. Caleb told her that she had done good. A sweet face. A sweet smile.

At the bottom of the gold medal were printed these words: Skill Encourage Sharing Joy.

On the way home I thought that I might give a little lesson on any number of things. I decided not to. Sometimes words mess up moments. It thought this might be one of those times.