Bikes, Wives and Body Parts

Old man porn is surfing Craigslist for a motorcycle.

No, it is not "mid-life crisis".  I had my mid-life red Bugatti twenty five years ago.

It is almost painful to admit my life was such a cliche. (Probably still is, but I'll figure that out in retrospect yet again if I live long enough and don't end up with dementia.)

The Wifey says The Bike is my second childhood.  She's right, of course.  My last bike was 44 years ago. I paid $625.00 for it brand new.  A Yamaha two stroke twin.  I couldn't afford the "Widow Maker" Kawasaki triple. I still can't because now they are ten times the price they were in 1969.

I found a killer deal on a Suzuki 650 single.  Low maintenance, cheap to fix, easy to remodel. I've done a little chopping and cutting on it already.

It is hard to look "hard" in a blue pinstriped shirt, Dockers and a backpack with oatmeal cookies and a peanut butter sandwich in it. 

Hell's Orthodox? Maybe I should wear my "Neo" cassock. Better that than tight leathers at my age.  (Yes, I do wear a helmet, it is under my arm with the 3-bar cross on the back of it... I couldn't resist.)  I've thought about getting a "My Little Pony" or "Rainbow Bright" backpack to wear while I'm riding but they don't make them in adult sizes.  Oh well.

So, in other news, the Wifey and I celebrated our twenty year anniversary this week. She's still a beauty, and mellows nicely with only one Long Island Iced Tea.  In spite of how I've treated her over the years and all the things she's discovered about me that weren't so clear in the beginning, she still loves me.  I'm a blessed man.

I've been married now 40 years, but not in a row.  I still wrestle with guilt and "what-ifs" for the divorce.  It is a hard trade off to know your own happiness and contentment caused so much grief and pain to others. I know intellectually I couldn't forsee all the consequences.  I know intellectually neither can I prognosticate the outcome of a different decision. Life's threads can't be that easily unraveled and rewoven in retrospect. Joy and pain get magnified by years as the incomprehensible consequences continually manifest themselves.  And yet, intellectually, who does not live so regardless of any decision we've made?

This is where I start sounding like my parents.

My one year "pre-existing condition clause" on my school insurance expired this year, so I've begun getting all my aches and pains of 30 years of construction work checked out.   So far:

Sleep study done to find out why I fall asleep in 30 seconds, at the wheel on the freeway, at stop lights, and during sermons.  It would be nice to email all those preachers and tell them, "It wasn't you..." though I think it was.  (I get the results next week).

Heart stress test done.  After 30 years of fast food for breakfast and lunch, 250+ cholesterol count, high blood pressure and a red meat, bratwurst and pulled pork diet my heart is clear.  Physical labor and the miracle of red wine, I suppose.

Speaking of hard labor.  The podiatrist walked into the exam room and stood at the door and said, "I bet those hurt... you don't need to be a podiatrist to know your feet are messed up."

My big toes are fused from arthritis.  That changes how you walk and causes knee, hip and lower back problems. Duh.  I will need joint replacements in both my big toes.

I went to an orthopedist to check out my knee, neck and shoulders.  I need a right knee replacement.  It has been "bone on bone" for quite a while he says, and is riddled with arthritis.  My neck has arthritis that causes the upper back pain, but can be managed with cortisone shots.  My shoulders have arthritis and possibly rotator cuff damage. An MRI next week will confirm.  The doctor said he will probably have to snip some tendons on my biceps to relieve some of the stress on the front of my shoulders.

Basically, I will be in a boot, in a wheelchair, on crutches, or in a sling for the next three to four months. 

They always ask, "Why didn't you get this checked out when you hurt yourself or noticed the pain?"

Well, I suppose the true "Art of Manliness" is, if you don't have insurance, are the sole income feeding a wife and six children, and can't take 2-3 months off to rehab, you take six ibuprofen, drink two beers and go to bed.  Yeah, it was hard. But, even if it was my own damn fault, even if I would have had to work and feed someone regardless of a divorce or not, I can look back and say "I manned my post."  No brag. But no regrets, at least in that arena.

At 60, there's something to be said for that.

Stuff...

So... I had a couple of clients that have owed me money for over a year who finally paid up. I've been surfing craigslist "motorcycles" for 3 months (old man porn). A really good deal popped up. I happened to have the cash. It's a Suzuki 650 single. Low maintenance, easily modified, relatively cheap to work on and they make a sidecar for it in case I can talk the wifey or my dogs to get into it. Not sure yet what I'm going to do to it cosmetically. I can't just leave something "as is". But it is a good canvas to begin with.

The book project is moving forward... in "Orthodox time". Fr. Joseph and I have gotten two extensions from the publisher (so far) for the manuscript.  His recent podcast foreshadows the book. Originally I was going to just illustrate, but we've ended up co-authoring and co-editing each other's stuff. I have to say it has been a marriage made in heaven. I was gun-shy of working with a priest after being beaten down over the years by priests for DARING to edit or even suggest changes to their "Holy Spirit inspired" words. So, behold a priest in whom there is no writer's (or clerical) arrogance!

In the process, I've discovered I can't edit a manuscript on a computer screen, I have to have a hard copy that looks like a book in my hands. For some reason, I'm proud of that.

In other news, the Wifey and I both had heart stress tests done a couple weeks ago because we have insurance now through our jobs. After 30+ years of fast food, pulled pork, red meat, a cholesterol count of nearly 300 and high blood pressure (genetics), mine came out OK. The doctor was amazed. The Wifey had to go in for an angiogram, her's wasn't so good. The doctor said 1/4 of her heart wasn't functioning.

Of course, regardless of "faith", the mind travels to the worst case scenarios when faced with an uncertain diagnosis. The immanent possibility prospect of losing your friend and lover, your children's support and comfort, your grandchildren's spoiler, is a harsh rumination for a couple weeks. Mortality looms large and ordinary things shrink in importance, but you still do the dishes for some reason.

All is well, however. It turns out she has a benign congenital heart defect that gives a "false positive" on a stress test.

So we are back to normal... whatever that means in our life.

1:00 AM

I woke up and figured out why one of my special ed students couldn't log into one of our school websites today.  I had emailed him direct links, his login and password so he could just cut and paste them, I called him and walked him through it with his mother (who is a tech person) helping and they both still could not log in.

At 12:30AM, I figured out why.  I could just say he (and his mother) failed to follow directions.  He (and she) did that. In fact, that is one of his learning issues. But I too failed.

Failure is in the small details. Failure is generally in not paying attention, both as a student and as a teacher in all arenas of life. Failure is in assuming we are both looking at the same thing. Failure is assuming competence in another. Failure is in not clarifying, double checking, asking the right questions, listening and looking. I know where *I* failed my student and his mother today in all those areas. In the middle of the night I realized that one question would have solved the issue, but I assumed something at a critical point.  Any one of three things I could or should have done would have solved the problem, but I assumed something that did not send me down those paths.  And we all ended up at a dead end.

Of course all of those things are things I know from sixty years of being taught and teaching. My academic and spiritual training focused on all of those things. Intellectually I "know" how to ask, clarify, listen and watch.  In the grand scheme of things, and knowing a LOT of people, I think I do all that pretty well (he said humbly). But I also know that in certain situations, like today, I don't do it well. I fail to do what I know to do.

As a human being, none of that is really an "AHA!!" moment. Our existence is marked with failure to do the things we know to do. The "AHA!" is that I thought I knew better in this situation. ONE DETAIL! So yeah, I'm still human. I'm still vulnerable to the same dumb mistakes in specific situations. I'll fix this specific issue tomorrow.  I may even generalize it to other similar situations.  The important thing is, I think, that my focus is on MY failure rather than the shortcomings of my student and his parent to do EXACTLY what I had instructed them to do.  They actually didn't do EXACTLY what I said, but I didn't ask the right questions to discern that because I assumed too many things.

The secondary issue (actually the PRIMARY issue) is "How do I approach this tomorrow morning?" There are two scenarios.  The first is to either blatantly or subtly point out their failure to follow instructions. The end game is they are shamed and I am vindicated. I actually did give clear instructions, they've worked for 98% of my students and parents.  They were clear to me and a LOT of other people.

The second scenario is to be humble. I failed at several critical points to clarify, ask, check, double check and be specific. I failed them. For that, I am accountable and I should apologize.

So, last week I had lunch with one of the founders of a multi-million dollar software company. My oldest son is his executive assistant. We chatted business, being an owner, family and spiritual life. I told him about how I started my construction company with only a few months experience as a laborer/clean-up guy.  On Friday I was a floor sweeper for fifteen journeymen, on Tuesday I was their boss. My default position with them had to be "humility".  I didn't even know how to read a blueprint, much less frame, sheetrock, finish walls etc. etc. But I was still "The Boss" and held the "Boss Card".  That experience formed my "management style", and even my spiritual life for the past 30 years, both as one in authority and one under authority. We very briefly talked about  the problem with when to or how to play the "Boss Card" and the problem with employees/managers who can't figure that out and its effect on "the corporate culture", but didn't really delve deeply into the topic.

I've thought a lot about "management by humility" the last few days. What would that look like? What would be the effect on a "corporate culture"? How could you (is it possible?) to train someone to be humble? Would humility even work in the long run in a corporate environment? Is it possible to "hire to the core value of humility"?  How would an HR department screen for that and end up with quality employees?

But, it is now about 2:30AM and I need some sleep.  More later....

Ecumenical Dialogues Overheard #3

Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew meet for the first time...

Snippets

I went to visit my parents to sign some legal paperwork as the executor of their estate. As I drove into the driveway I could see the back of their heads. They were sitting next to each other on the couch that sits in front of the living room window. Dad holds Mom's hand now. When he talks to me when she is out of the room, it is clear he fears losing her.

I need a hobby that is not computer, technology or construction based.  I have no clue what that could be.

I want a motorcycle, an old one and not a Harley... too "mid-life crisis-ish".  I did the red sports car 25 years ago already. 

With the IRS virtually paid off now, I made an appointment for a heart stress test next week. The doctor put me on blood pressure meds.  Is 170/90 bad? Then after that, a sleep study to find out why I fall asleep at the drop of a hat, during sermons, at stop lights and long stretches of freeway for the last 35 years, then an MRI on several of my joints so I can heal up by summer if I need surgeries.  I took out "top of the line" health insurance through my job this year because all my "pre-existing conditions" are now covered.  Blue Cross/Blue Shield is paying for an overhaul on my body this year.  Thank God none of this had to happen while I was self-employed with no health insurance.

I'm reading a novel for the first time in over ten years... and a book of any kind for the first time in over 3 years.


Lately, 8:30pm has been past my bedtime, even on weekends.


After a year an a half as a "guidance counselor" I am convinced that the education system is not about the children (though there are educators in the system who do genuinely care about the students, but it is the only system we have to work within).  In reality, American public education is a government business. It is about politics and power, educators keeping their jobs, and federal and state funding. The bottom line for schools is performance ratings tied to funding. It is about "no dollar left behind".

The current education system has little to do with the reality of over half of my students' lives and futures.  It is a poorly run circus and my job is to hold the one-sized flaming hoop at one predetermined height and figure out a way to coax them to jump, limp or crawl through it, if they can at all.  If they can't we have to find a way to move them out so their performance doesn't "ding" our school's ratings. Education needs not reforming, it needs to be blown up and re-built from the ground up.

I miss self-employment, but I like the people I work with at my job (both my co-workers and my students and parents) and they seem to like me.  But then so did my construction clients. All things being equal, I have no illusions that I'm making any more difference in people's lives by being an academic guidance counselor or a drywaller and painter.  What matters really is my relationship with any of them.  I got more face to face time with my drywall/paint clients and their families than I do with my students and parents at school.  I'm inclined to think drywall and painting has been a more fruitful spiritual career.  God knows. I am where I am. For now...

Lots of other stuff going on, but it boils down to I have the best kids and I'm proud of every one of them, I keep falling more and more in love with my wife and I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up.

And, finally, I started going back to Church at our Mission a few weeks ago.  They decided to start doing Matins again for the Lenten season.  My wife (the choir director) asked if I would come back and help. The Mission has healed from its past. I went back on Zaccheus Sunday after almost a couple years away, and it was good.

Lent is a time for catechumens and penitents to find themselves defined by the mercy of God. This week, chanting the Canon of St. Andrew as a re-engagement and re-orientation to the life of the Church is as humbling an experience as I can imagine. 

It's past my bedtime. 

OMG "We're" Offended?

BREAKING NEWS FROM OCN (Orthodox Christian Network)

(This is a press release from OCN, sent to subscribers to their program... I don't know if any national news outlets have actually published this yet).  God, I hope not.....

National Christian Group Launches Video Response To Controversial Saturday Night Live Skit
• Asks NBC For Apology
Saturday Night Live went too far when it portrayed Jesus as a blood thirsty murderer. So says a national Christian group that's so upset by what they saw that they have asked NBC for an apology and have launched a video taking the network to task.

"The Orthodox Christian Network is outraged by the DJesus Uncrossed Skit that was aired recently on Saturday Night Live", said Father Christopher Metropulos, head of the Orthodox Christian Network (www.myocn.net). "While we realize that Saturday Night Live is a comedy show, we strongly believe that NBC has seriously crossed the line with material that is grossly offensive to Christians."

According to Father Metropulos, "the skit was shockingly indecent and demonstrated a blatant disregard to the feelings of millions of Christians who would most obviously be sickened by the sacrilegious content of the material. This is especially difficult for Christians worldwide to witness as we prepare for the Resurrection of our Lord and Easter. Never have I seen such reckless irresponsibility from a national television network."

JCPenny and Sears have already pulled their ads from Saturday Night Live in reaction to the controversy.  (END OF PRESS RELEASE and inserted here is a link to the video they produced that I have not watched in response to a skit I have not watched and won't... neither of them, so I'm not posting it here. If you want to watch it, google it.)


Personally, I find OCN's response to NBC more offensive and un-Christian than anything NBC could possibly do to make fun of or parody Jesus Christ, the Church or anything I believe.  Fr. Christopher's concern for millions of Christians' "feelings" as they witnessed the mockery of Jesus Christ shows the depth of his lack of understanding of Christianity's core.  His lame self-promotion as a "spokesperson" and posturing of OCN as a voice of a "national Christian group" to garner publicity for OCN is a reckless, irresponsible and offensive representation of the Gospel and Christianity itself, far worse than anything NBC could produce.  In my mind they are both flip sides of the same coin: outrageousness for the sake of publicity to get ratings.  (Don't even get me started on why "Christians" are watching SNL, much less TV at all... that's another whole issue.)  So, back to the issue at hand:

SNL's skit was "especially difficult to watch... as we prepare for the Resurrection of our Lord and Easter"???...

Has Fr. Metropulos paid any attention to the services of Holy Week in all his years in the priesthood?  (I would broaden the landscape and say, ANY Christian who has read the Bible account of the machinations leading to the Cross and Resurrection). All of Holy Week (and Lent) is clear: The preparation for the Resurrection is mockery, injustice, ingratitude, blindness, betrayal, torture, greed, politics, defamation, slander, gossip, misinterpretation, insults, parody, lies and death.  The message of the Gospel is the offense of forgiveness of sinners, the slaying of the innocent, non-retaliation by God and men, the bearing of offense, the love of enemies and betrayers and cowards, the bearing of darkness, the kind word said to a moral failure while dying unjustly, the concern for the living while taking a last breath.  If Fr. Christopher really gets "the Gospel", his message should have been directed to Christians who are offended, not the offenders of Christians.

Has Fr. Christopher and those offended ever read the Gospels?  If not, here's some excerpts from one of them:

"Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and say all manner of evil against you for My sake, rejoice and be glad..."  (MISSING: publicize your offense before believers and unbelievers).

"Do not resist him who is evil; but whoever slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also..."
(MISSING: Push back, boycott and launch a publicity campaign.)

"...but I say to you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you in order that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven...."   (MISSING: parade your outrage, the insult and the perceived injustice you suffered, or even your pious prayers for their salvation, before the public.)

By parading himself and whoever participated in the video he produced as representatives of "Christians" to send to NBC, Fr. Christopher has maligned, misrepresented and brought scandal upon the Gospel and the Orthodox Church.  He has promoted the Orthodox understanding of the Gospel as a force in the "marketplace" by aligning his outrage with corporate sponsors who have "pulled their advertising (dollars)".  He has presented his campaign in a way that non-believers will equate the Orthodox faith with a Taliban-like coercion of "don't f*ck with our religion or else". He has not addressed his true audience: Christians, and taught them what being a real Christian is all about. Instead he produces a video, issues a press release and tries to coerce the unbelieving offenders to accommodate the lack of faith and true spiritual depth of the people he is ministering to.  That'll convert 'em!  Or... neither of them.

In short, this one's for you Fr. Christopher.
CLICK on THIS.
It's an oldie, but it is relevant.

May God have mercy on you and us all.

Yeah, I admit I'm pissed, and it's not even the first week of Lent yet.

Rant over.

Uh Oh....

This looks dangerous...

Stay tuned.