Timely Thoughts, or two seemingly unrelated themes united by brief refrences to the Underground.

Thought 1)
It is the end of another year and I am astounded by how much distance I have covered.

How do we ever manage to find the people we make our lives with – we get a leg up with our family, because if we’re lucky we don’t have to find them. But all the other people – the people who go bowling with us, the ones who cook us mac’n’cheese after a few drinks, the one’s who know any number of inane facts about us and who love us all the same – how do we ever, ever find them. How is that you can wake up suddenly and someone who is on the periphery of your life is suddenly one of the most important people in your world, while someone you pinned some dreams to is gone without a word, leaving only some questions? And how is it that some people are supposed to be in our lives forever and others only for as long as a trip on the subway? Why is it that sometimes the people we thought were forever end up getting off at the next stop?

We fold people into our lives, we take them with us and vice versa. And somehow it all works out. All of the folding and traveling and distance and storms and we change with each other, and sometimes we part ways, but if we are lucky we move forward. It is such a gift.

Thought 2)
It is the end of another year and time is a funny, funny thing. See – we tend to think of time as a constant natural law – like gravity, but its not. When you look at the stars you’re seeing light that started traveling towards the earth years ago. That same star you’re looking at could have died ages ago – the news just hasn’t reached us yet.

Maybe time is just a way of trying to make sense of the way life changes. I’m not the same person I was a year ago – but it wasn’t time that changed me. Life happens without a calendar. Go out and shake the world without getting hung up on time.

(I think it was Jim Elliot that wrote, “Wherever you are, be all there.” I get so wrapped up in thinking about what comes next that I miss the moment I’m in. And I really believe that every moment is valuable – the subway is an excellent place to learn this.)

And even though time isn’t a constant – we can’t go back and we can’t change it. There are no do-overs.

What do you want? Because whatever it is, it is not going to knock on your door and ask if you are ready. Does life happen to you, or do you happen to life? What have you got to lose? Go out and shake the world.

So tonight marks another year. “Good luck, exploring the infinite abyss.”

Just when it feels like my feet are finally starting to know their way around this city, I find that it's nearly time for me to head back home. I'm excited about that, but I know I want more time in this city - in this country. Who knows, maybe I'll read law at Oxford and join the inns of court?

So here's my A to Zed of London - or at least how I perceive it tonight.

A: Allsop or Alsop - which is how my name is always misspelled over here. The second "L" I've seen before, but the "O" is a new variation. Allsop is also the name of a very successful real estate company over here.

B: Barbican - the crazy, industrial chic part of London that I work in. It landed itself on a list of "Ugliest Areas in London" earlier this year. But it's not bad.

C: Colin Firth. Who Jo and I happened to run into at Leicester Square at the same time we saw Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgewick. We're not a crazy celebrity stalkers, we just wanted to buy tickets to a musical and the London Film Festival just happened to be going on right across from the ticket booth.

D: Dancing at the Mean Fiddler up near Tottenham Court Road. Dance Contest. Strobe lights. London hipsters. The Clash's "London Calling" on the stereo.

E: E-mails with Blythe, Tim and Jo in the downtimes at our internships. These people are some of the smartest, funniest, insightful and passionate people I know. From discussing the presidential election and press coverage to learning fun facts from world fact books - these kids make me smile everyday.

F: Foyles book store - one of the best finds.

G: Great Ormond Street Hospital - did you know that the royalties from the sales of J.M. Barrie's "Peter Pan" go to this children's hospital. Go buy a copy - now!

H: Hogarth Road - with it's hotels, flats, Asian grocery stores and some good take-away places. Home.

I: Internship at the Methodist Recorder. Which has had it's ups and downs, but have made me more sure than ever about what I aspire to be as a journalist.

J: Jam - Blythe and Jo know what I'm talking about. Jam the bane of my existence.

K: King's Cross Station and the night we tried to see the Decemberists, but it was sold out so we walked down to the Thames and found a crazy bowling alley.

L: Lectures - lots of class lectures. The worst one was the one about Prehistoric England. Also the Laundrette - with it's slightly mean attendants.

M: Millenium Bridge - which I must say, is one of my favorite spots in London. St Paul's Cathedral on one side, the Tate Modern and Globe on the other and a really pretty bridge.

N: Notting Hill - well really the pub in Notting Hill that also has live jazz every Sunday afternoon. Also - George Orwell use to live there.

O: Oxford - the college town where I ate at the Eagle and Childe (where C.S. Lewis and Tolkien hung out) and Oxford Street - as in I'm going to go look at stuff I can't buy on Oxford Street.

P: Seeing "The Producers" in its first London run. Also seeing Nathan Lane reprise his starring role on Broadway as Max Bialystock after Richard Dreyfuss pansied out.

Q: Professor Quirell from the first Harry Potter book. The president of the Methodist Conference looks like Quirrell in the movie - it's freaky.

R: The Russian restaurant near Harrod's - Borscht and Tears, baby. Complete with live Russian music - even songs about freezing to death.

S: St. Bride's Church on Fleet Street. The church that is historically associated with journalists. I will say that one of my best memories from London will come from this church.

T: Trafalgar Square by night - I think this could be my favorite sight in London.

U: The Underground is a warm and happy place, like a womb.

V: Victoria and Albert. Victorian architecture. Statues of Queen Victoria everywhere.

W: Wesley. John Wesley. Founder of Methodism - whom I feel a lot closer too after my sojourn at the Methodist Recorder. We ran a full length column the other day dealing entirely with the subject of whether he was a vegetarian - whether or not an old, dead guy was a vegitarian. Hard hitting news, folks, hard hitting.

X: "Xenophobia" as in I have seen the word "xenophobia" in newspapers over here way more than I ever have in the states.

Y: Young directors giving lectures on the Globe theatre. Young directors with dark hair and eyes. Dreamy young directors. Nuff said.

Z: Zed - as in no one says "Z" here, it's always zed.

Edinburgh

Can I say I love art? Cause I do.

Saw "Three Tahitians" by Paul Gaugain today - part of one of my favorite group of paintings ever. I just about had a fit - okay - I did have a fit when I saw it. The colours. The warmth. The fact that one of the figures has their back turned. Goodness - it's good.

Low key weekends are also fantastic. As are happybooks.

Train rides. Rugged hikes. Clean hostels. Good food. Pints. Beautiful cities. The ocean. Bagpipes. All things that are rocking my socks off.

What a blessing this entire time has been!!

Next weekend - Paris. Quite Shortly... The World!!!!

Estoy aqui.

I am in Madrid. I am leaving on Friday and I am already thinking about how to get back here.

My Spanish isn´t great, but being able to communicate with people is thrilling.

Yesterday, an old Spainard and I talked about bullfights. Mostly he talked and I listened. But I understood and that is a gift beyond words.

I'm off to Spain tomorrow for the mid-term break.

Those of you reading this should know that I am excited out of my mind. But in case you didn't - I'm excited out of my mind.

Sun. Spanish. Good Food. Good Company. Really - do you need anything else in life. No. I'm so glad you agree.

Rather than be the girl who never updates, here you go...

Post-o-Wonders 0r random meanderings through my mind:

1) I saw an American company perform "Death of a Salesman" - it was. It was. I've made my peace with it since the last time I threw myself into it.

2) I bought some colored pencils. And a little green journal with blank pages. Sometimes in the evening I write and then doodle in the margins with colored pencils.

3) I've decided I should be the boss - eventually.

4) I've also come to other conclusions. You know that moment when you realize that you've been going in a completely opposite direction than you ought. That's a good moment. I had it the other day and I danced.

5) My mom sent me some pictures - three of which were all taken on the same day - and that day is one of my best days of my entire life. Looking at the pictures is almost like being there again. So thanks to Mel, John Doe, Sam and Jon for now appearing in pictures on my wall (P.S. Jenny - you would be there too, but you left before we got the camera out)

6) My parents make me really happy.

7) I saw the ocean yesterday. I smelled the ocean yesterday. That was the best part of yesterday.

8) Old church ladies are the same everywhere - from Dallas to Dublin, they all encourage you to "join them after service for coffee and biscuits." Coffee in the crypt of ChristChurch Cathedral, no less.

9) It's a bad moment when you think "Alright tasty veggies - who wants to come home with me," in the grocery store. It's worse if you say it out loud.

10) I should find some coffee. And a cake. And that should happen...now.

I get off at the Barbican stop, walk past Nagshead Court and up Golden lane to my office. It's an a quieter part of the city, out east of everything. My office has a baby blue door and green carpeting. When 3.00 rolls around it's tea time - milk and sugar please. And occasionally there are chocolate biscuits. There is also quiet - the Methodist Recorder doesn't have the same frenzy as a daily paper.

Last week I saw Hamlet performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company - from the time the first person came on stage till Horatio's "Good night sweet prince, and angels sing thee to thy rest," I had tears in my eyes. To see it staged, see the intricacies of the plot - Hamlet's transformation from grieving son to young leader, Ophelia's descent to madness, Queen Gertrude's repentance, the King's villiany and Horatio's truest friendship. It was like hearing music for the first time - that same wonder and astonishment.

I know that the four months I'm planning to spend here will be far too short.

But London's not going anywhere - right?

You can take the girl out of Texas, but she's quite keen on London...Besides, I did happen to find a place that flies the Texas flag here, so I figure I'm in a good place.

I am mostly recovered from jet lag. Air India's customer service philosophy is "the customer is god." If I were god though, why would I be flying on an airplane? Clearly a question to think through.

London...

It is dense and wonderful. It truly is a city that moves and lives and has a life all it's own. It feels comfortable.

Notably today, me and some lovely companions rode on the London Eye - the large ferris wheel. The LARGEST ferris wheel in all the world.

At first I was a bit apprehensive, as I don't fancy heights and have never been on a ferris wheel.

But it was beyond amazing to sit on top of London, looking from St. Paul's dome to Big Ben and the Houses of Parliment. To see it sprawl below.

I live here. And at night, I can feel the tube (subway) train as it rumbles on the tracks beneath my kitchen window. In the morning I turn back the curtain and see the hotel with it's hanging flower baskets across the street, and see parents walking their children to school. And I am home.

Today I am going to London.

But it was a summer - everything that a summer should be. Everything that I needed.

I saw elephants in a cornfield. And I caught fireflies. There is a difference between existing and living of which elephants and fireflies are only a small part.

There were fried green tomatoes, Texas thunderstorms, and the cool sanctuary of a familiar church. There was a family that is amazing and strong and beautiful. Home.

And there was life. There was life waiting to be had. It doesn’t always wait – but this time it did, fortunately.

That was my summer. Full of quiet and whispered realizations about what’s important and what falls away. If I had talked any louder the quiet would have fled in an incalculable loss.

Today I am going to London. But I’ll be thinking about elephants and fireflies. And home.

So I’m off then. But, I’ll be back soon enough – “Lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise.” I’ll be back soon enough.

What I take with me

My brother told me to always remember that there is someone out there who wants it more than you, will work harder than you, will fight harder than you.

My Dad told me never to look a gift horse in the mouth. And he taught me how to sing, “This is the day the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it.”

And my Mom told me not to let my ears start itching. (This is not in regard to bathing habits.)

That’s the most valuable advice I’ve gotten in my life and I carry it very close to my heart.

Sleeping with Prufrock

Life twists in unexpected ways so I feel as though my feet are already off the ground with one week left here in familiarity growing increasingly unintelligible.

One week till...London, four months till...home, less than that till...the rest of my life.

"And time yet for a hundred indecisions/ and for a hundred visions and revisions/ before the taking of toast and tea." The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, T.S. Eliot

Where are those damnable mermaids and will they ever sing for me?

Flashback and explanation
I was a substitute teacher yesterday at my high-school - two 10th grade Bible classes and one freshman study hall.

It's somewhat strange for me to go back to First Baptist Academy. As it is always strange to return to one's past and roots. But important to look back and remember. I can't say enough good things about the teachers, both academically and personally, that I had at the Academy. And if you really want to understand where I come from - FBA would be a prime place to start.

Sometimes there's a pretty interesting dynamic in private religious schools. It's hard to explain...and it's very easy to laugh at. I guess one fair way to look at it is that it's essentially like every high school -with it's share of cliques and dramas and teenage angst, but then it's got this whole spiritual element to it that, to some extent, heightens all situations.

I don't often write on this blog about my personal faith. In fact this is probably the most I've ever written about anything related to Christianity. I also rarely volunteer to share either my personal testimony or a testimony of "how the Lord is working in my life" - in fact I can recall only one time that I have spoken up volunteerily in a group setting about how a particular event affected me. And I still consider it a story worth sharing and occasionally I tell it and the whole thing happened in remote Alaska - no kidding.

Most of that attitude stems from my experiences and observations from my high-school and my youth group involvement. For many kids in that type of setting, it is almost a contest to see who can share the most dramatic testimony or show that the Lord is clearly doing more work in their lives than anyone else's. Who can lead a prayer, who can lead a song. The hottest guys at summer camp are the ones that have felt called to the ministry. Testimonies that rely upon the emotional roller coaster that you can lead the audience through.

I have always eschewed arguments which rely upon emotion, simply because emotion comes and goes and is not so sturdy a thing as to build a life upon. And as for me, well, I've always been of the mind that my actions ought tell my faith and heart more accurately and eloquently than words. At times, my actions have miserably failed to speak of my faith - and this too is a testimony of my state.

And quite frankly, it also comes from the fact that I don't fancy public speaking and I tend to be a very guarded person. I don't wear my heart on my sleeve, particularly when it comes to my personal life. And that's at least one of the reasons why I don't write about my faith a whole lot on this blog.

I've written myself out. It's just an explanation, I guess. Doctrinally, my beliefs haven't changed that much over the years. But I've grown up a bit and seen more of life, and so my faith has grown up a bit as well. Funny how that works.

Sometimes I fear that I say too little of my faith, that I am too guarded with it, and too private about it. But it is deeply important to me, and I would say, the best thing in my life.

When I first met my editor at the Missourian she asked me about my family.

"Do you have any siblings?" she asked.

"A brother, about 13 years older," I said.

"Tell me about him," she said.

"Well. Everyday he's my hero," I told her. "Everyday."

And this is why.

"I could go on and on….Thinking of these things makes me realize that it “Rocks my face off” that I am such a good brother. "

Jimmy - my bro sent me an e-mail today. It read like this:

"Just read your Blog which you finally updated. It was ok, except for the fact that there was no mention of me. I think you should Blog about how good a brother I am. How I set the bar so amazingly low that you look good (probably better than you really are) by comparison and how I didn’t beat you for watching David Letterman in my bed while you ate crackers when you should have been asleep. Also…how I handled mom and dad having children 14 years apart (which was an alternative lifestyle then), and how I never did anything really bad to you even though you could be irritating when you were young (and will grow out of it soon, I hope).
Also…how I was a “Brother Reader” and read “Horton Hatches an Egg” to your kindergarten class. Also, How I didn’t beat you when you would wave at the people selling flowers at I-45 and 1960 and they would walk over to the car (back then, kids could sit in the front seat in their car-seats). Also…how I used to drive with the sunroof and windows open in the car because you liked it…even if it were 212 degrees. "

It's true - I did eat crackers in his bed. Although I don't know about the irritating bit. I still like to drive with the windows down and the sunroof open in the Texas heat. I no longer wave to the vagrants selling flowers on the highway - but if it pushed Jimmy's buttons I probably would if we were riding together.

Yeah, as big brothers go, I'd say I got pretty lucky.

Summer Reading:
The books I’ve read:
Reading Lolita in Tehran – excellent, hard to fathom that it’s non-fiction
A Wrinkle in Time – Yet again, but it’s a great
A Wind in the Door – A wee book, but great ideas
Into Thin Air – About a doomed Mt. Everest expedition, grim but interesting
We Were the Mulvaneys – Biggest waste of time ever. Ever. Ever.
The World According to Garp – A little wacky, but definitely worth it.
A Widow for a Year – My least favorite John Irving that I’ve read- too far reaching and unbelievable.
Ten Minutes from Normal – Yes, this is Karen Hughes memoir. No, I don’t agree with everything she says – particularly about Bush. But, a really interesting read about a highly successful woman who tried to put her family first in everything she did.
The Poisonwood Bible – Really excellent, well written. Falls into one of my favorite books category.
Secret Garden, Secret Window – the novella by Stephen King that the movie Secret Window was taken from.

The books I’m still working on and hope to finish before London:
Absalom, Absalom – Beautiful.
Eats, Shoots and Leaves – Grammar beware.

The Flaming Lips said, “happiness makes you cry,” and I say that life is a series of adaptations.

Tonight is a night in which I will turn out my light and stare sleeplessly at my ceiling and rather than find satisfaction in the silence feel only the vapid sucking of time past my window.

I’m working up to a good cry – I can sense it like animals sense the atmospheric changes preceding a tornado.

Not a sad cry, or a mad cry – just a long-over-due-completely-irrational-making-sure-my-tear-ducts-are-working cry.

Ch-Ch-Changes…are coming my way in the form of a couple of plane tickets and a key to a flat. And all London really means to me tonight is a place on the far side of familiar.

Worry has been my struggle lately. Worry in the form of a rather nasal voice that belongs to the skinny, middle-aged librarian that works in the archives in the back of my mind and wears orthopedic shoes everyday.

She points her finger and says, “Everything bad that can happen, will happen, to the people you love while you are away across the ocean.”

“Shut up you old bag, your shoes are ugly, your face is pinched and you smell of moth balls and dust and stale cellar air,” I say.

Then she gets huffy and bustles off to reorganize a file cabinet. She’ll be back, I owe her a paycheck. Still. By that time, I may be on my way.

People say time flies, and I agree that happiness makes your face awfully wet.

Knickers in an Uproar
 
Last night I laughed so hard  that I had tears streaming down my face.  I guess that's what happens when you get my mom and I and my aunt and two cousins together.

Yesterday I got massive quantites of water up my nose doing underwater flips with my 11 year old cousin.  We also made amazing salsa.

The week before I was in Austin watching my 15/16 ish cousin play some wicked volleyball - she can take your head off.

In short, my family rocks my face off!   I'm so glad they're here.

 

Hello Blog, I've missed you.
I haven't written anything in a while - not a blog, not letters or e-mails, not even very many journal entries. I guess I'm still looking for words.

But I feel as though if I don't start writing again soon I'll just get flabby.

A while ago...

In eighth grade we had to memorize Emma Lazarus' "New Colossus." "Bring me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breath free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

I wish I remembered it all. I realized last week that I was born with the American Dream in my tightly closed fist. That I have never had to look for it because I am a favored daughter of the lady with the lamp.

Last week I talked with a woman who lived in fear of her life for over 30 years all the time looking for her entrance to this free land. Land of the Pilgrim's pride, where my father's died, but not her's.

She, orphaned at 15. She, waiting for her chance and that of her family's. She, wearing now only to church the brightly colored sari's of Sri Lanka.

Land where I've never questioned my freedoms but worn them as peacock feathers in my cap.

"The first year I was here, I did not like the fireworks because of the sound," she said, miming the action of a machine gun with her arms.

She told me of a church and a bomb and a world where her family was singled out because of their faith. She told me this as we watched fireworks light the sky above the Wal-Mart Garden Center. She knowing that her two children and the rest of the family were watching the same fireworks - safe and sound. Later they would share the watermelon she took home with her.

"I like them now," she said, smiling as she saw the red and green and white explosions. "It is peaceful here."

And I looked in my hand and saw the dream and freedoms I have taken for my birthright. And I looked in her face and saw only gratitude for the life that was peaceful here.

To see the fourth day of the seventh month through an immigrant's eyes is an experience which humbles.

"El sueno Americano es para todos," said President Bush, addressing the national council of La Raza. "The American Dream is for everyone."

Only when I looked at Philo. Only when I heard her story. Did I realize how true a statement that is. Only when I looked at Philo - who reached out and grabbed the dream.

...And the lesser light to govern the night.

The moon was beautiful tonight. Full and clean and very bright. And I was glad of it.

So much cooler than you

My friend Ann is officially, the coolest girl ever. She rocks, hardcore. She will rock your socks off and you won't know what hit you.

My phone's on vibrate for you, too.

Oh yeah, baby. Rufus Wainwright, performing live on my voicemail. I felt like I was there for just a second.

Ann - she's hot(tttt) with five t's.

More than a week ago I wrote that I was waiting to be sure of what I know. There’s been a lot of upheaval in the past several days. Little sleep and lots of bad coffee. And I am much closer to being “grown-up,” than I was before.

If I wait until I am sure of what I know then I will never write again. There must be some aspect of faith in one’s life. And sometimes that requires a step without knowing…

Knowing. Living. It all requires some amount of faith. A small amount of trust that the sun will also rise and you with it.

At six years old, a child may think that her heart is actually heart-shaped. And why not? The two people the child loves and trusts most in the world, the people she places her six year old faith in have named two semi-circles and a peak a heart.

It is sad to hear a six year old voice say, “I thought my heart was heart-shaped.” To know that her heart has become to her merely the lump of muscle that resides in her chest.

And for some children, this is the first small test of faith.

A child’s faith in a loved one’s words. What else could a heart be but that which we draw and color on scraps of paper? What does it mean if a heart is not actually two semi-circles and a peak? When one is six, the heart is for loving and believing and hoping. The heart, for a child, might be the principle organ of faith.

What is lost when a child’s heart becomes to them only a round, fist-sized organ?

It may take some years, but she may find the heart truly is something for wishes and dreams and faith. A force of strength that may guide according to the love it holds. What’s the old line…where your treasure is, there also your heart.

For some adults, this is both the test and the restoration of child-like faith. Belief which looks past the immediate and hopes for things unseen. A heart which trusts its treasure.

Of this I am sure. This I know.

Until further notice...
"Listen, to live is to be marked. To live is to change, to acquire the words of a story, and that is the only celebration we mortals really know."

"I may have to stop talking again, until I can be sure of what I know." ~ Barbara Kingsolver, The Poisonwood Bible

I haven't updated in over week. It's not for lack of trying. So, gentle reader, rather then leave you in suspense, I'm just saying that productivity is down.

I'll continue to write, and when it's coherent - I'll put it up for your enjoyment (and your criticisms - which I tend to prefer). Let's just say I'm acquiring the words to the story. Stories.

And there are several rolling around up there - stories of elephants and mushrooms and other pieces of life crammed into dusty corners and gathering cobwebs.

Maybe I'm just waiting till I'm sure of what I know. Soon though. Soon.

"I love thee to the level of everyday's most quiet need, by sun and candle-light." Sonnets from the Portuguese, Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Posted by Hello

On a sunny Saturday, two young women – freshmen at the University of Missouri – sat at a kitchen table in a house in Barnhart, Missouri drinking coffee.

Glad to be away from classes for the weekend, the ladies relaxed in their pajamas in front of the kitchen window.

“Oh, do you see that little box of house down there,” said Jana, the one who had invited her roommate to come home with her. “The one just down there at the bottom of the hill?”

The white house at the bottom of the hill was beyond tiny. Just four walls enclosing four rooms. It had a gracious front porch that looked out to a garden that seemed almost bigger than the house itself.

Jana knew the family that lived there – the father had passed away the year before, when Jana and one of the boys had been seniors at Crystal City High. There were eight kids in all, and only two were still under the family roof. The mother was a tough old bird who worked long hours at Steak ‘n’ Shake to take care of her boy in college and her son still at home.

“Yes, I see it,” said her friend. She was from Raytown, the eldest of five children and the first in her family to attend college. The daughter of a TWA pilot and an Illinois farm girl, she was studying to be an elementary school teacher, but spent lots of time playing bridge and drinking coffee in the Union.

“Well those people can cram more people into that house for barbecues and get-togethers than you could ever imagine,” said Jana. “They practically pour out of the house and on to the porch and into the lawn.”

“But the house is so small – how could they possibly fit two people, much less ten or fifteen?” said her roommate.

“Oh, more than that. I say you wouldn’t believe it if you saw it – their family is large,” said Jana.

With that, they finished their coffee, and at the end of the weekend returned to their life in Columbia.

I suppose Jana’s roommate didn’t think much more of that weekend until she found herself, three years later as a senior in college, in the small house next to the man she loved.

She must have laughed remembering her first encounter with her husband’s family from Jana’s kitchen window.

Actually she’s still laughing about it. Both of my parents are still laughing about it.

37 years ago, today, Jim, who grew up in that box of a house, and Lynn, who was Jana’s roommate in Johnston Hall, got married in an evening ceremony at a Methodist Church in Kansas City, Missouri.

She carried a bouquet of daisies and yellow roses and her husband wore a daisy in the button hole of his jacket. And in every picture the joy on their faces seems to challenge the world to find something to bring them down. Hasn’t happened yet.

Here’s to them: 37 years and they love each other something fierce. They have a gift of laughter. They have a tremendous sense of adventure and curiosity. And they have given their children a vast appreciation of life and love and all that those two things entail.

Congratulations folks. And thanks.

This little piggy went to market, or
An open letter in response to the recent flurry of comments

To the one who posted the comment, "which gives me the right to free speech,":

The constitution also gives you the right to not speak - it's a lesser known right, but just as cool.

It's a little incomprehensible that you seemed to reiterate Jo's comment - but perhaps you were confused about what the first amendment is - that's the free speech one - which is actually what Jo was pointing out.

The right to free speech is wonderful - you're absolutely right. And it's that right that protects that marketplace of ideas of which you are so fond.

Why then, does it seem like just because Sam and Jo and me don't agree with you, you respond as though it is an attack on your right to free speech.

Do you really want to play in an open marketplace of ideas, or would you rather just bemoan the entire "liberal media," and follow your country unquestioningly because of your belief in the fundamental goodness and decency of your nation and the righteousness of your cause.

And by the way, the above paragraph isn't an attack on your right to free speech. Just a question of how open the marketplace of your ideas is - wouldn't it be kind of pointless if everyone agreed on everything - how horribly blasé.

Yeah, the first amendment rocks my face off - the right to speak or not speak, the right to worship or not to worship, the right to have a courageous and free press. The right to question your government.

You want to go to market? Great, come on, there's room for everyone - but let's not feel your speech is being subverted or attacked simply because people don't immediately see the "rightness," of your words. By posting your response to, “Penny for your thoughts, a flag for your troubles,” on a separate blog, you invited comments and responses to that. And I would say that most of those comments have been extremely kind and more generous than I am being right now, or am inclined to be.

Perhaps if your response had been grounded upon stronger evidentiary proof, the comments you have received would have been different. By basing a response upon your knee-jerk reaction rather than well documented occurrences, you have effectively closed the door on any truly open and reasoned discussion about your position.

It's a big market - and in this particular booth, there aren't any bullies trying to steal your lunch money, er, I mean your right to free speech.

Penny for your thoughts, a flag for your troubles

The vast majority of the bodies of American soldiers fly into Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. Under the auspices of protecting the privacy of the soldier’s families, the Bush administration has enforced the policy used in the first Gulf War, which prohibits journalists or other citizens from witnessing the homecoming of these now quiet Americans.

While no press cameras are there, photographers from the Department of Defense are clicking away for record keeping purposes.

The public saw these pictures after Russ Kick, of Arizona, requested their release under the Freedom of Information Act. Kick requested the photos and was denied on the grounds that releasing the photos would result in an invasion into the privacy of the families. Kick finally won on an appeal, and received 288 photos of U.S. dead returning to Dover.

Not all the pictures are of soldiers killed in Iraq. Some are from Afghanistan, others from U.S. military operations in other parts of the world. But it is a reasonable assumption that most of the bodies are coming from combat actions in Iraq.

In Griswold v Connecticut, 1965, the Supreme Court held that there was indeed a right to privacy within the constitution. Justice Douglas wrote in the court’s opinion, “Specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras formed by emanations from those guarantees that give them life and substance.”

Thus, there are implied freedoms, without which the “specific guarantees,” would not stand.

Justice Douglas illustrated his point using the example of freedom of speech and freedom of the press. He wrote, “The right to freedom of speech and press includes not only the right to utter or to print, but the right to distribute, the right to receive, the right to read and freedom of inquiry, freedom of thought, and freedom to teach…Without these peripheral rights, the specific rights would be less secure.”

Justice Douglas efficiently affirms both a right to privacy and a right to know.

The Restatement (Second) of Torts, an academic collection of laws, states that a charge of invasion of privacy must meet two requirements in order to have legal weight. The matter at hand, in this case, pictures of caskets, must be both highly offensive to a reasonable individual and not involve a matter of public concern.

Even if the subject is deemed offensive, it may still be released if it is a public concern, that is, if it is newsworthy.

From Iraq we have seen pictures of the dead bodies of Uday and Qusay Hussein, towns a flame, and other violent pictures which might be called offensive.

But the pictures recently released show nothing of that sort. There is no blood, no anguished faces, no smoke or fire or terror.

Just an honor guard. Just a white hearse. Just the belly of a transport plane and rows of simple boxes covered with the stars and stripes.

So here are the soldiers who joined up to pay for college, or escape from their town, or to provide an income for their families. Here are those who went to a strange land to die.

And the American government refused to let you see them cloaked in red, white, and blue. Not because the pictures were gruesome or offending to delicate public sensibilities. But because, these pictures, more clearly than any chart or newspaper show the cost of the war.

The Vietnam War was called “the living room war,” because of the broadcasts that were shown on the evening news. The images returned from those jungles played a great role in turning the tide of opinion against that war.

Operation Iraqi Freedom is already an unpopular war. And it isn’t just about the dead Americans. It’s about the Japanese humanitarian workers taken hostage, the journalists who have died, 25 since 2003, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, and the people of Iraq.

There are folks here in Columbia who stand on street corners holding signs asking people to “Honk for peace.” And several people sound their horns each time they pass, but whether the sound is heard in the hallways of the capitol has yet to be determined.

There have been numerous ceremonies here to read the names of the American dead. Still the appropriation of the names of the dead soldiers in an anti-war protest is arguably offensive. No one can say whether these soldiers would have added their voices to the vehement declarations against the war.

Either one of these actions may be thought offensive and ineffective in turning the tide of war.

But pictures of living soldiers helping their fallen compatriots to a final home?

This is not offensive. This is not invasive to their privacy. This is their last statement, neither affirming nor denying the justness of the war. These are their silent voices. And no one may say what these soldiers thought of the war except that they are dead because of their service.

They are no different from those silent Americans in Flander’s field, who, “short days ago…lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, loved and were loved…”

Regardless of one’s stance on the war there is no denying that there are costs to the action.

We hear that we are at war in order to protect our freedoms – this is a perennial justification for military action. Yet this most recent challenge to our freedom to view public records and the freedom of the press, came not at the gates of Baghdad, but from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

And that ought to be offensive to any reasonable person.

Hi...surreal
Jenny is totally back in Columbia, and today she swung by Panera to say hey. It rocks my socks off that she's back. I envision some many good times and I can't wait to hang with her.

But, it is a bit strange to think that she was just in London, ordering from the Easter Star and riding the tube.

Welcome back, yo.

"I get by with a little help from my friends," The Beatles

My Saturday should have been terrible. It was rainy, I had to work an eight hour shift at the Mo-ian, during which I had to write three (count them, three) obituaries - that's three phone calls to three different grieving families, and then I got off at 8 p.m. and ate dinner by myself.

But, due to a variety of beautiful people in my life, this was probably the best Saturday I've had in a long time.

Thanks to:
My Dad for a lovely Saturday morning conversation.
Sammy D. for wanting to play Scrabble.
Mel and Jon for coming over.
Scrabble followed by Euchre followed by a trip to the diner with three of the best people in my life.

I wish you all such wonderful folks as these. Today picked me up in so many ways, and for the first time in awhile I don't feel a knot of tension between my shoulder blades.

"Why he left his home in the south to roam round the pole, God only knows," The Cremation of Sam McGee ~ Robert W. Service

It is my firm belief that all truly great writers are stronly connected to the place where they consider home. What is Faulkner without the South, Steinbeck with out California? Who would read Garcia-Marquez if his words did not carry a Colombian heat? And would Tom Robbins' characters be convincing out of their pacific-northwest home? Incidentally, Robert W. Service was the poet laureate of the Yukon.

People tease me about the south and Texas, and that's fine - I make most of the jokes myself. But I'm counting the days till I can get back to that place, because I need it. And my home is a much bigger part of me, than I will ever be of it.

I need the housewine of the South, amber in glass that flows from morning to night.

And the wisteria that hangs so heavy on it's branch that it drags the ground.

I need magnolias as big as dinner plates and Southern lilacs in every color you can think.

I need my Texas sky, and Texas bluebonnets, and Texas longhorns.

To sing "Just as I am," in the cool of a Southern Baptist Church.

Banana pudding, and fried green tomatos, and creamette salad.

The skyline of Dallas and the Red River.

More than anything I need my family who loves me and the familiar faces I grew up with in a place called Texas.

Hello Weekend - I will pet you, and hold you, and love you, and....study like a mad scientist for my comm law test.

Exhausted and going through the motions.

Win some, you lose some

MU Jazz Concert, 8:00 p.m., Stotler Lounge - Memorial Union.
(Good music, good people, good times)

If things work out...
If my life will go, just for the next few hours, exactly as I have it planned (I know - I'm jinxing it) then I will be able to both spend an hour with four nurses from Mexico, and have dinner with a jazz musician and writer who is in town to perform with our band.

I've got one hour to interview los enfermera's and then book it to Loeb to make dinner.

Hoping and wishing, ya'll

On the edge of what promises to be a long day...

8:42 p.m. Adelante Newsroom...
Wrote a new lead - hacked about 5 'graphs out of my story.
Am now waiting for editor to return with coffee so that we can put out a magazine.

8:44 p.m. Wondering...
Why do the international people that use McReynolds always play in the FARC yard? All winter it was snowball fights and now it's frisbee. Why do they want to play outside so much - the snow I get, 'cause maybe they don't get snow. But still - is it that restless drive to be Joe College?

8:46 p.m. Must be spring...
The landlocked Mizzou campus smells of dead, festering fish - is it a plague? No. Those trees that smell of fish are in bloom.
Almost brings a smile to my face.

8:48 p.m. Decided (mostly)
I told Mel that I've decided what I really want in life.
I want a dog. I want a kitchen.
These are my top picks. Anything that comes with them is gravy.
I possibly want: someone to share dog/kitchen with and/or children to play in kitchen with dog.
The someone and the children are tentatively penciled in -- we'll see.
But I'm sure on the dog and the kitchen.

9:00 p.m. Trabajo
Editor back - bearing gifts - back to work.

P.S. If anyone has leads on a dog or a kitchen, let me know.

From the Holy Sonnets of John Donne (1572-1631)

Batter my heart, three-personed God

Batter my heart, three-personed God; for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend
Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurped town, to another due,
Labor to admit you, but oh, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captivated, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly I love you and would be loved fain,
But am betrothed unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

~ John Donne

"Get me heaven or hell, Calais or Dover." ~ Rufus Wainwright

Whoa -- Good day, Yeah!
So today was great for a variety of reasons...

Both former residents of 309 D managed to be a part of my day -- I got a postcard from Jo. And....Dylan is camping out in my room for a couple of days.

Can I stop and say how good it is to see that boy!!! I've missed him since he's been in New Zealand, and it is so, so good to see him. He just makes me smile in so many ways, and spending the evening just laughing with him was exactly what I needed.

But...the biggest, most exciting news of the day:
So I saw that Clint had called my cell phone several times today, and when I finally had a second to sit down and call him back he told me some happy news.

He and Lisa got engaged over the weekend.

So to Clint and Lisa -- who very shortly will be married -- Clint has the days on a countdown:
I am so beyond happy and excited for you both. What an amazing time in your life!

On a personal note -- I've known Clint for several years. He was a skinny East Campus kid, with brown hair and thick classes. He was the guy who made All-State Band in eighth grade, and who was named Mr. FBA his senior year.
The Clint effect, smints, Monty Python, San Antonio, the short lived adventures of the Audi -- I have so very many shared memories.

And I must say there's something awfully comforting about a friend who you have had since middle-school -- who's gone through all the same teachers, and classes, and endless band events.

Sure, you change a lot in college, but that makes those people who are connections to your past that much more precious.

So I really don't have the words to say how terribly proud of and happy for him I am right now. I'm just so blessed to have known him so long, and to have seen him become the person he wants to be.

Best wishes you two, always and forever. See you in July!!!

Happy Texas Independence Day, Y'all!!!

On March 2, 1836, the Texas Declaration of Independence was adopted at Washington-on-the-Brazos. During early March, even while the Republic of Texas was being formed, the Texans suffered heart-rending and cruel defeat at the hands of Santa-Anna's army.

But the Texans would not give up. In the months after the defeat at the Alamo, Sam Houston led the Texas army to victory at San Jacinto under the battle cry of, "Remember the Alamo."

And so Texas became an independent nation, with it's own hopes and dreams. And Texans always dream big.

Happy Texas Independence Day.

Definitions:
Gateway date: like a gateway drug, it is meant to pave the way for other, more serious dates.

Thanks, Jo.

So I stand...
"He's a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back -- that's an earthquake. And then you get yourself a couple of spots on your hat, and you're finished. Nobody dast blame this man. A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory." ~ Arthur Miller, "Death of a Salesman"

Dream big and bigger. Nothing's out of reach, really.

Setting aside Mr. Loman's rather misguided perspective, the statement stands, "Nobody dast blame this man." And it's true. We just have to remember to not lose sight of the present in the light of our dreams.

Dream big. Nothing's out of reach. Really.

Hoping I can remember what it's like to be in second grade, and that I can hang out with a second-grader without seeming to much like an adult.

Wish me luck.

He sat there on the bed, hair standing on end from his fingers trailing their way through it.

He sat there and looked at once completely relieved and a little bit terrified. Of himself, of others, it was unclear of whether his fear was in the specific or the general.

And yet the sense of ease was almost tangible. Though he was a part of the room, he was also not a part of it. He was removed. Above it all.

He shook with nerves. And spoke haltingly but without hesitation.

A laugh deep and tuneful, and then a quiet certainty of life.

In that moment with amber hair on end, and deep breaths, and dark eyes that were quiet, he had never been more himself. Recognition of that was clearly written on his face. Scary as knowledge of self can be, the corners of his mouth still turned upward in a smile.

And he was beautiful.

Fact:
There will always be a deadline. What a hole.

Sometimes you just have to go in your room.

Close your door.

And dance.

Sway in the gentle light from a lamp in the corner.

And in the motion try and find something nice to grab hold of when maybe your night hasn't had the best of endings.

It doesn't matter if there's music playing or not, just keep dancing.

One foot to another and now a turn, then a step.

And now lift your arms till you can grab hold of peaceful dreams.

At the beginning of a long day.

Here I sit, at the top of the hill, in my little cart, waiting for the push over the top and the careening journey down the other side.

Rollercoasters have safety devices -- I'm not sure that this day does.

Here's to the unknown. The unexpected. The untried.

Here's to going over the top.

Hoping for snow and old people.

It is snowing -- that is most assuredly not the answer.

I would give my eye teeth for a fried green tomato.

I'm a completely hopeless romantic in case you didn't know. Mmm, how I love the drawing rooms of Moscow and St. Petersburg, circa mid 19th century. Which is exactly where I've spent most of today. I'm completely head over heals for Leo Tolstoy.

And so back again, to swishing silk skirts, and aristocratic notions. I've left my friends, the Rostov's, in the midst of a name day party, and it would be rude to stay away so long.

Au revoir

Sweet Friday, I could kiss you. You make me so boundlessly happy, Friday.

A brief respite in this moment. And then one more hour apart from you, my cutesy-wootsie Friday-day, as I bustle busily in the crazy Adelante newsroom.

But after, Friday, then you and I can be together dabbling our toes in the weekend.

Until of course, 6:00 p.m. tomorrow -- which is apparently the only time that a certain subject of a story can make tortillas.

Don't journalists get weekends too?

Think not of that, dear Friday, let us only be in this moment held in sweet embrace.

Words to think on...
Tonight someone told me, "Tomorrow, when you wake up, the people who love you will still be loving you."

And it's true. So for those of you who read this, know that it's very much the case.

Tomorrow, when I wake up, I will still be loving you.

The best thing I saw today...
Professor Strathman on the end of a leash, walking his dog.

The best thing I said today...
"Julio..." in high pitched voice when I needed someone to speak Spanish to the person I had called.

The best thing I heard today...
"So if they say they don't want an accuracy check do we still have to do an accuracy check?" from the same kid who asked in our orientation, "So if we know that we got their quotes exactly right, and we've got it on our recorder, do we still have to do an accuracy check?"

Hmm, do we see a Stephen Glass in the making?

What a day
Today, people treated me like a real person, with an actual job.

I pitched two stories and sold them both.

I don't have a professor. I've got an editor.

Weird.

Thankful...
Yes, I am. Very thankful indeed.

What I learned...
Today I was reminded of two things:
1. There are some pretty ridiculous people out there. People who have skewed priorities, and perceptions. People unwilling to do the right thing unless it is specifically written out for them in their handbook of how-to-be-a-ridiculous-person. People unwiling to choose what is better over what is obvious or immediate.

2. There are also some pretty amazing people out there. People who will do the right thing regardless of personal consequences. People of integrity and character. People with enough vision to discard the immediate or the obvious or the apparent for what is better.

To the folks in number 1: Develop a concept of how to be decent human beings.

To the folks in number 2: Thanks.

Tomorrow I'm going back to Missouri. Leaving this place so familiar to me, so comfortable to me. And there's always a bit of melancholy in that.

You've been to those houses where every color is coordinated to match, right down to the color of the dog and cat? A house perhaps where there was a theme in the decoration?

Yeah, my family's home is not like that. Never has been.

We have a kerosene lamp sitting next to a painted coconut on our mantle. Mardi Gras beads hanging off the edge of a quilt rack that my Great-Grandmother’s quilt hangs on. The figures of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza hanging on our kitchen wall. A cigar store Indian in one of the corners.

I like to think that it’s a special place. And I love every crazy thing in this house, and I love that there is no uniting theme, and that nothing matches, and that when a person comes to the house for the first time there is a usually something that makes them say, “Oh, how interesting.”

But what I really love is what makes all of those things so special. The fact that some bit of my family is wrapped up in the painted coconut, and the cigar store Indian, and all the other quirky things in our house.

My folks are pretty good people when you come right down to it.

When I leave I take these things with me…

Waking up and hearing my parents reading the news-paper over coffee. Being under the covers and hearing them laugh in the kitchen.

Reading aloud. There was the year we read Longfellow’s “Song of Hiawatha,” – “By the shores of Gitchee-Goomi, by the big sea shining waters…” And then the year when Dad went on a “Henry V” kick – “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers. For he today who fights with me shall be my brother…”
And the Sherlock Holmes stories, and Stuart Little, and Edgar Allan Poe. My passion for literature begins with sitting in my parent’s lap and hearing them read all these things, and so many more. Milne, and Beatrix Potter, and Silverstein.

Beating the pots and pans. Walk this way. Woof-woof. Cold biscuits. Argentine art museums.

All these things mean something very dear to me.

And I think of them when I am far away from home.

Just enough

“Charlie, don’t forget what happened to the man who suddenly got everything he always wanted.”
“What?”
“He lived happily ever after.” ~ Willy Wonka to Charlie, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

It’s a great scene. Having broken through the great glass ceiling, they find themselves in a place completely new, with an unexpected perspective. Wonka essentially hands Charlie the world. Wonka, the unpredictable, sometimes volatile, but always generous candy maker gives Charlie the opportunity to realize not only his conscious dreams, but those that he’s too scared to admit he has, even to himself.

Langston Hughes asked about the fate of dreams deferred. My initial encounter with his poem, with its vivid and rather unpleasant imagery, left me with my nose upturned.

It was not until my senior year of high-school, when life altering decisions seemed to loom and change and mock every other week, that I saw myself in Hughes’ words.

I lay awake nights. Reciting the poem. Straining my body to hear an answer, any answer. At 17 years old, I had several dreams and sensed that I would choose to defer them all. And in the dark I would begin to sweat. Because no matter what answer I imagined they were all the same. These refused dreams issued a hot and sickeningly sweet smell that clung cloyingly to any image of life I conjured for myself. How they laughed, these dreams, a shrill, wildly mocking cry. A cry without words, only a whistling. A derisive whistling past my ears. For dreams do not give way quietly, they burn themselves upon your heart and mind; they lurk always in shadow and in light, and they are relentless in their demands. Dreams die neither peacefully nor heroically, and above all, they are never put away willingly.

As a freshman in college, I grew resigned. I tried to embrace what I felt was expected for me. I sought stability and found it in resignation to what I felt was the status quo.

And in 2003, at 19 years old, I told the status quo to shove off.

It came quietly, without fanfare or promise. At its beginning, 2003 seemed only the next step in time’s progression. And I had no expectations of it when it began, for I had not yet learned how to expect great things.

I will remember 2003 as the year in which I came into my own. The year I learned how to stand, took the first faltering steps at living abundantly. The year in which I, to quote C.S. Lewis, “became myself, only more so.”

In 2003 I walked near dreams that I had been too scared to speak of even within my heart.

I walked near presses, great beasts of machines that demand attention when they begin to place words upon paper. And I laughed, because for the first time I thought that perhaps, someday, those words would be mine.

In 2003 I tried out for a jazz band. And I won a chair in a group of musicians that are keen to play. Hot to play. A band of brothers bound together in musical freedom and expression. And I laughed, because here was a dream, whose voice had grown weak, come back to live with me.

In 2003 I found the friends whom I have sought all my life. What more can I say about them? They are the blessings that cause my cup to run over. Every day.

Last year I found myself faced once more with a choice to pursue dreams, or to put them aside, to ignore them, and live a life where always present would be the question, “what if?” What if I had chosen otherwise? What then?

2003 was not a year without challenges.

In fact it was the most challenging year I’ve ever had. There were times when it all seemed so desperately tenuous, when it seemed that no sooner was one battle faced, than another presented itself.

There were tears, and hurts. There was weariness. There were moments when I felt like I was boxing at air and shadows. But there were friends, strong and tender, who reached out patient hands and caught my tears.

I remember one conversation I had last year, when a friend looked me in the eyes, and said, “Sara, your friends want to help you in this, but we can’t help you unless you want to take that first step.” And having no other choice really, I decided to take a small, tentative stride. True to their word, my friends came to my aid. It was I who moved forward, but it was they who kept me from stepping back.

What happens to dreams deferred?

Sometimes, particularly when your friends lend a bit of their courageous spirit, and when you take a step, however small, when there is just enough hope, and just enough starlight, and just enough laughter, when there is just the right amount of love…

When all of those things are there, then sometimes, if you are fortunate, you find the dreams you tried to lose, the dreams you thought were lost.

It’s a great scene, really. When, having broken through great barriers, you find yourself in a glass elevator with a completely new perspective and a candy factory in your hands.

What happened to the person who suddenly got everything they’d always wanted?

She started to live happily ever after.

Good life choices...
I feel like I need to start making better life choices, one of them being to not be a chronic insomniac. Seriously people, it's 3:04 a.m. and I am awake. What's the deal?

Speaking of what's the deal?
I had a friend in high-school, named Philip, who was one of the funniest people I've ever met. And because of him, "what's the deal?" became a big catch phrase for our group of friends, and I dare say much of the Chapel orchestra (which incidentally, was mostly our group of friends.)
Philip would stand up and say, sounding rather like Bulwinkle the moose, "Grape-nuts. You open the box, no grapes, no nuts. What's the deal?"

Why did we find this so immensely funny?

Really, I don't want an answer to this question. This same group of people could be reduced to hysterical giggles simply by saying "Smints" in a rather obnoxious British accent.

Compelling Television
No, I don't think there is any. Although if anyone happened to see the clip of the Crocodile Hunter trying to feed his baby to a croc, that was pretty entertaining.

Serious
Does sprinkling sugar heavily on your bowl of Cheerios negate the healthy effects of said cheerios?

No Phat Here
My birth place carries, for the second year in a row, the crown of fatty-Mcfatfat-fattest city.

Let's also note that there is not one Southern city in the top-ten fittest cities (I don't count Virginia Beach as Southern). But the South does come in with four cities in the fat top-ten. Why?

I propose that this is due to the fact that one of the secrets of Southern cooking is to:
a) wrap whatever you're cooking in bacon
b) cook whatever you're cooking in bacon grease
c) wrap whatever you're cooking in bacon and then fry it in bacon grease

Sneaky
I'm currently sleeping in the guest bedroom which is next to the kitchen. This also happens to be where I'm typing this blog-entry from. My dad has just gotten up to forage for snack items and if he figures out that it's 4:00 a.m. and I'm awake, then I'm in trouble. I'm typing with my inside voice, and if he starts to come towards my room, I'm so throwing the laptop and myself under the covers -- this totally used to work with books I was reading while I was supposed to be asleep.

Never mind
I win, he's gone back to bed, and my covert blogging continues.

Good life choices
Well, I reckon I'll quit while I'm ahead -- you know, there's a funny joke about that...

I should make more good life choices, not just about sleeping, but just in general. It's a move I would support. Or at least more informed choices -- that might work too.

And finally
In reference to my life choices of late, I've mostly heard my friends telling me to
a) not be crazy
b) not be crazy
c) not be crazy

Slightly perplexing -- I beginning to be concerned that they are secretly planning an intervention in which they commit me to an asylum.

I appreciate the sentiments, but really, what's wrong with crazy? Please -- don't let them cart me away to Bedlam.

Looking for Eileen
Last night I found myself awake at 3:00 a.m. I resisted the urge to blog mindlessly and instead turned on the radio.

KRLD News 1080.

I tuned into the some show called, "All Across Texas," or something like that. The host presented trivia questions, and then people called in to answer them, and present other trivia questions in what amounted to a rather dreary cycle of prattle.

The most intriguing person was a gal named Eileen. She was clearly an older woman, probably in her 60's or early 70's and the sense that she just wanted someone to listen to her was almost tangible. She kept the host on the line, deftly avoiding several moves on his part to get on with his show. She talked about how her father was a civilian survivor of Pearl Harbor, how her family had lived in San Diego during WWII -- how you had to keep dark sheets over the windows during a blackout. She talked about how a teacher she had brought a turbine engine to school for the kids to take apart.
She shared that a 12 year old kiddo had recently told her that H.O.M.E.S. was an easy way to remember all of the Great Lakes.

Her voice crackled with age. It quavered at times, it shook, not with depression or a sense of desperation, just a sense of several years gone by. She laughed quickly and easily, she had opinions on several different subjects.
And the host didn't seem to realize that he had a pretty interesting woman on the line. He pandered to her, his responses peppered with, "Well, all right," and "I'll be." His voice growing shorter and quicker. I could imagine his finger hovering anxiously over buttons that would move the show forward.

Eileen said good-night, and we moved on to callers in Farmer's Branch, and Euless, and Lubbock. None quite so interesting, or at ease as Eileen sounded. The host continued to fumble, and be generally uninteresting. Just as with Eileen, he failed to engage any of the subsequent callers in a conversation.

The host had a chance. A chance to talk to the kind of people who call a radio program in early morning hours to answer questions like, who played the wolfman in the classic movie, "The Wolfman?" (It's Lon Chaney Jr., in case you were wondering, and yes, I knew this before the lounge singer from Lubbock called in with the answer.) The host missed a chance to engage these people in a dialogue, to find out what made them tick, what made them unique. To find out what experiences they had, or wanted, or dreamed about.

Eileen wouldn't have. She would've talked to Don in Euless and the Paul in Farmer's Branch as though they were sitting on her front porch. On her front porch, over a cup of coffee, they would have talked and listened and laughed with one another. Eileen wouldn't have rushed on to the next caller, and the next inane bit of trivia.
Eileen knew it wasn’t about the trivia or the answers. It was about people who at 3:00 in the morning, on a warm Texas night, found themselves listening to an AM radio station out of Dallas.

Eileen realized that the urge to be known and heard is a fundamental aspect of humanity. It’s in our nature, the desire to connect with one another. To find other people who have grieved, and reveled, and wept, and lived. Somehow connecting with others reminds us that life really does happen. That life really isn’t some fantastic dream that will rush away and leave us questioning our existence.

It’s rather reassuring, at 3:00 in the morning, when it is dark and quiet and still., and you are unsure of where reality ends and fantasy begins to hear someone like Eileen. Talking and laughing. Simply being.