picnic

Summertime is here and to celebrate this with a picnic is very appropriate. Don’t worry about your Sunday nap – it can be had in the sun. Don’t worry about your Sunday brunch – it can be prepared on Saturday and chilled (is this not most biblical? :-) Don’t worry about your weekend dating, a picnic is sated with romance, alone or accompanied. Don’t worry about the dishes – nature will take back its own fiber plates soon enough. Don’t worry for time – leisure is your aim. Conversation is the order of the day. Don’t worry about your lack of red hair or basketed bicycle for I have neither and still fasten to the dream of picnicking. Ah – but I romanticize. Enough of that – where’s the bug spray??

waxing eloquent about...the weather

What is it about weather that makes it a common bond of discourse among all men? The stranger on the bus, with which I share so few interests, can instantly be made a friend by remarking on the weather. “It would be a beautiful day if it weren’t so hot!” “At least there is a breeze!” “Yes, thank God for the breeze.”

When rain meant food on the table, the weather gave men a deeper connection: survival. This connection was spiritual, unprejudiced, and uncontrollable. Rain falls on the good and the evil, the poor and the rich. Weather was a leveler of men by the hand of God. Since we’ve killed God (according to Nietche) weather is only a leveler of men. Yet, by that very fact, we hear whispers of a gap - the uncontrollable Origin denied.

I love the weather. It’s not the enthusiastic predictions by my father in the early years and the anticipation he created, nor those moments clinging to the mast of our oak while a thunderstorm tossed me with the breath of cool mist, it is that recognition of a force totally unaffected by any of man’s scheming. We can only react and never resist.

Despite those early encounters, I was never aware that weather was a profession until my course was set toward other work. But I am not tempted to meteorology. I don’t want to understand everything materially possible about the weather. I know satellites and radars help prevent deaths so I’m grateful for their place, but prediction feels like a hollow attempt to control what is not ours. Like a dance off beat, man’s movement with the weather minus God, is odd and somewhat sad.

I have a garden and it is dry. My rain barrels are empty and I pray for them to be filled. My vegetables are sparse, small, and bitter. And I know now, in a way that I did not before, that God feeds me everyday. The weather is the movement of His living hand sustaining the world, undimmed by men, ever witnessed yet never acknowledged. The mystery of it draws me.

politics

Yes, it's that time again - for sj to go all political in her post :].

I have been sympathetic to the plight of Palestinians much as I am toward Afghans and Iraqis and all civilians caught in the middle of wars decided by their leaders. When I listened to NPR on the way home from backpacking Sunday, May 30, I heard Greta Berlin, organizer of the flotilla describe her organization's unwavering goal to break the blockade. When asked by the interviewer why she did not accept Israel's offer to deliver the supplies after inspection at a port designated for humanitarian aid into Gaza, she responded that her goal was to not simply transport supplies but to break the blockade.

I think Israel poorly executed the raid on the flotilla. However, they were within their legal right to stop the ships. A blockade is a viable military alternative that American has employed against Japan and Cuba and the international law which governs conflicts at sea was not violated. If a vessel ignores all warnings and willingly sails into an existing blockade, it is an offensive action, and defensive actions by the blockading country should not come as a shock to anyone.

The blockading nation, under international law, can request an approaching vessel to stop for inspection. If the vessel does not comply, it can be subject to capture. International law does not allow for the boat to be sunk, but it can be attacked if it resists capturing.

I'm really sorry for the Palestinian people. I believe they are probably living in poverty but I'm also sure that the truth is not as easy as blaming Israel. Hamas is considered to be a terrorist organization and could very well be responsible for most of the poverty in the country it controls. But let's cut the hypocritical talk about war crimes and the sense of indignation that a country had the balls to defend it's own border. We would have done no less (in fact, we probably would've done much more) if someone tried to break a blockade we set up or if a neighboring country declared itself our enemy and lobbed rockets at us.

love

My sister marries this Saturday. My brother arrives today. My parents arrive Wednesday. The calendar is filled so the blog will be sparse.

I am reading The Kings English (1908) and am challenged to brevity in my writing. This challenge may be difficult to meet since I’m prone to loquaciousness. The English language is ever mutating and I don’t want to contribute to the proliferation of meaningless, unclear, or wasteful words. But I probably do and probably will continue. Still, I like reading the book and I like the challenge it gives me.

I took more pictures of Megan. Some nurses make comments about my attachment to her, rightly insinuating that it will be difficult for me when she goes home. I will be very glad when she goes home but also sad to not hold her or sing to her everyday. I may be projecting but I wonder if there isn’t also an insinuation, wrongly, that I should guard against developing a strong attachment to her. I can’t help but think of John 3:16 paraphrased: for God was so attached to us that He gave the life of His Son so He could be attached to us forever [even though most of humanity willingly rejects the attachment]. That little girl needs to be held and loved and I am in the honored position of doing both for a little while. So will I do, without regard to the painful ending (for me) that is sure to come. And I will be deeply thankful for the honor.