200 pounds of milk chocolate salvation
First, we had Heywood Banks’ Big Butter Jesus song. Now, apparently, we have Anatomically-Correct Chocolate Jesus.Â
I’m not sure whether or not to be offended. On the one hand, I don’t honestly think the artist was trying to be offensive–any more than Michelangelo’s David was meant to be offensive. This particular artist apparently usually works in food as a medium–previous works have included mozzarella cheese, pepper jack and processed ham. I personally think as a Jew, Jesus would have been more offended by being portrayed in ham than chocolate. But I digress.Â
I don’t think I find it offensive. It could be a statement about the commercialization of Easter–letting chocolate easter bunnies take over the resurrection. I don’t know. The main issue I have is that when I read the words “200 pounds of milk chocolate” my mouth starts to water, and that is a really disturbing sensation to associate with my savior. Of course, every week we “partake in his body and blood” in communion…Â
mrs. wellington strikes back
I had lunch today at Joe’s O.K. Bayou, and as the girl at the counter was writing down my order, I saw her make a note at the bottom that cracked me up:Â “Lady in White.”
I guess I’m getting too old to be Mary Sharon these days. LOL. You have to be either a rabid Prince fan (or married to one) to get that joke, probably, but what the heck. In Under the Cherry Moon, the Lady in White (aka Mrs. Wellington) was the rich divorcee who was “sponsoring” Prince’s piano-playing Christopher Tracy.
Come to think of it, I do wear a lot of white (well, off-white–I’m an Autumn.)
everything is connected.
So I’ve been having a series of bad days. Didn’t really blog about it, didn’t really journal about it much. But for the last few weeks, I’ve felt, in the words of Bilbo Baggins, like butter scraped over too much bread. And the worst of it was the feeling of inevitability attached to it all. The feeling that life is completely out of my control, and predetermined to be hard and bad and pointless.Â
I felt like I was missing something, and I couldn’t really place what it was. The more I tried to connect to family, friends, work, Christ, anything meaningful, the more I felt like I was separated from all these things. The problem was me, and I knew it. I wasn’t being the person I wanted to be, wasn’t being a person I felt good about being. I was angry and disappointed in myself, but felt like I couldn’t do any better.
So Thursday night, Chris came home from his uncle’s funeral, and he was mad and disappointed with himself too, albeit regarding different issues. And he was struggling to translate that into something positive and productive, instead of just doing what we all tend to do with that, and beating himself up pointlessly. So I just decided, right then, that the next day was going to be a good day. No matter what stuff beyond my control happened, I could control my attitude and my actions. I could turn those things, even slightly, in a better direction.Â
So I got up Friday morning, painted my fingernails, and headed in to work. And told everyone all day long: “Today is a good day.” At the beginning of the day, it was said with conviction. There were a couple of points in the day, I’m sure I didn’t sound terribly convincing, but I said it anyway. I said it in faith.Â
It was a short day. We’ve been working a lot of overtime and weekends at work, trying to get a big project completed. And initially, when I found out that they were sending us home early, I admit I didn’t feel relieved. It felt like another layer of pressure. “Great, now I have to get the same amount of work done in less time.” But I decided it was a good day, and that leaving early was a good thing, and that things would work out. And strangely enough, they did. All the crazy stuff just… kept getting resolved, one thing at a time, till when 2:00 rolled around, I was actually caught up, with no crises in need of aversion.Â
So I went into the conference room, and the management team thanked the production people for working so hard for the last few weeks. It was a very positive meeting. Then they dismissed all the people to start their weekend… except the ones who had been working late, coming in early, and doing weekends. I have to admit, my heart sank a little. I think we all thought that we were going to be told “Hey, I know we were going to let you go early, but it’s just not possible.”Â
That’s not what they said. What they said was… well it was good news. The people they kept in got some tangible recognition for their extra effort. I’m not going to blog the exact nature of that recognition, and really, the exact nature of it isn’t important to this story. It was significant. And it meant a lot to me, because to me, it didn’t just mean my supervisors at work recognized that I had been perservering despite a struggle, but that God recognized it as well. I firmly believe God put it on their heart to do what they did.Â
It was a good day.
So I was checking out the website of a new band that I’m really liking, Needtobreathe. And if you want to see how to make a really excellent music video with a lot of creativity and $183, check out their video for Shine On at www.needtobreathe.net. But I was reading their bio, and I got to this:Â
“We feel like you can change your life in a day,’ Bear explains, ‘at any time, at any point. Â Basic decisions that you make can affect your life completely. I think in many ways, that is the theme of the record. Regardless of where you are in your situation, every passing moment is a chance to turn it all around.”
Amen.
signs, signs, everywhere are signs
I don’t put much (read: any) stock in horoscopes, but I gotta say, mine for today gave me pause:
The Sun enters your 6th House of Daily Routines, emphasizing your work habits over the weeks ahead. It’s time to shift your focus temporarily away from searching for the deep meaning of life as you gain efficiency in your day-to-day actions. If you are preoccupied with metaphysical issues, give yourself permission to take a short vacation from the intensity.
LOL. Dangit. I better get back on that whole GTD / Constructive Living thing before God has to resort to communicating to me via fortune-cookies or billboards.
Edited to add: Here’s an extra little fortune cookie worth pondering. What if the “deep meaning of life” actually is in your day-t0-day actions?Â
two awesome posts from my feed reader
I took a brief moment to check my feed reader and at least scan some of the most recent posts from bloggers who generally have something interesting and useful to say. There were at least two gems in the bunch that I felt like almost anyone could get something out of:
The first comes from Seth Godin, on Thrill Seekers and Fear Avoiders
Thrill seekers love growth. They most enjoy a day where they try something that was difficult, or–even better–said to be impossible, and then pull it off. Thrill seekers are great salespeople because they view every encounter as a chance to break some sort of record or have an interaction that is memorable.
Fear avoiders hate change. They want the world to stay just the way it is. They’re happy being mediocre, because being mediocre means less threat/fear/change. They resent being pushed into the unknown, because the unknown is a scary place.
The big end point in Seth’s post is that these two opposites used to be known as “risk takers” and “risk avoiders.” But as fast as things change, there’s actually more “risk” involved in resisting change than in embracing it. Chew on that one a minute.
The second item comes to us from Brian Kim via 43Folders. It’s an article on the top 5 things that should be taught in school. I especially related to this part:
If you look at this generation of students, you’ll find that most are “shell shocked†once they graduate because they had little or no preparation for what was to come.
High school mostly teaches you to memorize information and to regurgitate it back to your teacher, only to completely erase the information from your mind the moment you walk out after taking the test.
Kim includes Personal Finance, Communicating Effectively, and Time Management among his 5 Things. I have to say, had I picked up on those three alone when I was younger, I could have avoided a lot of trouble in my early to mid twenties. Another gem in that post was related to our materialistic culture, and how that makes it really difficult for young people to be financially responsible:
Another important subset regarding personal finance are those “intangible†things, such as learning to differentiate between need and want, delaying the gratification, and having an inner sense of value. These concepts can’t be taught in the classroom but only taught through oneself via self discipline.
We live in a materialistic society where unfortunately, many young people grow up with the “have†then “be†mentality.
If I have _______, then I’ll be ____________.
Blame it on the media, advertising, or the impressionable minds of young people, but you’ll frequently see that a lot of people get stuck in this mentality and as a result, needlessly pile themselves in a mountain of debt.
Amen, Brother Kim. Preach it.
honestly, seriously
I should be in bed.
I’ve got a long day behind me, and a longer two or three ahead, but I need to get this out of my system, out of my head, somewhere, so I can sleep.Â
Chris was asking me what I thought of tonight’s episode of LOST, about the exchange between Christian Shepherd and Claire. I told him that I thought they both handled it badly, but that they both handled it as well as they were able at the time.Â
There are lots of situations in my own life, in my past, that I know I handled badly. I screwed up. But I also understand, deep down, that I did the best I could at the time. “My best” at the time just frankly sucked. I’ve forgiven myself. And I sort of thought out loud that most people don’t forgive themselves for the things they’ve handled badly in life because to get there, you have to first admit “I screwed up.”Â
You have to be be able to look honestly at yourself. You have to acknowledge your sin first. Then you can look at yourself with compassion and grace, understand that you did the best you could (even if the best you could do at the time was pretty awful), and forgive yourself for that sin, and allow God and others to forgive you.Â
And once you’re able to do that for yourself, you start to become able to do it for others. You become able to, first, look at others honestly, and second, look at them with grace and compassion. You stop seeing bad people and good people. You start seeing people, who do both good and bad things, for all sorts of complicated and often stupid reasons.Â
You stop making excuses for the bad behavior. You stop seeking the reasons behind the hateful choices. You also stop resenting it and expecting payback for it. It was wrong. It mattered.  But it’s past, and whatever it was, you survived it. You’re okay. And if you’re okay, there’s nothing to gain by holding on to it, and everything to gain by forgiving and letting it go.Â
you know you’re an alpha geek when…
Your boss tells you you’re going to spend the weekend, not reading, but writing, a computer manual–and you’re actually excited about it.Â
I’m a little concerned what it says about me as a person that I’m equally stoked about the prospects of tent camping with small children and writing a users manual for a software application.  Something about that just says “Unabomber in training.”  Or very possibly “legally insane.”
a sick vader-ette and a new whirlpool
Today, the Mini Vader and I are home together, as our short Sith Princess recuperates from bronchitis.
We had a mostly uneventful trip to the drug store to pick up her prescriptions, and now we’re watching a lot of Nick Jr. and eating toaster waffles.
On a positive note, Chris (with an assist from Steve S. and his truck) picked up our washer. So no more trips to the laundromat. I did learn a valuable lesson from that experience: if you have to go to the laundromat, and you live the same distance from Corydon and New Albany–go to New Albany.
Now I have to try and get my house back into some kind of order after the last month of chaos and disorder…
HRH germ-related update
This just in from Chris: the HRH has been diagnosed with asthmatic bronchitis. Which we’re not sure if that means she also has heretofore undiagnosed asthma, or just a peculiar type of bronchitis. On the positive side, he also said she is acting her normal, chipper preschooler self. (Which she was last night after sleeping six hours yesterday.)
So she’s going to be on antibiotics, and gets to use an inhaler, evidently.
In unrelated news, Joshua and I went to the park together yesterday and had a lovely time. We slid down the really enormous metal slide. We played on the merry-go-round. We annoyed the animals in the petting zoo.  We swung on the tire swing. We scoped out potential camping spots for next weekend. We shouted “Whazzup!” to my old high school accounting teacher, as well as an older guy on roller skates (well, Josh did. I just nodded like a grown up.)
I love spring.
the germs, they are among us
I have just figured out that everybody I know is either sick, getting sick, getting over being sick, or taking care of a family member who is sick. At our house, it’s currently the HRH who is feeling the nasty–chest cold, which we’re hoping to head off before it becomes pneumonia. And I don’t feel so well myself.
I think we’ve reached that critical mass point where people are getting sick because they’re so worn down from all the additional work created by everybody else being sick. It’s like a perpetual sickness generating machine. So stock up on Zicam and Airborne, people.
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