Christmas

Christmas is pretty much over at our house--except for the take down and clean up. What a wonderful season it was. My friend Dace says, at our Bible study group annual Christmas breakfast, "How rich we are!" referring to our friendships, families and general blessings. And so it was made evident to me over and over throughout the month of December.

So many people had a part in making a great. We started with the Holiday Stroll in downtown Red Wing the day after Thanksgiving. The merchants have treats and specials, Santa comes to town, there is a parade and fireworks and music and then we invite people over to warm up and have some soup. Next on the agenda is the Christmas cookie bake at church where we make about 8000 cookies for a youth fundraiser. It takes the efforts of about 40-45 people to get it all done in a day and a half and its a lot of work but a lot of fun too. Then my sisters and brother and I go for our annual day of shopping and fine eating. We always have a good time together and this year was no exception. Next came the Christmas program at church. No matter how chaotic the practices go, the program always comes together with only a few minor glitches--and they make it all the more memorable for all the parents and grandparents that come to watch. We had Secret Santa's at work--which is always fun (I'm going to write a whole posting on this soon). I'm still working on getting the Christmas cards done--which now turn into holiday cards, I guess.

Mr. Wonderful and I made it away overnight for our annual two day shopping trip. We started this tradition when the kids were little and have managed to do it every year--its a great recharge time for us, giving us time to walk around, holding hands, doing all that mushy stuff--and getting the shopping done too.

There are three things that intertwine to make Christmas special to me--the extra involvement with people due to the extra Christmas activities, the traditions of Christmas, and the Christmas story. It all comes together when I'm sitting in church and hear the story of the first Christmas being read from Luke--something in me settles and I have a sense of Christmas having arrived and all the busyness being done and everything quieting down.

My Vatican Splendor "toothpick holder"

For the past few years my two sisters, my brother and I have spent a day in the fall with my mom to celebrate her birthday. This year we went to the MN History Center to see the Vatican Splendors exhibit. The artwork on display was pretty amazing and we decided that when money is no obstacle its really much easier to build a fine collection of fine art. The intricate detail work on the dishes (I know there are real words for each item-I'm too lazy to look them up) used for communion was impressive. I suppose it would be sacrilegious to consider melting them down to provide proper health care to the retired nuns who live in poverty relying on donations.

The part of the display about digging in the mid-1900's for St. Peter's tomb, in secret for a couple of decades, had me remembering Geraldo Rivera's dramatic unveiling of the supposed vault of Al Capone's wealth (which only contained some bottles). Apparently, the Vatican excavating crew found some bones that they thought were St. Peter's, so they hid them so they wouldn't be misplaced, then someone else found them and then they were place in a proper reliquary. Enough about that.

The gift shop had all the usual museum type stuff--reproductions of the artwork, statues of the some of the popes, calendars, creches and postcards. The only item that got me to open my wallet though was the Vatican Splendor shot glass. My sister and I were laughing so hard that the clerk was even laughing with us. He said something like, I see you found our "toothpick holders". I bought two--one for me and for my most Catholic friend.

After seeing the rest of the museum, doing a little shopping, we went to Moscow on the Hill for dinner. Its a Russian restaurant. I would like to go back someday when I'm not driving as they have flights of vodka you can order--six different kinds of their over a hundred kinds of vodka to try. I tried one shot of the house cherry vodka and thought it was excellent. It would have been a good time to use my new shot glass but I forgot it in the car.

Rome and Moscow, all in one day. I hope my mom had fun.

Noisy and Messy

Molly Ivins was one of my favorite columnists. She wrote for several publications but finished her career in Texas at the Fort Worth Star Telegram. The following quote is attributed to her:

"So keep fightin' for freedom and justice beloveds but don't you forget to have fun doin' it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin'ass and celebratin' the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was."

And so ends another election season. Although the mud-slinging got tiresome, the money spent overwhelming and the rhetoric hard to believe--it was as it should be. From the President of the United States, to Congressional races, to local county and city contests-never should such big decisions be made quietly. This democracy is a noisy, messy business isn't it?

One Issue Voter

After being out driving this week, I think I could become a one issue voter. If a candidate promised to ticket everyone who drove in the passing lane when they weren't passing anyone--I would donate money to that person's campaign, put their sign in my lawn, show up at their rally and put my "x" by their name on election day.

I'm embarrassed to say that this is how shallow I am.

Why don't people move over? One woman I know said she couldn't go back to the other lane because she drove a pick-up truck and it was too hard---hey, hey, hey--how about getting off the road if you can't handle the vehicle. Others say they are going the speed limit and have a right to be there--oh for pete sake, time to mosey on back to Mayberry RFD. And others, I'm sure, are just unaware or on their cell phone or are planning to pass someone or turn left at some point in the next 100 miles or so. Again, I know I'm a little bit on the ornery side about all this.

For several years, I've reminded the little darlings that when I die, it is their responsibility to tell their father to move out of the passing lane. Mr. Wonderful gets a little too comfortable in the left lane and is slow to put on his blinker, check over his right shoulder and slide back over to where he belongs. (I didn't pick up on this when we were dating--love is truly blind)

So, if you've been thinking about a political career but didn't really want to be bothered with foreign policy, recessions, depressions, global warming, crime, health care, mortgage meltdowns, poverty, energy resources and all those other big fancy issues--maybe this is the place to start. You can count on my vote.

Potlucks

A potluck, also called a covered dish supper, faith supper, a carry-in or Jacob's supper in different parts of the country or cultures, is in my estimation, consistently one of life's best culinary experiences. It's been a good week for me, I've been to two--nearly reason enough to raise my arms and praise the Lord (but behavior like that could get me barred from future feasts in my Scandinavian Lutheran neighborhood so I won't be risking it).

A potluck may seem like a free for all to the uninitiated but to pull off a good one takes some top-notch organizational skills. Some have themes, some have part of the menu provided, some require only some of the eaters to bring food. The organizer has to decide how many main dishes, salads--vegetable, pasta or fruit, breads, desserts, beverages (if not provided). Are the plates and utensils going to be provided or should everyone bring their own?--but even then someone will forget, you have to have spares. Bring a big sturdy plate--no flimsy nine incher.

My least favorite potluck was at an all natural, organic food store. Not only did it have the most unidentifiable foods, they were mostly inedible, at least to my cream of mushroom soup trained palate. My favorites are church potlucks when there are a lot of older women who don't have any fancy ideas about food. Hotdishes, jello salad, hotdishes, buttered buns, hotdishes, more jello salad, and another dozen or so hotdishes.
Hallelujah! Amen!!

art studio ramble

Last weekend my friend, Gina, and I went on a tour of art studios in western Wisconsin. I think we saw about 10 or 12 studios and drove about 100 miles. My vocabulary for talking about art is so limited--I don't know how to tell you about the great stuff we saw. Pottery, painting, sculpture, jewelry, glass work, photography, woodworking, iron smithing-and variations in each category. It was phenomenal. It was cool, beautiful, inspiring, calming, exciting and on and on.

My appreciation of art is uninformed and unsophisticated. I don't know what makes art good or bad and have only a minuscule bit of knowledge about technique or style-- enough to recognize the difference between a Picasso and Monet, and that's about it. But, as we cretins like to say, I know what I like and you can bet your crayolas I saw a lot that I liked on Saturday. It would have been fun, (in a "look at me, I just won the lottery" way), to be able to buy something from each artist just to show them how much I appreciate what they do.

The artwork was great, the weather was perfect, the scenery wonderful and as an added bonus, I got to spend the day with Gina, who, it could be said, is a piece of art herself.

The truth about politics

Only a month and we'll be done with the current cycle of campaigning. The advertising will go back to more benign topics and the TV news/talk shows will remember that there's a whole big world out there that doesn't need to be seen through the red and blue filters of the Democrat and Republican parties.

I was out walking today and listening to music (have I mentioned how much I love my Ipod?). A song came on by The Roches, called "Who Cares". Here are some of the lyrics:

I like to watch TV
listen to the news
hear what everybody is saying
there's a lot of talk about God
peace and safety and
war and fear and
there goes a girl in a bikini

This guy's saying that guy's an idiot and
she's on the right, he's on the left and
everybody's screaming and yelling at each other and
calling each other jerks
its a party

Who cares where the truth lies
Who cares where the truth lies

Guys dressed up in suits and ties
look you straight in the eyes
telling you lies
but I really wish I knew
what they were talking about

Meanwhile human beings
are being strung up on bridges and
little kids getting their legs blown off and
young soldiers are coming home no more

who cares
who cares

After listening to all the words being thrown back and forth by the politicians, their ads, their parties, the analysts, the newscasters, the comedians, and any of us, who've so charmingly been reduced to being "joe six pack" or "soccer mom"--its easy to see where the sentiment of the song comes from.

We can only guess our best at who is being truthful the most often and who has the most workable solutions to all of the complicated problems that face the US and the world. I have strong opinions about who is better suited to the job but I recognize that they are only opinions based on my biases, life experiences, likes and dislikes etc. There are precious few verifiable facts regarding any candidates past record (those records are so like Bible verses in that they change depending on who's doing the interpreting) and no mortal can tell us what will happen when one or the other is elected.

So....if you want to talk politics with me, don't be getting all high and mighty thinking you know the truth--because then I'll just have to start my own little delusional rant. And that'll just suck the fun right out of running into each other, don't you think?

why don't lutherans have this kind of fun

If you move to Superior WI, you might want to consider joining this church. It looks like it has the potential to be a congregation that knows how to mix a little fun in with their theology.

The rent-a-sign says at Holy Assumption Catholic Church says--

BEER RAFFLE

TICKETS HERE

Now, if it had been vodka they were raffling off, I would have stopped to take the picture AND bought some tickets.

Tourist Traps

In an earlier posting, I mentioned that there are two types of people in the world (those that like watching the weather reports and those that don't). Now as I get ready to write this posting, I want to divide the people in the world into two groups again. I have a feeling this dividing of people in two groups is going to be happening a lot in the future.

There are two kinds of people; those who love tourist traps and those who hate them. I love them. If you build it and make the sign big enough and flashy enough, I'll find it eventually.

Just a partial list:


the world's largest ball of twine-now there's a hobby

a real marshmallow factory-my mom and sisters were less than thrilled

the Liberace Museum-loved it

Gatorland-saw death with every misstep

the Mark Twain Cave -spelunking without risk, perfect

Bear Country USA-they mean it when they tell you to keep your windows closed

Rubber Rainbow Condom Company-you'll have to ask for details

Storybook Island-kind of odd but...

Ripley's Believe It or Not--oh yes, I believe

and Wall Drug--for us lovers of tourist traps, this is our Taj Mahal

Sometimes I need a quiet, maybe even a lonely, place to restore my equanimity and to bring my social skills up to an acceptable level but most of the time I'm ready to follow the directions on the sign to the next, "not to be missed, fun for all, come and see" roadside attraction. And when I'm there, I'll invariably decide that I have to buy something (except, ironically, not at the Rubber Rainbow Condom Company) and that always adds to my fun. So now, the tourist trap people are happy and I'm happy--how great is that.

Beautiful Day

It was a beautiful day in Duluth and I had some fun practicing with my new camera, at least until the battery died. Now I know what that little flashing light means.

Making me Smile

Occasionally people will say something--and for years after, their choice of words will make me chuckle when I remember it. One of my supervisors, a man I really liked and respected, once said "I'm verbalizing what I'm saying". I can't tell you how many times in the past twenty years that has made me laugh. My good friend Susie once pointed out a "dark light" and I don't recall why she said it but only that we laughed hysterically--so it still makes me chuckle. Little darling #3 has, in all his young seriousness, said enough hilarious things to make me wonder if he was some kind of comedic idiot savant.

Now, some of the things that people say that make no sense, but make me chuckle, also worry me. There was a bit on Jon Stewart's, "The Daily Show"--I only saw the clip on You Tube, because we don't have cable (don't get me started on that) and I don't know the name of the woman who does comedy sketches for his show----but anyway, she was talking to people at the Republican National Convention about Sarah Palin's daughter, Bristol, being pregnant, and trying to get them to say the word "choice"--and finally one woman very reluctantly said "...freedom of choice--but that's different than being pro choice." I know I'm going to remember that one for a long time.

Today I was reading a blog about the Catholic Church allowing dissension among "good" Catholics about some issues, specifically, in this article, the death penalty and no dissension regarding the Catholic church's teachings on other topics, such as abortion. In response to the blog, a man named Dudley Sharp, wrote, in the comments section, "Furthermore, you can, rightly, argue that the death penalty is pro life." I just want to shake my head and say, "Dudley, Dudley, Dudley." If he was one of my kids, I'd probably say something wise like, "Hey, now, no more stupid talk" and try to make sure he didn't catch me laughing at him.

Sidelines

The youngest of our little darlings went to her first school dance the other night. Knowing her personality, we knew she would never be one of the kids that would actually get out and dance or jump around or do whatever they do in the middle of the floor that passes for dancing these days. She's a cautious girl who has a strong need to know what she's getting into and if there's any chance at all that she'll look silly, she won't be taking part, only observing.

Sometimes, it makes me a little sad for her. I want to be able to help her see that living life on the sidelines isn't near as much fun as jumping in and letting loose,whatever the activity may be (except rock climbing, duh!). Its taken a lot of years--and self-talk, sometimes downright sarcastic rude self-talk, but I think I've finally learned the lesson and am applying it to my own life.

So here's my mid-life mini-manifesto (if I was really clever, I would insert a You Tube clip of a drumroll): If I want to do it, I'm going to do it. I'm not going to live on the sidelines worrying about what other people might think or say. You should all be thankful I'm not interested in ballet--because with this body it could get ugly.

Now comes the more difficult task of gently continuing to teach/coax/reassure my little darling that life is more fun lived than watched.

I figured out how to add a picture tonight--and I've got to say I'm pretty darned impressed with myself. Just like the I-pod thing, even though I'm late to the party, I'm going to have a good time.

When we moved into our current house, I was kindly invited to join, what had originally started as, a neighborhood book club. People have moved so its no longer defined as tightly along neighborhood lines but is kept to about the number 12-13 so there will someone to host each month.

Now this is no ordinary book club. The major discrepancy--we don't really read books--at least not as in "what book should we read and discuss next month". I believe the charter members did the book thing the first year and maybe the second but the last 8 or 9 years --no books. That's not to say that a lot of reading isn't done. But its not really a team sport with this book club. We might mention what we read but don't discuss it.

But, what we do do (I know there are two dos there)is have a helluva lot of fun together. What a wild variety of women we are and what an amazing gift of friends. We are married, divorced, living with significant others, mothers, not mothers, grandmothers, we have a wide range of spiritual beliefs, a wide range of educational and work backgrounds, short, tall, thin, thick, quiet and not so quiet.

We went to a cabin this summer and had a rip-roaring good time (and in the way that late nights can make things happen, came back calling ourselves Daisies-and that's all I'm going to say about that-although its really not so sinister as it sounds) and came back with these tattoos.

To the daisies--you're the best, thanks for the invitation.

women in church

I was sitting in the balcony at church today during the worship service with two of the little darlings. I think it was during the sermon when it hit me that all the "up front" participants in worship today were women. All three pastors-our regular one (though sadly for us, she's leaving in a week), the interim pastor, and a visiting preaching pastor were all women, the music leader was a woman and the lector was a woman. Even the acolyte was a girl.

Now, I'm not bringing this up to say that this service was any better or different just because it was run by women. I'm only noting it because I think its the first time in my life I've ever experienced an all-woman-run service (of course, I'm counting on the members of the trinity being asexual). And it made me thankful that my children are living in a time when such an event isn't even noticed by them or if I pointed it out, they'd probably say, "yeah, so?". I think the LCA, one of the groups that joined to form the ELCA, started ordaining women in 1970 and sadly there are still a lot of denominations that don't ordain women.

Even with all those women up front, teaching and preaching, and leading men and women alike and doing it with their heads brazenly uncovered, (1st Corinthians 11:1-16) God was present and His work was being done. It was remarkable only because it was unremarkable to all those at that service this morning.

Rewriting my resume to include hockey mom

I'm wishing I had thought to put "Hockey Mom" on my last resume--look where its taken Sarah Palin. One of the benefits of having a lot of kids is that I'm going to get to put a lot of things on my new resume--Gymnastics Mom, Soccer Mom, Basketball Mom, Chess Club Mom, Girls on the Run Mom, Cub Scout Mom, Softball Mom, Tennis Mom, Garage Band Mom, Webkinz Mom, Illegal Consumption Mom, Christmas Pageant Mom, School Band Mom, Detention Again Mom---the list is endless. Even though I'm not looking for a new job, I'm sure my beefed up resume will so impress my supervisor that I'll be looking at a big raise soon.

Now, I'm not claiming that I was any good at being any of these kind of "mom's" but I tried to show up (well, not really all the time and I often brought a book, but that's another story), I made sure, with a whole lot of help from Mr. Wonderful, that the paperwork was done, the kids had rides, and the uniforms were clean. Mostly its been great for the kids and fun for us--but its a bit of hassle and work too. I'm not complaining--its part of the job of parenting--and I don't think you should get extra credit for it when running for political office--especially since I doubt the governor spent much time outside the hockey arena late at night, waiting for practice to get over to pick up her child or was constantly searching for ways to diminish the "hockey aroma" from the trunk of the car.

I know a lot of hockey moms and Sarah Palin wouldn't make the team around here.

I've been watching just a little bit of the news coverage of the Republican National Convention--well, actually, none of the convention, just the protester and police stuff, so far. It disturbs me.

In theory, I support protesting because I think its necessary. Obviously different levels of protesting have more or less effective and appropriate uses --letter writing, speaking out loud in public and private forums, directing money to groups that can protest on a larger more effective scale, art of any medium, and getting involved in processes to change whatever you're protesting. Where it gets a bit murkier for me is in the physical action phase---not so much marching or standing, carrying signs that respectfully but pointedly state a position, marching, or sitting down and refusing to move---but the dressing up, throwing things, dumping things, and destroying things just because they're in the way or belong to someone on the other side of the issue. And trying to hurt people is way beyond protesting and moving into vengeance, or some deeper issues.

The newscasts, I'm sure, are showing the more sensational of the protesting action--at least so far. They've shown the wild protesters being advanced upon by law enforcement and dragged off to presumable arrest. Unfortunately, the news has been so distracted by all that drama that the message of their protest was lost. And even more unfortunate is that the credible, thoughtful and mature --maybe not the right words (but I hope you know what I mean)--protest groups aren't getting the attention that would probably be more meaningful.

Maybe you should have to show you've been protesting for a certain length of time before your protest organization lets you show up for the big events. Put in your time so to speak.

In Red Wing, there have been a group of people protesting the war in Iraq since the start. They have protested in the park, by the highway every single Friday for the duration---and they are at the RNC to continue their protest---and it irks me that some protesters who haven't really thought it out are acting like idiots and diverting attention from the serious work some serious people have done to protest this war.

Back to that crabby middle-age again...

"christian radio"

I drive quite a bit for work and often listen to the radio while driving along. My car radio doesn't have great reception so the number of stations I can listen to is limited and it can get a little dull. Sometimes I push the scan button--(that's where it goes to each station it can get a signal from and stays there for 10 seconds so you can decide if you want to listen there)--and instead of picking a station, I just leave it on scan for the trip. Kind of like radio attention deficit disorder.

What really gets me going though is listening to "Christian" talk radio shows. The Christian is in quotation marks because that is what they call their radio programs and ideas but I call myself a Christian too--and let me tell you, we're not playing in the same ball park. I agree with Rob Bell, in his book, "Velvet Elvis" that the word Christian makes a bad adjective but a good noun (I don't have the book in front of me so hope I didn't mess that up too bad.).

On one radio program the the host and guest of the day talked about the people in the World Trade Center attacks that lived because of their specific prayers and faith. On another program a pastor told a caller that when people talk about tolerance in public settings they are really secretly promoting homosexuality. I've listened to numerous hosts and guests talk about how persecuted they and other Christians are for their faith--in the United States. And of course, there's only one true way, and lucky for you, you're listening to the people who can tell you all about it....

Why do I listen? Sometimes I hear something I like or agree with or find interesting in a good way. Often what I hear pushes me to keep thinking and working out the questions of faith that run through my mind, helping me to clarify my thoughts about such things. And as I usually argue out loud with what is being said, it keeps me awake while I'm driving.

weather

Sunday night and thinking about the weekend we just finished.

The weather was perfect for my fickle internal thermometer. The weather is always somewhat of a mild surprise to me--mainly because I rarely watch weather reports on TV or pay attention to them on the radio. This is one of those differences that define people--as in you either pay attention to weather reports or you don't much care.

I happened to marry a man who comes from a family of serious weather watchers. I might even say they're a bit obsessive about watching weather reports especially when it inclement weather is on the horizon. This then becomes an ongoing topic of conversation--and if the particular weather issue lasts for days, so does the conversation, in person or over the phone lines. I understand that the weather watching habit hearkens back to their roots in farming but.....

...it makes me crazy sometimes. If the weather's going to be lousy its going to be lousy whether I know about it ahead of time or not. If I'm going to get hurt in two days, I'd just as soon not spend the next 48 hours hearing the predictions about it, having someone track it and talk on and on about it. Let it catch me by surprise. My thoughts are similar about weather watching. A quick sentence or two is all I want to know--"rain all day tomorrow", "nothing but sunny skies tomorrow", "its going to snow for three days-have fun and drive carefully" or something like that.

I don't know why I'm complaining about this--probably because I'm a crabby middle-aged woman but I'd like you to remember that I did start out saying that the weather was perfect this weekend--so I'm not all crabby all the time.

loving my Ipod

My friends, for the most part, are not a very technically savvy group(except for some of the men) of people. Their interests lie in different areas and for the most part they don't care much about HDTV, plasma TV, taking pictures with their cell phones or using their computers-if they have one-for much more than email or looking a few things up on the Internet.

I'm pretty sure that if I wasn't married to Mr. Wonderful I'd still be debating the pros and cons of getting a cell phone--as I hate using the phone. As for computers, he's the one who makes sure we all have them, that they're all running, have all the right programs and all that stuff. He's always trying to teach me new computer stuff but I don't take direction well from him--is that every marriage or just me.

However, Mr. W and the little darlings gave me an IPod for Mother's Day and I gotta say, I'm loving it soooo much. Its full now with about 2000 songs, culled from the 3000plus on my ITunes site. Now I'm dreaming about getting a bigger IPod. Maybe for Christmas. In the meantime, I want everyone I know to get one. I'm beginning to feel a bit like an IPod evangelist even if I'm a little late to the streetcorner.

readin', writin' and revolvers??

Harrold Independent School District in Texas has 110 students and about 55 staff people. This district made the national news for their recent school board decision to allow school staff to carry concealed weapons at school. The rationale is that the school campus is near a busy highway and someone might come in and cause trouble and it would take law enforcement at least thirty minutes to get to the school campus.

The gun carrying staff will have to be certified by the State of Texas to carry a concealed weapon, receive some form of crisis or critical incident training, get specific permission from school officials and promise to use bullets that don't ricochet too much.

This seems like a really bad idea to me--in a lot of ways.

First of all, more guns equal more risk. Right now there are no guns in the school, so just bringing guns in increases the risk that someone will get hurt by one of them either intentionally or unintentionally--by a staff person or a student. For it to be useful in a school shooting situation it has to be fairly accessible which then of course makes it harder to secure.

Second is the whole idea of mixing guns with education. This, I admit, is probably more of a philosophical objection in that I've never used guns much and am not comfortable around them. For me, seeing a gun in the room is like seeing a rattlesnake on the living room floor ready to strike. I realize that a lot of people are a lot more comfortable around guns and have safely used them for legitimate activities.

My third objection is that I think that it asks teachers to do something that is not right to ask them to do. If one teacher decides to get a gun and another doesn't--do parents get to have their child moved from one class to the other depending on their thoughts about armed vs. unarmed teachers. Does marksmanship count in the administrations decision to let the teacher have the gun in school---it seems like it damn well better if they're going to be shooting in or around a room full of children.

Teachers are expected to teach academics, nurture social and emotional development, foster good citizenship, make sure every student has enough to eat, has school supplies and adequate clothing. They need to be able to detect abuse and neglect and report it. Teachers work with changing expectations from government and school boards and administrations and parents. While some argue that teachers are overpaid it isn't usually anyone who has known a teacher well and watched how hard they work (at least the good ones). I think expecting them to carry a gun and shoot the bad guys is going too far.

Vacation Recap

We, Mr. Wonderful, the little darlings and I, just returned from our week road trip from Minnesota, through Iowa, to Kansas City, then to St. Louis, back through Iowa and home again.

In Kansas City we cheered the Minnesota Twins on even though they lost to the KC Royals. We saw some people we know from Red Wing so that was extra fun--(hope you had a good trip home Don and Kac, Luke and Jessie?). We raced go-karts, played mini-golf--which my family likes but is some kind of mini-hell to me so I took pictures. We went to the Starlight Theater, which is a big outdoor theater at the KC Zoo and saw "Fiddler on the Roof"--the family was humoring me by going but ended up really enjoying it. A visit to the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library proved more fun than you can imagine (I'm not being facetious either-ask the little darlings). We found a couple of disk golf coursed so the kids could play and I enjoyed the museum about the people who crossed the frontier in wagon trains.

On to St. Louis where the first stop was the Arch. Man o' man, how did those guys who built it dare to be up that high. Pretty amazing. The film before the ride to the top was almost better than the trip up. We then toured the Anhueser Busch beer factory which was a little like being in Pleasantville--but a couple of people in our party enjoyed the free beer. A highlight of the trip was the St. Louis Art Museum--not because I'm so artistically minded--but because it's such a beautiful building in such a beautiful setting. Very impressive. The art was good too.

I didn't mean for this to turn into a travelogue but guess I got carried away. I'm already planning my next trip to both cities to do all the things I missed this time.
Hope my memory lasts that long.

the Mississippi Shuffle

Last night was spent doing the Mississippi Shuffle which is the Red Wing version of the American Cancer Society all-night walk to raise money for cancer research etc. Our team, Pretties in Pink, captained by Jen who was sadly home with some sort of intestinal bug, persevered without her. Red Wing's Baypoint Park, along the Mississippi was home to approximately 20 teams (I'm really bad at estimating so might be way off), at least 1000 luminaries, several campfires, tents, music, Native American drumming, fireworks and hundreds of walkers. Add in boats, a couple of barges and the Delta Queen-which is a massive paddle wheeler-it was a festive night.

But, as always, its the names on the bags of the luminaries, and the names of those in our hearts and minds, that we think about as we do our laps around park. There is no six degrees of separation with cancer.

What's in a name?

Doubt is good. There are so few things in life that I am 100% sure about and I'm always amazed when others present themselves as absolutely certain about their ideas. My dad gave me a book, maybe 15-20 years ago, called "The Myth of Certainty" by Daniel Taylor and I remember that I liked the book but what has really stuck with me is the title. It gave me "permission" in my Christian faith to be comfortable with the questions and doubts that kept pestering me-- without feeling disloyal or less faithful to God. What a relief. Having spent a lifetime in a more liberal arm of the Protestant church and two years at a Bible college, its possible that that information had been presented to me in some form before but with this book it finally sunk in.



So here I am, this many years later, still reminding myself that questioning is okay, uncertainty is normal and doubt is good.

Getting Ready to Go...

I spent a couple of hours tonight make plans and reservations for our family vacation. We leave on Saturday for a 5-7 day road trip. I love road trips--going alone, going with people--it doesn't matter-I love 'em all, as long as I get to sit in the front seat. On this trip, Mr. Wonderful (my husband) and I are taking our four kids along with us, although we had originally thought of taking a trip alone to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary. Finally we decided that we really wanted to take a trip with the little darlings (even the two that are in college and don't live here any more) so that's what we're going to do.

I hate to wish time away but I can hardly wait until Saturday morning and then as Willie sings so well, "On the road again..."

It was National Night Out here tonight (and across the nation I presume). In our neighborhood, thanks to some people who are much more organized than me, there was a progressive picnic starting at one end of the neighborhood for the main course and moving to the other end for dessert. The fire truck and ambulance came as well as city council representatives. Games and grab bags for the kids and gift certificates from local merchants added to the festivities.


But, of course, it was talking to the neighbors that made the night fun.


I know that not every neighborhood across the nation, or even in my town, participated in National Night Out, and I know that as a society we're more mobile and less likely to know our neighbors and that books like "Bowling Alone" (which I haven't read-but have read about-how's that for lazy) talk about how we are less engaged in our communities, but tonight between Third and Fourth St., from Cedar down to Dakota,

First time, kind of shy

Hello. This is my first time writing on a blog, well, not technically true if you count a one sentence response to a picture posted on another blog. Already lying in the first paragraph. Dang it.

Now I've got to make all kinds of important decisions about fonts, colors, size of type--never mind the topics and opinions.

I'm not a real stick to it kind of person so we'll see how long this lasts. Hopefully longer than any diet or exercise program I've tried.

Now that I've gone through a bunch of the fonts I think I've decided on "arial" as my favorite. No need to get fancy with the color or size.

I've been inspired to start a blog by several that I've been reading lately--"lutheran chik's L word diary", "a place called B.L.O.G.", "Time's Fool" and others.