a really great song

No, I'm not colorblind

I know the world is black and white

Try to keep an open mind

just can't sleep on this tonight

Stop this train

I wanna get off and go home again

I can't take the speed it's movin' in

I know I can't

But honestly

won't someone stop this train

Don't know how else to say it

don't wanna see my parents go

One generation's led the way

for findin' life out on my own

Stop this trainI wanna get off and go home again

I can't take the speed it's movin' in

I know I can't

But honestly

won't someone stop this train

So scared of gettin' older

I'm only good at being young

So I play the numbers game

to find a way to say that

life has just begun

Had a talk with my old man

said help me understand

He said turn 68

you renegotiate

Don't stop this train

Don't for a minute change the place you're in

Don't think I couldn't ever understand

I tried my hand

John , honestly we'll never stop this train

Once in awhile when it's good

it'll feel like it should

And they're all still around

and you're still safe and sound

And you don't miss a thing

till you cry when you're driving away in the dark

just singing

Stop this train

I wanna get off and go home again

I can't take the speed it's movin' in

I know I can't'

cuz now I see

I'll never stop this train

by John Mayer

Kissinger on Ford

"With Ford, what one saw was what one got. Providence smiled on Americans when -- seemingly by happenstance -- it brought forward a president who embodied our nation's deepest and simplest values.

The modern politician is less interested in being a hero than a superstar. Heroes walk alone; stars derive their status from approbation. Heroes are defined by inner values, stars by consensus. When a candidate's views are forged in focus groups and ratified by television anchorpersons, insecurity and superficiality become congenital. Radicalism replaces liberalism, and populism masquerades as conservatism."

From "Years of Renewal"

Christmas in Miami

Me and Grandfather. We weren't supposed to be there. The sign said hotel guests only,

but we walked in anyway and I wanted a picture. It was rainy in Miami this time and I decided I like a rain over the ocean better than sunshine.

merry decorating!

horray for visits!

whacha miss in life

Sitting at work when the President comes on TV and pardons a large white bird from his Thanksgiving death.

Me, loudly to the whole office: NO!!! Look at what the President is doing! What on earth!

Greg: He does that every year. Ever since I can remember, every president since Carter has done that.

Me: Really? Where have I been?

Greg: Probably in Idaho.

heard on tv, still on my mind

"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."
- John Lennon

Wednesday, at work, after deadline

http://www.linerider.org/

yup, this is what we did. try it. it's pretty amazing.

encounters at the polls

An older woman slowly walks out of the building with her “I voted" sticker prominently displayed on her wool coat and an expression on her face that suggests she may be upset with the entire political process.

Split seconds later, another woman tumbles out of the building towing children, coats, and sample ballots.

Then, a well-dressed man rushes straight past the women and children into the parking lot and to his car.

And I stand about 40-feet away with my note-pad, trying to make eye contact with those people and many others who kept trickling out of the schools turned into make-shift polls. Does that man look like he has a note-worthy opinion on the candidates and issues? Does she look like she would stop if I chased her through the massive school parking lot to ask who she voted for and why?

I feel uncertain and by the way, where, exactly, are the 40-feet lines surrounding the polls? The ones reporters aren't supposed to cross?

Okay. Deep breath. I just have to ask someone to talk. I pick at random.

Yes, there are some rejections.

But then, people agree and reveal snap-shots of their lives that bring them to the polls, be it for the Republicans or Democrats, passionately or reluctantly, for same-sex marriage or against it.

And I realize that I'm really having fun.

not an metropolis issue

A man may flee the computers of metropolis to Centreville where everyone will call him "Harry" - at least everyone who stays one speaking terms with him. Will he then find himself? No, the metropolitan millions serve only to confuse the issue.
The tragedy of alienation is not that so many people do not know me; it is that no one knows me, for I do not know myself. The terror of modern though does not spring from the addition of millions in mass population. It springs from the subtraction of One - the Lord my God.
True identity can never come from relations with men, for every relation is a role to be played. To multiply the roles is to fracture the facets of emptiness. To concentrate the roles seems more promising. The man with a few friends and one wife knows more personal involvement than the social butterfly. Yet such involvement cannot engage his whole person, and the man who seeks his identity in love to those nearest him falls into idolatry.
There is but one relation that can give identity to man, the relation to his Creator and Savior. God’s call gives a task that is more than a role, for it engages a man’s whole person in the service of his Lord.

An excerpt from "Called to the Ministry" by Edmund Clowney

thanks to a friend for pointing the passage out to me last week...

Happy Birthday Sarah Shipp!

I love you and miss you much dear friend! Happy Birthday!

Apple Harvest Fest.

Went to the Graves Mountain Apple Fest last weekend. Trees were thick with color. Apples were pretty good. Fun.

Captivation with toilet rendezvous

“I will remember you,” I heard a local radio personality sing under the toilet bowl this morning.

Well, sing as well as she could with her mouth under toilet water level (that's where they claimed it was anyway).

The Sarah Mclaughlin song, and the others she was singing, came out more like, “blirb, blirb, blerb, blerb, blerb, blurb” as several people called in to guess titles and artists and win tickets and pizza. She would take brakes for commercials and to flush the toilet to prove she was in the bathroom.

That was early on in my drive hour-long drive.

When I pulled into my office parking lot, I realized I was still tuned into the station listening to toilet songs. It's amazing what will keep me preoccupied.

the dangers of spitting

Some advise they gave folks back in the day.

To Idaho, Oct. 2006

Yes, I went home to Idaho last week and it was good. Even while I was driving from the airport through the hills with my family, I knew I wasn't going to be there long enough. And when I hugged them goodbye at the end if the week and they told me I was a "long lost sister" I was pretty sure I hadn't spent enough time.

Highlights of going home included going to Rachel's music class at the University of Idaho with her, celebrating Deborah's birthday, eating out for mom's birthday at Costco (yes, Costco), and going to church with my family. I also enjoyed spending time with my friends and cousins and taking a long walk down this honest-to-goodness dirt road that cuts through a field behind my parent's house.

Coeur d’ Alane Lake

I felt like I could stare at it the water and mountains

forever and not get enough looking in.

Looking towards Coeur d’ Alane, Idaho

The drive towards Coeur d’ Alane is one of my favorites in the whole world.

Happy Birthday Deborah!!

My sibblings

Rachel, David, me, Deborah, and Sharon in Coeur d’ Alane, Idaho. Home

On D.C. streets

On the way to church yesterday I saw a dark-haired little girl, no more than four-years-old, confidently marching the streets of D.C. with her nose high in the air and her little purse swinging.

At first I was worried because it looked like she was all alone but then I saw a man almost a whole block behind her who looked like her father, letting her march, but gently guiding her with his presence.

And then I thought she looked familiar.

A beautiful picture

Reston, Va., Sept. 28

Emu update

Fairfax County Police Department
News Release:
September 22, 2006

UPDATE
We are pleased to report that all three emus are safe and sound at home. The third emu returned home yesterday, September 21.

release can be found at www.fairfaxcounty.gov

Emus on the loose

Fairfax County Police Department
News Release: 06/261/1895/CSN/(1)
September 20, 2006

On Monday, September 18 at about 3 p.m., three emus escaped from a farm located near the 15000 block of Braddock Road. One emu found its way home while Animal Control captured a second in the 5300 block of Chandley Farm Circle. The third emu is still on the loose. The last sighting was at 8:30 a.m. today, near Kamputa Drive and Sully Park Drive.
Citizens are urged to pay close attention when driving near that area. The emu will most likely stay off the highway unless scared or cornered.

Anyone with information about the location of the emu is asked to call the Animal Shelter at 703-830-1100 or police non-emergency number at 703-691-2131.

release can be found at www.fairfaxcounty.gov

unworthy praise

Want to write about the depths of God's goodness in my life and am frustrated that I can't. Started to blog many times in the last few days and have ended up with nothing but wasted time.

Even spent two hours on a post last Saturday that is still in a Word Document and will probably end up in the Recycling Bin because it makes no sense. All I try to write comes out too simplistic and inadequate. I'm too deeply tired right now and know my thoughts are clouded by sin.

Typing words like, “a good summer is ending,” or, “good times of fun and growth with friends,” or, “there is Grace in loneliness,” doesn't cut it.

Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book! That they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock for ever! For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth.
~Job 19:23 – 25.

A Labor Day scene

Hysterical laugher unnoticed.

Boy runs around the corner and across the coffee shop with a bandit mask on his face and other boy squeals. Stuffed animals attack each other with vigor. Brrrrrrr. Arrrrrrrrr.

More giggling as the line moves on past the register and out into the world with coffee, yawns, blank stares, and slouched shoulders.

Just a stuffed animal for me, thanks.

Cash on songs

"I realize that generally songs don't say anything that songs weren't saying a hundred years ago; the difference is we are saying it in a different way."

~ Johnny Cash

Dear Rebekah,

I used to wish there was a gang of boys in the woods who would let me join them. Girls weren't any fun.

Through the lacy curtain framing my bedroom window, I looked across the street into the woods and wished it so hard that I got jealous because the boys were playing, solving mysteries, hunting, without me.

Over and over again, my jealousy would turn into loneliness and prayers, because it was all just wishes.

Then from somewhere across the hills came a quiet, red haired girl, and I found out for the first time that girls can be good friends.

And as the years rolled by, wishes turned into trips, talks, summer job, winter job, laughs, growth, and dreams come true.

The happiest of Birthdays to you, dear old friend.

Layla

From years to ashes

Most of the house I grew up in has blown away in the wind by now, I'm sure. At best, maybe some of its ashes are mixed in the soil.

They burned it a few years back cause it wasn't worth much.

Shouldn't care.

I hated it while we lived there. It was all we could to do keep the old, molding thing clean and the flies and weather from coming in through the window cracks. Paint wouldn't stick on the walls and parts of the floors were sinking into the basement.

But I do care. Some days like today, I get sad because I get the urge to go back and sit in front of the stove, or play the piano in the living room or to just stand in my bedroom and think for a bit and I know I can't.

But then again, what's in a house?

soothing dongs

I dropped my work bag in the kitchen and ran upstairs to put some jeans on before I rushed back out again.

And then over the sound of traffic, over the roars of the planes, I heard church bells from the church down the street.

They rang softly so I couldn’t tell what they were playing, but the ding dongs hushed my soul.

As I brushed my teeth and pulled my hair back, I thought of the scene in Heidi where the little girl goes running up the mountains into her grandfather’s loving arms while the church bells rang bellow, signaling the joys of love, redemption and friendship in their lives.

By the time I ran out the door and into my car, the bells had stopped ringing and all I could hear was the traffic and the roars of the planes, but my longing ears held on to the sounds, and in my ears the bells kept ringing through the night, and week.

Throw the dog a cone

So yesterday I started working here ( http://www.thedairygodmother.com/ ) a few hours a week and was surprised that I sold almost as many puppy pops (yes for dogs) as I did ice cream for people. One customer bought nine. Bow-wows have it real good ‘round here.

Church lingo foreign

Doing a couple of church-related stories this week reminded me again of just unaware Christians are that our lingo makes no sense to others without quite a bit of explanation.

I realized that if I really used words from direct quotes like "kid's crusade," "typical Lutheran minister," or "mission developer," most people wouldn't have a clue what I was writing about.

excerpt on dreams

Man dreams and desires; God broods and wills and quickens. When a man dreams his own dream, he is the sport of his dream; when Another gives it him, that Other is able to fulfil it.

~From the end of George MacDonald's Lilith

Wendy's voice not for real

For some random reason it hit me today that the really friendly guy at Wendy's drive through, the one that says “would you like a super sized combo” when people first drive up, the one that always sounds the same, the one that I always irritably shout “no thanks” to, is a recording.

A co-worker confirmed when I got back from lunch. Saying the line is probably not someone's 24/7 job, he pointed out. But he suggested I try shouting “are you real?” next time just to be sure.

On God's promises

Good sermon on Sunday about relying on God’s promises.

My notes:
Despite the fact that promises are often broken, we habitually build our lives around them. Civilization, in fact, rests on promises. It is a way for man to build the future. After every divorce, every betrayal, we wake up the next morning and rely on promises, again. This is because a longing to rely on promises is hardwired into this world by a God who is a promise maker. We must struggle to rely on His unfailing promises alone and not on promises of sin or of the tempter (like Adam and Eve did in Eden, during the fall).

God’s promises are kept by His grace and not by human effort - Consider Biblical example of Abraham. Abraham thought he would help God fulfil His promise to give him a son by sleeping with the servant Hagar. But it was through his barren wife Sarah that the promise was fulfilled.

God’s promises are not made to the deserving and they are not conditional - In the Bible God chose to fulfil His promise to a sinful human race by fulfilling His promises to a shepherd, slaves, murders and adulterers.

The fulfilment of God’s promises are personal - The measure of God’s love for us is not us getting what we want. The best gifts is the gift of Himself and all that leads us to Him because that is all we need.

So why do we suffer and persevere on this earth? - Because God wants us to re-orient on lives to a hope that will not disappoint. He leaves us here so He can grow in us a longing for a better country. Doubt God’s goodness, wisdom in ordering your life? Look to the promise kept through the cross. There is no better promise maker and no other promise keeper besides God.

~ Sermon by Michael Lawrence. The last in a series called Biblical Theology.

Bye to friends

Me, Sarah, Nora, and Lauren, soon to be in Va., Scotland and TX, respectively. Laters dear, constant, friends.

jars concert

Went to see Jars of Clay at the Birchmere (http://www.birchmere.com/) last night. Good. Currently listening, over and over, and over, to their song Hiding Place...

Lord, guide my wandering feet, Draw me to Thy mercy seat, I've nought to trust but sovereign grace, Thou only art my hiding place

Opening for the Jars were Christopher Williams, ( www.christopherw.com) and Judd and Maggie ( www.crosswalk.com/fun/music/1382872.html).

And on a site note, the Birchmere is just down the street from Pentagon City and a really great place, I found out. Amazing how you can miss what's in your own backyard.

bITS oF LiFe in the last few days

I stepped of the edge of a cliff up here but I was in a harness and hooked to a rope so that’s why I’m still alive. Anyway, I’ve never been up to Raven’s Rock during a sunset and a storm. It was so pretty. Thanks Maleeka and Aaron.

Read at the coffee shop.

Went to Pennsylvania to visit Beth.

Finished my Varmint hunting story. Found out that in Fairfax County, it usually consists of trapping critters alive and taking them to the animal shelter to be put to sleep.

Read at the coffee shop.

All the Shipps from Herndon left for Scotland.

Read at the coffee shop.

Happy 23rd Rachel

Lots of good memories happen when people are sisters for 23 years.

I stole, put needles in sand boxes, and lied my way into trouble during our one and only year of school in Brazil while you were just sweet you and won your way into everyone’s hearts.

When we first flew up from Brazil we thought that all of American was Disney Land, thanks to kind folks who paid for us to spend a few days in there before we drove to Idaho. You didn’t like the Pirates of the Caribbean ride.

We were chopping wood. I told you to hold a log while I swung the ax, missed and chopped your finger.

Practicing for hours, and hours, and hours on songs we were singing for church because you wouldn’t perform them unless they were perfect.

Getting you to loose your temper because I thought you were fun when you did.

Watching you elegantly and bravely play your nose flute for church, with your snot dripping. Everyone was so intrigued.

You carving up a squash to make a musical instrument out of it.

Writing scripts for you to use when you called people because you didn’t like to talk on the phone.

The day you told Dennis Dean and Rebekah that you wanted to try to grow a mustache, just to see if you could do it, and really meant it.

I caught my sweatshirt on fire, screamed, ran through the hall and jumped with all my clothes on into a full bathtub. You ran in to see what was wrong, laughed, ran out for the camera and took a picture.

The first day you tried to put gas in a car. You couldn’t get it to come out of the nozzle, so you looked down the nozzle to see what the problem was and pulled the "trigger." It worked, all over your face.

Whenever people were gathered around you, they were laughing.

The yearnings of three sweatshirts

Every morning I open my drawers, reluctantly pull out my summer shirts, and leave my sweatshirts alone in a stuffy drawer for a few more hot summer weeks.

It's really hard to leave them there because I know they really want to be in front of a television and fireplace with hot coffee, or passing over crunchy leaves in red, orange and yellow worlds, or getting moist with snow flakes.

My brown Oregon Trail sweatshirt remembers driving across the country in the winter time a couple of years ago and my dark blue Patrick Henry College sweatshirt wants to try that this year. Oregon Trail wants to go Shenandoah National Park for a weekend and also to Idaho. My gray Patrick Henry College sweatshirt is new to the drawer and so it can't wait to meet a ton of new sweatshirts and sweaters. Maybe it will organize a bonfire when it gets out.

But as long all of them can get out to enjoy crisp cold air creeping between their threads and hang out with other awesome sweatshirts, they will be thankful. Just a few more weeks.

Random song phrases

This is some of what I heard at the coffee shop during live music tonight...

Open the window to the world. You needn’t be so scared.

It’s a brand new low but that’s where you like to go. Would you ever hold a candle that was real? And the answer is no and that’s just the way it goes. You didn’t even care to ask me how I feel.

Everybody is down on me but the baldheaded woman. In her summer dress she dances with the trees.

I’m paining pictures of her from the opposite side of the road and she is painting pictures of me from the opposite of the road.

My train is coming around the bend, I think that’s what I heard. It could be her best friend, but I think that’s what I heard.

In the candy store you got your hands in all the drawers...

Singer/writer was Tim Parks, http://www.myspace.com/parkstim.

Cannery Row and incapable goodness

In John Steinbeck’s novel, Cannery Row lives Mack, a man who fulfils his needs and desires by taking advantage of people. Steinbeck calls him an "exploiter." Le Chong, the local grocer, "stiffened ever so slightly when Mack came in (p.13)." Doc "waited for the storm to break" when Mack came in to talk with him.
But yet the man cared about people in his way. He knew that despite Doc’s friendliness, he "was a lonely and a set-apart man (17)." Mack felt Doc’s plight so deeply that he himself would get a "dreadful feeling of loneliness" because of it and Mack and friends decided to throw Doc a surprise party. They planed to get the money for it by getting Doc to pay for frogs they gathered for him. Doc was a scientist and liked frogs.
Getting party supplies by promising in return what they couldn’t deliver, the friends finally threw Doc a party, but without him because they couldn’t wait to have one sip, and then another. And that’s when Doc’s party got out of control and his laboratory was destroyed and everyone in the town was not surprised because Mack could never do anything good. And when Doc got back, he beat Mack up and Mack was in "black despair (p.23)."

Whether or not he intended to, I think Steinbeck did a good job of using Mack's character to capture the struggle of incapably sinful humanity longing to do good because a perfectly good God made them in His image.

59 arrested for trying to drag race Sun. morn.

Fairfax County Police Department
News Release 06/197/0161/SB(7)
July 18, 2006

Police Intercept Street Racing Crowd

More than 50 people were arrested early Sunday morning after officers intercepted a crowd setting up to street race. Police were called to the Fairfax County Energy Resource Recovery Facility, located at 9850 Furnace Road in the Lorton area, around 1:45 a.m. on July 16. They observed numerous vehicles on the facility’s property setting their cars up to drag race. Officers acted quickly and blocked the vehicles in before the races began. Officers charged 59 adults and two juveniles with trespassing on private property.
Press release can be found at :http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/police/reports/Reports%202006/071806trespass.htm
___________

I've wondered if it is possible to do this around here.

a weekend with Charity Joy

Some of my best and earliest memories include a little girl who lived near me. She wore frilly dresses, carried around a block of old lace called "whacey," and called me "whywha."

Some of my best and most recent memories are of that same girl, this time all grown up and on her way to Indianapolis to finish her last year of college. En route to Indy from Idaho ( sorta), my cousin Charity stopped in D.C. and got to spend a day with me last weekend. We had fun and it was so good to see her.

home, just 'cause I miss it

what dawn looks like over the Palouse in the summer time
dusk
Photos courtesy of: http://www.travelimages.com/photoessaypalouse.html

Isaiah 30: 15 – 18

For thus saith the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel; In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength: and ye would not.
But ye said, No; for we will flee upon horses; therefore shall ye flee: and, We will ride upon the swift; therefore shall they that pursue you be swift.
One thousand shall flee at the rebuke of one; at the rebuke of five shall ye flee: till ye be left as a beacon upon the top of a mountain, and as an ensign on an hill.
And therefore will the Lord wait, that he may be gracious unto you, and therefore will he be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you: for the Lord is a God of judgment: blessed are all they that wait for him.
For the people shall dwell in Zion at Jerusalem: thou shalt weep no more: he will be very gracious unto thee at the voice of thy cry; when he shall hear it, he will answer thee.

The woes of apparels

I hate dressing up. I like looking nice, but I don't have the patience to spend any real time getting dressed and I paid for it this morning when I got to work and realized, by looking at my reflection in our building's glass doors, that somehow the bottom layer of my summer dress got about six inches longer than the top layer. It must have happened before I left home somehow but I didn't spend a lot of time in front of the mirror this morning.
Regardless of how and when, a black cheap material was drifting unevenly at the bottom of my fun polka dotted black dress, making me look really stupid. My first impulse was to turn around and drive the 45 min. back home to change. But I made myself dash for the bathroom where I tried to rationalize my unique outfit. That didn't work. Scissors, I thought. They are on my desk. I snuck out of the bathroom and tried to reach my desk through the back door, but it was still locked. I gracefully walked through the front part of the office, and in front of my editors' and co-workers' desks, thankful that only three of them were in the office and their eyes were on their computers.
Too composed, I set my bag down, grabbed my red and silver scissors and walked out of the editorial department back into the bathroom. I should have explained to the co-worker in the bathroom who saw me carry in the scissors. She said, “Good morning?” like she wanted to make sure I was okay. I didn't though. Before she could look my outfit over, I smiled at her, said that I was glad it was Tuesday and got myself and the scissors behind stall doors. Blocks of the unwanted material came off and went into the bathroom trash with the scissors.

Delight in fields of any color

If this day was a million years ago, when I was little, I would be probably be outside in a garden, watering, covering, weeding.
I would be surrounded by wheat fields that were turning gold, moving in gentle waves with the wind.
The grownups would be planning what to preserve for the next winter and getting the combines ready to sweep the fields clean of their gold.
And I would be longing to leave, to get away from the dust and heat to play in new places, and to do something that matters.
Vegetables, fruits, wheat weren't fun and didn't matter.
Well, I left and this day is now. I'm at my desk, with maps to look at on the wall, and fields of tree tops and building tops outside my windows.
Feel restless because I haven't found anything “that matters” to write about today, or yesterday, or the day before, but I'm trying to remember that just because I'm called by God to be here today, there is joy and purpose, and it is wonderful.

I love these verses:

Here is what I have seen: It is good and fitting for one to eat and drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labor in which he toils under the sun all the days of his life which God gives him; for it is his heritage.
As for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth, and given him power to eat of it, to receive his heritage and rejoice in his labor--this is the gift of God.
For he will not dwell unduly on the days of his life, because God keeps him busy with the joy of his heart.

Ecclesiastes 5: 18 – 20

if ya can't get west

Check out Highland County, Va.( http://www.highlandcounty.org/ ). It's rough and the next best thing to being in the Rockies, according to someone who knows. A visit is on my want-to-do list.

Shut eye

If I could write a song right now, it would be about me, Mary Sue.

Laughing, smiling, dreaming Mary Sue, not really hearing him, her, you.
You need a star, a blink in the dark of your earth.
And she knows but she just sleeps in the park, under trees, in the flowers.
Not even clouds paint your dark sky, you're awake with no mirth.
You call, she answers, and when you talk, she just nods.
But the burdens she’s called to bear for His sake are still with you, in the dark.
And you’re blind while she sleeps and reads in the sun, in the park.
When you needed a star, a blink in the night to give hope, light the way.

When hindus aren't hindus

So I called a number today that was supposed to get me to a Mr. Hindu-who-can-speak-a-little-English. I wanted to get comments on how area Hindus spend the 4th of July and I didn't have much luck communicating with the priests at the local temple.
“Hello?” I said in very clear, loud English. "I'm Layla from The Centreville Times and I'm doing a story on how the Hindu community celebrates the 4th of July.”
“I have no idea,” the man said.
“Don't you have fireworks in your temple parking lot or prayer?” I asked him.
“No.”
“Aren't you a member or a priest at the temple?”
“Who are you trying to call?”
Wrong number. Poor, confused, English-speaking man.

Bonding through sewage

The poop squad

"Smile," said Heather, Kristin’s cousin. "It’s the poop squad," said Logan, Bridger’s brother, as she snapped the picture.
We huddled on the front porch of our house for a picture Sunday night after we finished sloshing through 2 and a half feet of sewer and rain that rushed in our basement, trying to save our stuff.
Sunday night started off with an ice cream party with Bridger, Logan, Kristin’s aunt Carol Sue, Heather and her baby but by the time the early hours of Monday rolled around, 6 to 8 inches had plummeted the Washington D.C. area and our basement was flooded.

Bailing before we realized it was no use

Thanks to our guests who pitched in to help, we saved a lot of our stuff. Sorry we couldn’t have gotten to know you better in a cleaner way.
Josh C., who lives about 3 miles away, navigated traffic and floods for a long while to help and risked electrocution to make sure we had a working refrigerator. He says now we are sewage "brothers." We owe you.
Thanks to Jenn D. who tried to get to us from north Arlington that night but couldn’t make it because of all the roads that were shut down and flooding, and to you and Jess for sacrificing your time and hygiene to help us clean up the next day.

The spoil

Christina, thanks for checking on us. Appreciate offers of help from Justin, Ken, and Kristen S. even though you knew what that may mean. Brian, with the rain still coming down, the house still smelling, and no AC, it was a huge blessing to have dinner ordered for us tonight. And Mom, I’m sorry I laughed at the helicopter rescue comment you made after I first told you about the flooding. Girls, good times. The Lord is faithful.

Um, I know this is a wedding passage, but it’s what I thought of tonight...
Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up the other; but woe to one who is alone and falls and does not have another to help. Again, if two lie together, they keep warm; but how can one keep warm alone? And though one might prevail against another, two will withstand one. A threefold cord is not quickly broken (Eccl 4:9-12).

Five Mile Creek

Wow! I stumbled across this link today (http://www.fivemilecreek.net/) and it brought so many childhood memories of staring at the television. For a long while before I started high school (okay, maybe after I started high school too), I rented these from White Pine Video Store and watched them every chance I got. A great, fun series about the old Australian outback.

I wanted to marry Con Madigan (above). :)

a cold blast from the past?

http://www.kentucky.com/mld/kentucky/news/world/14851396.htm

bITS oF LiFe in the last few days

Me: Hello?
Kristin: Where are you?
Me: At home. Where are you?
Kristin: Driving home but I just sprained my ankle, passed out and had a seizure.
(She's limping, but okay. Apparently, it's all normal).

I wrote a story about Beaver dams in Fairfax County but spelled damns throughout my whole story. I do love copy editors.

In the Kitchen. Heard a lot of screaming. Realized that was my roommates outside and not the neighbor kids.
What followed was a water fight between Katie J. and Rebekah that started with a very wet Rebekah and an escaping Katie J.
It continued with Rebekah cackling like a chicken, and ended with a wet Katie J. and kitchen floor.

Found out from Bobby and Edward that Cederville students set large rocks on fire, and tied male engaged persons to stop signs and threw rotten food on them and then made their female counter parts kiss them.

Ran down the road with Katie D. and Catherine at a very slow pace one morning. Felt very, very sick. Told them to go on without me while I lay flat on my back on the sidewalk and tried to concentrate on the beautiful blue sky above. Some people walked by but I didn't look at them.

I set up an e-mail account for my mom a few months ago, gave her the user name and password and sometimes send exclusive things and tell her about them to motivate her to figure out how to check it.
Here is a conversation I had with Mom over the phone while I was helping her out by buying a ticket for my sister online (which turned out to be a two-day-process).
Mom: Why don't you send me the thing and I'll just do it.
Me: What thing?
Mom: The thing so I can look up the things.
Me: No Momma. You wouldn't be able to figure out how.
Mom: Yes I would. I can do it. Just send me the thing for it.
Me: You don't even know how to check your e-mail.
Mom: I don't have e-mail.

stuff

Last week had some friends over for a Brazilian dinner which was fun, played a very little volleyball, worked, think I figured out to go home in September which is too long away. This week want to check out a Songwriters Association of Washington open mike in Alexandria. Will probably have to cover planning commission hearings Thursday and that won’t be fun because land zoning language is still foreign to me. Watching Radio right now. It's really good, I think.

an emotional and rational gospel

Here is a question I have been pondering.

What are some good ways to communicate the emotionalism of the gospel to the intellectual and the rationality of the gospel to the emotional?

Caused by small group discussion on Tell the Truth: The Whole Gospel to the Whole Person by Whole People, by Will Metzger.

how we get some of our furniture

Sunday night after church, Kristin saw this

Half a mile later....

Chesterton on Courage

Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. 'He that will lose his life, the same shall save it,' is not a piece of mysticism for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide -- or a drill-book.
This paradox is the whole principle of courage even of quite earthly or quite brutal courage. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier, surrounded by enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely cling to life, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a suicide, and will not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine.
No philosopher, I fancy, has ever expressed this romantic riddle with adequate lucidity, and I certainly have not done so. But Christianity has done more: it has marked the limits of it in the awful graves of the suicide and the hero, showing the distance between him who dies for the sake of living and him who dies for the sake of dying.

G.K. Chesterton

green peas and world cup

Though born in Brazil, I always think of myself as an American. But, I admit I do feel a conflict of nationalities during World Cups.
I'm afraid I lean towards Brazil, actually, mainly because of the memories I have of my biological father Sebastian, a good Brazilian soccer player.
He passed away when I was 4 but I remember him watching soccer a lot while screaming loudly at the TV, playing soccer in the hall with him (sometimes he would forget I was there and just bounce the ball against the walls), and him teaching me how to play the game with the green peas on my plate.
Papa turned down an officer to play pro because of heart problems he developed in his late teens.
The Lord called him to be a pastor instead but the passion for soccer never left him and memories of playing soccer with him never left me.

http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com/06/en/w/schedule.html

Congratulations Stephen Shipp!

The University of St. Andrews in Scotland

WWII meets local middle school

I went to cover a World War II oral history day at a local middle school today. The day's theme: The last generation of World War II meets the latest generation. The school invited over 50 veterans and civilians who experienced that war to come and answer questions for the students about their lives.
The students sat around their guests in clusters and heard stories about a little boy who's father was a Japanese spy for the Allies , a Danish town dumping their chamber pots from their roof tops on the German invaders marching bellow, and about the hundreds of prisoners who endured hell on Japanese war ships....
It was a priceless to watch those kids start to grasp what all those awesome people sacrificed for them to be free.
Also sobering to think they will be some of the last kids to hear about those sacrifices first hand.

Happy Birthday Katie J!

a multi-destination camping trip

Kristin on the front porch of Great Country Farms, on the way to the campground.

We want rocking chairs like that for our porch.

Even though I was exhausted, I couldn’t help smiling when I woke up sometime in the earliest hours of Memorial Day and saw Kristin in a sleeping bag in the Clay’s front yard in the middle of Purcellville. This is how she got there. We both had Monday off so we decided to go camping near Berryville."How many of you are there?," the man at the entrance of Watermelon Park asked Sunday afternoon as we drove up."Just two," I said."That will be twenty bucks," he said. I gave him the money and Kristin and I got back into her car and drove into the camp, with tent, food and sleeping bags."This is awesome," we kept saying to each other as we drove through the camp past West Virginians grilling out in front of their tents and RVs. It felt so good to be out of the city.We parked, ate, and spent some time wading in the river.

Me in front of our tent

We agreed to find a safe spot for our tent and after a drive to Berryville for gas, we set it up next to a couple’s big pick-up truck.It was just getting dark and the people a few yards away from us were playing Johnny Cash’s "Hurt" and then a "Boy Named Sue" and a few other Cash songs."They could be playing any kind of music," Kristin said. "How lucky are we that they’re playing our kind?"It was pretty cool. Ate a little and then just laid in front of our tent for a few hours.The stars were amazingly beautiful. Some people across the way were listening to NASCAR racing.The Johnny Cash group had more people join them and they started playing live Banjo music. Pretty good sounds but we were both tired, so at 10:30ish, we crawled into the tent, hoping the music would be turned off at midnight, like the rules posted at the entrance said it should be, so we could sleep.

"Layla?" Kristin said at 12:30ish and few really loud songs later that had by then turned into music from some CD. "Yeah," I said. I was pretty annoyed."I think I know why the demographics changed," Kristin said. A lot of the Mexican families who were around earlier in the day had left. "The songs they are playing are all white supremacist songs," she said. I was too frustrated to be listening to the words. "Really?" I said. "Yeah. They’re pretty bad," she said."Should we go find somewhere else to sleep?" I asked. "Yeah," she said. "And let’s try to get out of here without being noticed."The tent came down pretty fast and we drove off. On the way out, we stopped and got our twenty bucks back.And that’s how we ended up at the Clays. We talked about parking the car at PHC and sleeping there, but agreed it would be too complicated to explain to the security guards. We drove to the Clay’s, parked in front of their house and fell asleep in the car. No, we didn't actually pitch the tent in their yard. Sometime in the middle of the night, I heard Kristin move from the passenger’s seat to the back seat with her sleeping bag. And then she was out on their lawn. "Did you sleep?" I asked her during breakfast at a little restaurant in town. "Yeah, I slept." "I did too,"I said.

The view from the rocks on the overlook above Harpers Ferry. Beautiful.

We spent the rest of the day playing in Harpers Ferry and listening to good music in the car before coming home to a barbeque party."I should call Mrs. Clay and tell her I slept in the yard before she gets a call from some neighbor telling her she had a body in her front yard this morning," Kristin said before we left Harpers Ferry.

Hangin' on for dear life.

And that was our camping trip. Good times.

yumm

We pulled of the side of the road near Harpers Ferry to get these shots. Just down the way, there is a little stand where these and more goodies are sold.

On lives lived and lost

It's hard to fully express how writing about several deaths and covering three funerals recently has me reflecting on life in away I’ve never done before.
I was struck by what others remember about those gone. Not their awards or accomplishments, but how they treated family, friends and community, and their faith in God.
That is the victory in their deaths and in the stories told after they were gone.
I was so inspired of praises spoken of the police officer who gave his life for his fellow officers, of the veteran suffering from cancer who took a big health risk to help others reconcile with their past, of a detective who was known for freely sharing Christ with her co-workers, of a faithful father, husband, mother, friend.
All this in mind, I was blessed on Sunday when a pastor at my church preached on Psalm 116, opening with the question, how does humanity respond to sorrow and calamity?
The Christian should be devoted to Christ in good times or in bad. It means to be grateful for the goodness He has provided us by drawing us to Himself and saving us from sin, and to proclaim that goodness to others, the pastor said. That is our calling and that is the victory in a life.
"The cords of death entangle me, the anguish of the grave came upon me, I was overcome by trouble and sorrow. Then I called on the name of the Lord.. For you, O Lord, have delivered my soul death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling.....How can I repay the Lord for all his goodness to me? I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord. I will fulfill my vows to the Lord in the presence of all his people. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints," the Psalm reads.
I know these concepts are nothing new to most believers and nothing I haven’t heard before, but something about listening to these people’s stories has challenged me.
Love thy Lord thy God with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself, is a passage that has been going through my mind.

Just a cute pic

(From l to r) Cousin Anna, sisters Deborah and Sharon

Photo courtesy of Ami's site

A David conversation

A fun part of my week was talking with my little brother David, 13, on the phone about books, which we both love.
What he picks up from the same books I read fascinates me. Numbers and details.
He told me the winter was long for the folks in "The Little House in the Prairie" series because it was long every 21 years back then, and he told me Laura was first attracted to Almanzo because of his horses, which were X kind of horses and could pull X amount of pounds individually and X amount of pounds as a team.
But then, this is the guy who includes about as many numbers in his sentences as words and a conversation with him usually means listening to him calculate something out loud.
And this is me, who just remembers that they fell in love in this book and they hated in this book and these people fought and killed in this book. Don’t ask me about the details.

fairfax co. shooting

Writing about a kid who went on a shooting rampage, killed one police officer, a mother of two, and injured two others outside a police station in Chantilly, Va.
I find myself loosing sight of the community and family, which has suffered a traggic loss, as I try to beat out bigger media outlets with my stories.
For better or worse from a hard-core journalism perspective, I don't like the feeling.

culinary doings

It’s a Saturday afternoon. Katie J. is grilling a cheese sandwich. I’m making myself a salad. I walk by her sandwich on the stove and notice that it’s burning. I tell her and she runs to rescue it. I make fun of her cooking abilities and then try to lighten my teasing by telling her I’m just as bad. But I’m not, I think to myself. I finish my salad and put dressing on it. I take a huge bite, full of dressing, and feel like I’m going to die. What’s wrong, Katie asks me. I can’t talk because my mouth is burning too much. Did you put something hot on it? Drink milk she says. I drink the milk but my lips are still on fire. I look at what I put on my salad. A blend of hot peppers, salts and vinegar. I’m holding a cold, wet dish rag to my lips as Katie rinses my salad free of the stuff. She laughs and I laugh and she says aren’t we a pair in the kitchen. We sit at the table to eat and have a good conversation about life.

Miami, May 2006

I love angry skies over the ocean too. It was windy that day and the water was rough. Beautiful.

Spring, 2006, entry one

I've blogged a lot about memories lately.
So here's one for the here and now.
Had a good visit in Miami and got sun but glad to be back too. Missed church.
Finished reading Angela's Ashes, which was very well written and profound, I think.
It's a prize winning biography about Irish boy with very tough life. Made me grateful for my parents and scared to be one. Warning: Book is rather crude.
Busy with work but I like it. Having fun.
This week covering a story about someone tearing down beaver dams, which are actually supposed to be good for the water quality in an area because dams filter water.
National Air and Space Museum in Chantilly is having space day tomorrow and I'm going.
Giving three piano lessons this weekend, going to a wedding shower, and then to a party at a friend's house.
Feel like Spring has officially started and am looking forward to fun in good weather.
Hopefully can get outside too.
Maybe the girls will want to play volleyball tonight.

a throwback in songs

Songs bring memories. That's part of what music is supposed to do, I think.
But you know when, for some reason, a song brings back just one, crystal clear memory every single time you hear it?
That's what I was thinking about this morning as I drove into work listening to

“Hold me Jesus, 'cause I'm shakin' like a leaf, you have been King of my glory, won't you be my Prince of Peace?
Memory? Sarah Shipp listening to it on her laptop during our first semester at school while we studied.

And then I started thinking of other memories like

“My Jesus, My Savior, Lord there is none like you...”
Practicing in front of our piano to sing the song in church with my sisters.

“How do you like me now? Now that I'm on my way?”
Driving around in the mountains of Hamilton, Montana with Rebeckah Ownbey.

“Remember when we said when we turned gray?When the children grow up and move away?We won't be sad, we'll be gladFor all the life we've had. And we'll remember when?"
Texas road trip with the Shipps, the Brownfields, David Snyder and Zach Martin. Zach told us about the mule he got when he was little (or was it a donkey?) and said he liked this song.

“Could I spare some change for gas? I need to get myself away from this place."I said yep what a conceptI could use a little fuel myselfAnd we could all use a little change...”
Katie Thornton, Beth Long, and very loud music and bass in Beth's car.

“Jesus I My Cross Have Taken, all to leave and follow Thee...”
Coming back from Lancaster, Pa. with Kristin Henderson and Christina Thornton.

My cousin Nathan

What on earth?!! To think it all started with you and Josh blowing up frogs in the pasture.... ;-P