Kathryn asked me to help her with a school project. I had to cut out a bunch of whales. I named it. Can you guess? (I gave you a hint)


















It's an "iPod." Get it?

first week of classes

As expected I hit the ground running. I've got four classes this term: Liturgical Music 2, Gospel of Matthew, Church History 3, and Preaching C. So far so good. It looks like the academic workload will be more managable than last term. So far my favorite class is Matthew, with History in a very close second. More on that later.

In other news, the ODCC can now be called the CDCC -- "Closed Door Community Church." I've been in touch with Pastor Bob to start the closure process of my study. My six months is nearly up. I just spoke with Bob and he's gone to AK to the home church.

The growth he anticipated was happening at an impressive rate. Last fall when I began, he had 15 members. As of two weeks ago when I was there last, there were 25. Bob had expected 30-35 by September. There were more and different people joining every week it seemed. They were a spirited group and I enjoyed praying and talking with them.

The church had to make some modifications in order to stay within budget. They left their store-front operation to become a home church, in what I consider a successful (and smart) move. The different venue gave the worship a whole different feel and intimacy that the rented space simply didn't have.

Bob said Sunday attendance was beginning to wane, but didn't speculate why. The Friday evening Bible Study that I began in December was a big success and continued beyond Christmas. It may in fact continue in an "unofficial" capacity as a Friday night get-together kind of thing. I asked each of them on one Sunday who God was to them and I got a wide wange of answers. Common to them all, though, was that God was part of their fellowship at the ODCC. They really enjoyed their weekly meetings. I don't understand why the numbers dropped so dramatically.

Bob said he'd been asked to join the community in AK at least twice before, but wasn't able to go. He seems to have found a niche for himself. He got a job that starts right away, found an apartment that he'll move into this weekend, and most of all, he's a pastoral assistant for the Sherwood ODCC. His voice was strained on the phone when we talked, and he sounded like the transition was, and continues to be, difficult. But he also sounded like he finaly made it to the place where he feels the most fulfilled.

So the Open Door Community Church is over for me, but the experience was good overall. Please send up a prayer for Pastor Bob if you would, that he continues to find spiritual fulfillment in the healing embrace of God's love.

back to the airport

"...I'm leaving, on a jet plane,
Don't know when I'll be back again..."

saturday

Last night as I was typing my last entry, my sister was making popcorn and preparing to watch the latest Harry Potter movie. She was so excited to watch it. I was a little huried with my entry. Trish is a huge fan of the Potter series, and she's also so excited that I'm home for a few days, I didn't spend much time editing. I've since made some adjustments.

Today we had breakfast with another sister, Claudia, and her oldest son Will. He told me about a party he went to last night where there was underage drinking involved, but he said he didn't partake. Good boy. That's my Will. He's a smart kid. I'm proud of him.

Trish and I went to our favorite mall for a few hours where I tried to find a Bruins team jersey. Maybe if they'd just win something there'd be more swag to buy. Ah well, this is what happens when you cheer the underdogs.

I made plans with another student to share a ride back to the Block from Midway. I tried to call and confrm, but could only leave a message. If it works out I have to host the cocktail party Sunday night in return. Being the team player that I am, I'll do it. At the Flower Show Friday, Trish, Claudia and I met a wine vendor who gave us a brief tour of their selecions. All we had to do was buy one case and we'd be in the club. If I was still living in this area I would have jumped on it. As it was, I almost got the Sisters to go in on a case. But they just don't enjoy wines like I do. Life is too short to drink bad wine, as they say. Every time I come home I try to get my family to try something new. It doesn't always work, but that's okay. They got to try some realy nice wines, and even if they didn't buy any, that's okay with me. All I could think about was how fun it would be to host cocktail hour with something new. Like the Bruins team jersey, the case of wine was not to be. I bet I can find something to our liking at the duty-free when I get back to Midway.

holy mackerel!

... well bluefish actually.

I made it back to Boston yesterday in time for dinner with my sister and brother at Legal Seafood. Legal's is a Boston favorite for the edification of my mid-west friends. They had bluefish on the menu. Blues are one of my most favoritest fish. It was a good day when God creatd the creatures of the sea, and an even better one when the blues were reeled in. Oh baby. The waiter asked me if I'd ever had this kind of fish before. He said that it's not something first-timers like very much. Let me tell you a story.

Once upon a time there was a little girl who lived on a hill in Maine. Her next door neighbor had a boat named the "Cardsense." Don't ask her how she remembers the name, she just does. Al, the neighbor, would get up early on some summer mornings, go down to the dock, fuel up the Cardsense, and head out past Boone Island Light to the place there the Bluefish ran.

"They're related to sharks," he would tell us as he baited the water with chum. "Hopefully the blues are running today." Al revealed with a quite pride, a length of line with several hooks sheathed in colourful plastic to attract fish. Carefully he fixed pieces of bait on each hook. As he cast the line out I think he said a little prayer for luck; for blues and not for sharks.

In no time at all the water around the boat swarmed with fish. "Bluefish?" I asked Al, never having seen one before. He began to reel in the line. The rod bent nearly in half and I was sure it was about to snap. Al strained and pulled and fought until finally our catch was in sight. "Sharks," he said grimly. Al reached out and grabbed two things. He pulled over a small baseball bat from his son's little league equipment, and his fillet knife. "What's the bat for?" I asked. He said if one of the sharks jumped into the boat he'd use the bat and club it to death. "And the knife?" "That's if they don't jump in the boat."

I looked over the side of the boat and sure enough every hook on Al's favorite line had a shark attached to it. Dorsal fins poked out of the water all around the boat. All the chum was gone; not even a trace of the blood stained the water. Al surveyed the situation. He dropped the bat and reached for the knife. He closed his eyes and turned away as he held out the knife to cut away the hook end of his line. The sharks would have to release themselves somehow.

Al made his way to the wheel and we sped away to find the blues elsewhere.

I don't remember the rest of the day on the water, but if I may be allowed to fast forward, I'll tell you about dinner that night.

Al is a pharmacist and he still wears his class rng on the pinky finger of his rght hand. It's gold with a red cabochon, and it glistened with the water from cleaning the bluefish. The fish had to be over a meter long and weighed 8-10 pounds. Al brought out the same fillet knife he used to cut his special line and sliced into the belly of our dinner. He wielded the knife like a surgeon with his pinky fingeruplifted. He turned over the fillet and placed it onto a sheet of tin foil. He added a little barbecue sauce, folded the foil, and brought it to the grill. In very short time we had the most amazing dinner. Bluefish is kind of like Swordfish in its texture. It's not flaky, but more fiberous and darker in colour. The bones peel right out of the fillets before they're cooked. After they're cooked the flavors intensify, and it's just so good. Al's wife Joan made her signature three-bean salad, and my family showed up hungry.

This was one of my better memories of Maine.

Today we went to the Flower Show. Dunno what we'll do tomorrow.

spring

It's a fabulous day in Ev'tn today. It's mostly sunny and above 60 degrees. To our delight, K and I discovered the first of the flowers that were planted last fall. K planted over 200 bulbs outside our livingroom window. We've had a mostly mild winter and green shoots kept popping up. Then it would get very cold again. It's been a very tense winter for the green thumb set. K asked me to take a picture of the first flower. I thought you might like to see. Along with being a superb hearing dog, Roz is also trainable as a flower hound.














Good dog.

a few things

Thing 1:
I don't know if this happens to y'all, but when I peruse the blog links on my site, and click on their links back to my own site I get a different page that's weeks old. Is this happening to anyone else? Most of the links take me back to "get up and do the first reading." I don't know why blogger is doing this. When I publish a new post it takes several hours for it to update my blog. There are a scant few ways to get help on blogger, and of those, I don't see any FAQs that deal with this.

Thing 2:
Today was the last day of classes and I suppose I should be elated, but I'm finding it hard to put the books down. There are some reading assignments for this past term that I could only give a cursory -- read just to get it done for class -- I could go over those again. Then there's pre-reading for next term. I've got some interesting classes. I want to get started with all that.

I went to the auto mechanic today to have a screw removed from a tire (littering doesn't pay, it costs), and I found a great article in Newsweek that directly related to the Ethics paper I wrote. The mechanic let me take the 'zine home with me. I really want to contact my Ethics professor and add what I got out of the article as a footnote to a part of my paper. It's so perfect. I wish I drove over that screw two weeks ago. Dontcha just hate when you find things too late like that?

Thing 3:
A few days ago I had some work done that required Novocain. All went well and I left the doctor's office feeling nothing at all. I decided to treat myself to a latte', because it was going to hurt bad later. I got to thinking about how there always seems to be a sense of numbness before pain.

Picture a triumphant Jesus riding into town, treading mildly on palm branches. What a great scene, right? For all intents and purposes his hard work seemed to be paying off. Do you think it was possible that Jesus was numb to the painful reality that awaited? Later in the garden, he knew it was going to hurt, but allowed it to play out anyways.

The needle pinch always hurts the most, and within seconds it was like I was outside myself. I saw the doc come in the room carrying the small thin curved razor blade he meant to use to excise the objects in question. I heard the cauterizor crackle just before he finished. It didn't take long and we didn't talk much. I hardly even remember what he looks like. He said to call him in a week and I left. We had a formal transaction, taking care of business that had to be done. Had to be done.

Jesus had to transact the business of crucifixion and death. It had to be done. He knew -- perhaps he saw -- the instruments that would cause him to cry out. Crucifixion wasn't a haphazard proceedure, but a formal process, efficient and effective. Was his minimal speech before Pilate evidence of attempt to numb himself before the impending pain?

We use Lent to get ourselves prepared with the semblance of loss before re-enacting the real loss. So we don't have chocolate, or meat, of booze, or some such thing for a few weeks. At first fasting is difficult. I don't know about you, but after about fourty days of fasting something I forget that it's missing in my daily routine. Then we come to Palm Sunday and all of a sudden it's a celebration. Everything we did before becomes water under the bridge, and we kind of forget whats going to happen later in the week. Our children weave crosses out of palm fronds (I never did learn how to do that), and we have (sometimes) a liturgy geared toward the children. All seems to be okay. Numb.

Within a few hours the Novocain wore off, and the reality of what the doc did was abudantly clear. Ow-ee. I knew the pain was coming, but the anesthetic that made me numb was a much nicer place to be. That which had to be done was accomplished.

Now that there are painful spots I have to be more careful, more gentle. I'm more aware of the things I previously took for granted, more sensitive. I think Easter is a time to be more sensitive to the things that are painful, things that we'd rather be numb to -- in ourselves and in others.

I haven't finished working out this thought. This is about as far as I've gotten.

crash

One of the things we used to say in Jeet Kune Do was "finish strong." That means save a little something for a powerful burst of energy at the end and make it look easy. I've been sharing that little mantra with some of my colleagues here this week as it's the last week of the quarter. Over this last week I've turned in two papers, two presentations (one of which I still think rocks no matter what grade I get on it), a preaching final assignment, and a final exam. As of 1:15 this afternoon I wrapped up the last of the things I need to turn in. I finished the New Testament 2 Bible content final exam in about 15 minutes, with the rest of the afternoon to spare. Finish strong, right. There hasn't been a lot of sleep happening here folks, there has been a ton of research, some late nights, and my little computer has been chugging away the whole time, and now I can coast through the last two days of the term. How do I make it look so easy? I've even got energy to spare. I was thinking of doing some pre-reading for next quarter, re-organize my file system, maybe some laundr-zzzzzzzzzzzz..........

"punk diggidity!"

My good friend Zabka flew out to visit us this weekend.











She misses us bad -- and Buffy cat too. Everytime I go home I stop in at Davis Square for a cup of joe with her as I make my way to the family. She didn't stay long so we tried to make the most of it. That means good eatin'. At my request she stopped at Capone Foods in Union Square, makers of some of the best home made pastas and sauces. She brought us Porcini Mushroom Tortellini -- two boxes! I made my signature soup with it. Today for a late lunch we had an artichoke tart -- another fav of mine. Zabka helped with the crust and it came out just perfect.






















Good kitchen help is hard to come by. Props to K for the great photography.