Old People LOVE being old.

Today is my birthday. When I came in to work today, my workmates were kind enough to make a big deal over it. I think that's a midwest thing to make a big deal over someone's birthday. Pastries, bagels, (good) coffee, fruit, silly desktop decorations... these are all typical earmarks of a birthday celebration around the workplace.

Everyone who sees me today has said 'happy birthday', and everyone who is older than me, has made sure to remind me of that. But they say it in such funny ways: "I have SHOES older than that.", "Oh, I remember when I was THAT young.", "Oh... you're just a pup!". Part of this is nostalgia. Part of it is their way of saying, "This is YOUR birthday, but I still want to talk about me. I'm older than you. I'm more experienced than you." ...or maybe that's just their nice way of saying, "You're 34, but don't worry... that's not old. Just be glad you're not as old as ME!"

Despite what they're trying to say about age, I'm not all that affected. I'm happy to be whatever age I am. I'm just glad I only have to be a certain age for one year at a time.

Cobwebs

This blog is full of stuff with which I am not very happy. It feels old and outdated and a bit infantile. I guess that's what a blog is supposed to do... it's a way to gauge your maturity or something. I don't know what it is, but after almost 2 years something compelled me to post again. I don't know if I have any intention of continuing this blog or not. It's just a thought.

updates

By the way.. for anyone who I don't talk to regularly... a few updates: I'm living in Ohio. I'm looking to buy a house. Life is good... but busy.

The Girl and the Eagle

This is a rough draft... please let me know if you have any suggestions or note any misspellings, etc. I will be going through this later. Also, this story begs for illustrations.


Once upon a time there was a young girl who was raised underground named Newt. She was a normal girl.. she had two legs, two arms, ten fingers and ten toes. Her family was horribly poor, and could not afford to live in town, so she was raised underground, away from the light of the sun. She would eat snails and hermit crabs at every meal, and she made friends with the rats who lived with her. She was a sad little girl, and she envied the people who lived in nice houses, wore clean clothes, and ate steak and ice cream three times a day. She would console herself by playing tricks on the people who lived above ground. Sometimes she would remove a manhole cover for somebody to accidentally fall into. Sometimes she would steal bicycles from children's yards. Sometimes she would just jump out and scare the 'day' people.

Newt tortured the 'day people' because she was sad and because she had no friends, but whenever she pulled a new prank, she found that she was no happier than before. She found herself becoming more and more sad with every prank. After one particular episode in which she had scared the wig right off of an old woman, Newt witnessed the old woman pointing at her accusingly and saying "You are a dirty, horrible little girl, and that's all you'll ever be!" The comment didn't stop Newt from giggling and laughing away with delight, but later, when she sat down next to an water-reservoir pipe, she thought about the old woman, and she cried. She cried because the old woman was right. Newt looked at her clothes, and looked at the dirt built up on her skin and under her fingernails. She WAS a dirty, horrible little girl, and she had no friends.

As Newt sat, she watched an eagle flying far over her head. As she stared up at it flying around the sky, unchained, seemingly unworried about the world beneath it, she thought she noticed the bird looking at her. She felt uncomfortable about this, and decided to look the other way and pretend she hadn't noticed the bird, but every time she glanced up, the eagle was hovering closer to her head. The eagle let out a screech and started flying directly toward her. She was very scared now... but was far too frightened to move. She tried to move, but her legs were too heavy to move, and a knot started forming in her throat. Newt closed her eyes, and heard a flapping of wings. When she opened them, the eagle was staring her right in the face. This was no ordinary eagle. Now that it was near her, she could see that it was a great bird... it stood even taller than she did. She also saw that it's feathers were lined with gold threads that glowed from within. It's eyes were a deep emerald green, and were as painful to look at as they were compelling.

"What troubles you, little girl?" asked the Eagle. Newt was so captivated by the beauty of the eagle, that she didn't think it strange at all that it talked to her. She almost expected it. She replied to the eagle in a frightened tone, "I'm horrible, and mean, and dirty and ugly and no one loves me." said Newt. "I was born underground and have had a horrible time of life. I'm tired of being dirty and smelly and ugly. I want to be richly dressed and popular and live above ground like the 'day people'. They wouldn't even let someone like me be seen in the street right now."
The Eagle had a sad look on his face as he listened to her story.

The eagle paused after hearing her story... as if deep in thought. Then, he plucked out one of his feathers, and handed it to her from his razor-sharp beak. "Take this feather." said the eagle. Then staring at her with his deep, penetrating eyes, he said, "You will no longer be known as "Newt". Your new name will be "Mercy". With this feather, you will be allowed to walk above ground with all the other people, and you will be a brand new person. By holding this feather with you, you are showing people that you belong to me now - to the royal family of the Golden Eagle. But..." warned the eagle, "Since you are now a member of my family, I ask that you play no more tricks on people. It displeases me to see you make fun at others' expense." The little girl cowered at his very mention of this. She had no idea how he knew that about her, and didn't question it... she simply replied with a whimpering "ok". The Eagle appeared to nod slightly, before flapping his large, thunderous wings, and taking flight, eventually disappearing into the sun.

Mercy, filled with hope and fear, ventured out into the open air of the daylight. Her bare feet stepped quietly and comfortably onto the wet grass of the new morning. She felt naked and awkward out in the open where everyone could see her, but the sun's warm rays soon warmed her, reassuring her that she was welcome here. She shuffled her feet, which still seemed a little dirty, but the wet grass brushed away the dirt and filth built up on her feet. She liked having clean feet. She couldn't remember when her feet had been so clean, so she walked through some taller grass near the edge of town. Just like the turf on her feet, the tall grass was also wet with dew, and seemed to wipe a lot of her grime and filth away from her... cleaning her up and making her more presentable to the 'townsfolk'.

Mercy looked down at her hands and feet. They were a vast improvement from earlier in the day. She was so thankful to the eagle, that she reached inside her pocket, and grabbed the feather he had given her, and squeezed it gently with pride.

Mercy decided that, given her new appearance, she would try to go make some friends. Mercy walked into town, and saw some younger children playing with a ball in the street. As she approached, she noticed that the children seemed brightly lit. She had never noticed before how some of these people seem almost illuminated. She walked up next to them to greet them, but when she came near, they looked at her and all screamed and ran away.

"Why did they run away from me?" Mercy said to herself. "They treated me as if I still lived underground and was coming to scare them." Mercy wanted to play a mean trick on them for running away from her, but she checked herself. The Eagle told her that she was no longer to play tricks on people, so she was trying to respect that promise.

She came across an old man who was playing the fiddle on a street corner for money. As she looked into his kind, honest face he also seemed to glow brightly. The man almost looked heavenly. Mercy stood in front of him to listen to his music, but when she came near, he stopped playing... and looked at her with wonder, then fell to the ground and started crying.

She walked away sad and dejected. "Even an old fiddle player is brought to tears and sadness at my presence."

Mercy walked around town, surrounded by people who were filled with light all around her, and they all just stared in awe at her. "They're all just mocking me." she thought to herself. "They're all shocked to see someone as ugly as me in the world above ground." she told herself. The crowd just stood there, staring at her for a while.
She walked around distressed for several hours. Wherever she went, people's response seemed to be the same. They even seemed to be following her now and staring at her like some sort of circus freak.

She became very angry. The people who lived above ground seemed more beautiful and bright than she had imagined before, and she felt more ugly than ever. She wished very hard that she was as bright and beautiful as one of the people she had met in town. She felt like she had been tricked into trying to live in the above ground world. The Eagle had lied to her. Maybe he was paying her back for playing too many tricks on people.

As she thought about the Eagle, she pulled the feather from her pocket and looked at it. It still gleamed and shimmered in the sunlight. She looked at it with contempt. It was so elegant and beautiful, and she was still very ugly. She threw the feather at the ground and folded her arms across her knees and moped. As she sat there, she could hear the soft whipping of the wind through the trees. Then it became louder. Soon she heard a great flapping of wings and gusts of wind blowing against her. It was the Eagle. She didn't look up. She was very angry, but was too scared of the great bird to say so.

"What troubles you, Mercy?" his voice almost sounded melodic. She felt compelled to answer, despite her strong urge to angrily avoid him.

"You said you were going to make me a brand new person - someone special. I'm no different than before. I feel even uglier than I was when I lived underground. People stare at me, and run when I come near."

The Eagle let out a long, drawn out sigh. "If only you trusted me. If only you saw yourself the way that I do." He walked over to a nearby pond and called Mercy over to him. A great pressure swept her off her feet and walked her to the waterside. She felt that if she had not walked over herself, her legs would have moved on their own. The eagle stared into the pond, and motioned for her to do the same. At first she saw the Eagle's reflection in the water, then peering in behind the Eagle, she saw a glowing, golden creature so bright she had to shield her eyes. To her amazement, the being in the reflection shielded her eyes at the same moment. She gasped with the instant realization that she was the angel in the water's reflection. She was bathed with light and gold and feathers and decorative jewels around her neck.

"Your light is so bright" said the Eagle, "that you actually have illuminated the people you have encountered. Their light is reflected from your own... and your light is reflected from me. People stare, but they stare in awe... in amazement... they fear of the amount of glory that shows from you. I have not lied. You are precious to me, and I have filled you with light, and I want you to spread that light to others." The Eagle looked at Mercy lovingly, then she hugged the Eagle's neck tight before letting him go to turn toward the sky and disappear into the sun again.

...and the girl was happy.

Coffee talks pt 2

As my coffee talks with Dwayne continue, we've started thinking not just about coffee and it's need for quality and flavor, but carrying that out throughout the rest of the coffee shop.

A coffee shop should have several rooms. Each room should be unique and beautifully decorated. Small, intimate rooms should be there for old friends to meet up and talk for an hour... or to study quietly. There's a quality that these small rooms should have.. a specific 'atmosphere' that's perfect for study or intimate chats. They should be small and intimate with bookshelves lining the walls. Dwayne recommended making it a 2nd-hand bookstore as well. Brilliant. But they would have to be GOOD books... not just endless copies of john grisham novels left over from a thrift store somewhere. I have my own idea of 'loading' the bookshelves with schaeffer, lewis, sproul, and other christian authors. I wouldn't restrict it from having the occasional copy of a marx or neitzche either, but i would want to spawn conversations of God... which coffee is perfect for. I originally had this idea in St. Louis. There's a PCA seminary in St. Louis and I thought it would be a neat opportunity to open a coffee shop nearby a strip of gay bars, and invite all the seminary dudes to come live above the coffee shop, and work there, and to use this area as a place of ministry.

My own personal coffee shop vision also includes one large room that you could fit several people in, to build a good sense of community. There should be people playing Go or Chess or Settlers or playing cards or just sitting around enjoying being around other people. The atmosphere wouldn't be quite so 'intimate' as the others, but it has other purposes. Along the wall of the larger room, we would hang artwork. Good artwork. I could review artists work, be as choosy as i wanted, then if the artist 'made it in', i would allow them to sell the artwork there, and even hold openings for their shows. If i found some REALLY good artwork there, i would probably buy something and strategically put it in one of the smaller rooms. This art-room would be not only for visual, but audible artwork. I would invite poetry readings, jazz, blues, experimental, bluegrass bands to play at the end of the room - Not rock shows... This is a coffee shop, not a sports bar. The final use of the large room would be a movie theatre. On Friday nights (or some set schedule) I would darken all the lights, pull a screen down from the ceiling and show vintage movies, or independant art films, or whatever i could get the rights to show.

How cool would it be to invite a bunch of people together to go have a cup of coffee over a Marx brothers movie? Or for the local college to lift us up as the ideal location to show their masterpieces?

Art, study, community, ministry... this isn't a coffee shop, it's a vision.

Coffee talks pt 1

I've been having several informal chats with my co-worker Dwayne Carr about coffee shops. We've got some ideas for a coffee shop, and we're even giving vague thoughts to opening up our own. These conversations with Dwayne are good. They're very uplifting, because we're not just talking about coffee shops, we're talking about life.

The coffee shop should have Good, quality coffee. This is a big deal for us since we've recently started roasting coffee ourselves, and seeing what a great difference it can make in quality. Coffee suddenly isn't just "coffee", it's a bold, smooth Indonesian coffee. Or it's an earthy bolivian coffee. Each coffee has a very unique flavor, and they're all completely different, and they're all better than "folgers".

This is where the talk of coffee shops began. It's the paving stone of our further coffee shop conversations.

Quality is important. Marx had a few things right. We lost something in that whole 'industrial revolution'. We lost tradesmen. We lost fine crafts. Hobbyists are starting to figure this out, but without recognizing superior quality, we will never get that back. Go into a really old catholic cathedral. Look at the ornate work in the sculptures and architecture. Do we even have anybody today who COULD replicate that? If someone was talented enough to do that, WOULD any business/organization pay to have it done?

People need to recognize art and quality in all things, rather than quantity and disposability.

P.S. I'm not a marxist. I think he had a few good ideas, but they were all executed badly.

P.P.S. I'm currently roasting green coffee beans that i've purchased through Sweet Maria.

Sam Samurai (part 3) (work in progress)

Sam worked as a servant in the Governor's house for the next whole year. Within the first couple months, Sam worked harder than any other five servants in the governor's house which earned him permission from the Governor to have the afternoons to himself. He was a quiet, and observant young man. He watched carefully to learn anything he could from the masters of the house. He learned arithmetic, politics, and swordplay from the same tutor who taught the Governor's children. He even became fast friends with the Governor's eldest son, Yoshi, and the two of them would practice swordfighting for hours into the evening. His kind, and happy personality caused the Governor and his family to accept Sam more as a son than as a servant.

Sometimes Sam would miss his family, and would retreat to his dark and quiet room in the basement of the compound to think about them. He wondered if he would ever see them again. He wondered if they missed him. He wondered if they were doing alright without him, or if they were struggling to survive.
On one such occasion, Sam began to cry softly when he thought about them.

"You miss them, don't you?" said a voice.

Sam's entire body became tense as a chill ran down his spine, and he tried to recall where his practice sword was. "Who are you? What do you want?"

"Don't worry, Sam." the voice said again, as a tall figure stepped from the dark shadows in the corner of the room. "I'm not here to hurt you." He paused, thinking. "And besides, if i did want to fight you, your wooden practice sword would hardly be a threat to me."

He was a thin, muscular man with tattered robes and a large, rounded straw hat which hid the top half of his head. The hilts of two swords protruded from his belt. One sword was very long - longer than Sam had ever seen before, and had a weathered, leather-bound handle. The other was short, and was wrapped in black cloth, and had several symbols etched into it's metal. It was hard to tell the man's age, but he seemed very strong, and smart. Sam felt he had seen the man before.

"Who are you?" Sam repeated.
"My name is Ogi." the man said. "I knew your father."
Sam's jaw dropped. "You knew my father?"
"Yes," said Ogi. "Your father and I worked under the Emperor together. I didn't know him for very long, but I can tell you that he was stronger than most men. He was fierce and powerful."

"I can see you've been learning a lot here, Sam. Your father would be pleased at that." Ogi picked up Sam's practice sword and spun it around in his hand. Sam carefully watched as the blade seemed to disappear with Ogi's smooth, cunning movements. His eyes grew wide as this stranger manimpulated his practice sword to do things he didn't know it could do.

"Keep learning." Ogi said after a long pause. "When you are finished learning what you can here, I shall resume your training."
Sam swallowed. "Training for what?"
"Do you need a reason to learn?" Ogi asked. He placed his hand on Sam's shoulder, and started again. "I am here to encourage you, Sam. You are doing good work, and your father would be proud. But your training cannot be revealed. The Governor wouldn't like the idea of slaves learning too much."
Sam nodded in agreement.

"Also, do not mention me. My presence here must be kept secret. If you reveal my presence I will not teach you." He turned to leave the room, then looked over his shoulder back at Sam and smiled broadly. "Keep up the good work, Sam. I'll see you soon."

And Ogi kept his promise. He would return in the evenings, and sneak Sam out of the compound to learn swordfighting, to learn about the stars and their locations, to learn about the history of their land. Ogi only visited once a month, but Sam continued to study and grew in knowelege every day.

In the spring of his second year working at the Governor's house, Sam was informed that Emperor Yamato was to visit the Governor.

Sam was sad that he had to live away from his family, but he also took great joy in his work as a servant. He had become very excited about the events that took place in the Governor's household. When he learned that the Emperor was coming, he wanted to make a good impression. He even borrowed some of Yoshi's formal robes to dress up for the occasion.

The entire household gathered in the courtyard to await the Emperor's arrival. The Governor sat in his chair, and all of his household stood in two large lines leaving a wide path covered in flower petals between them for the Emperor to walk on. As the Emperor arrived, music began playing from somewhere unseen, and the emperor's carriage was carried into the courtyard carried by 4 guards. The carriage was carried on two long wooden poles, and was inlaid with bright red and gold. Atop the carriage was the Emperor himself. He was large, and fierce looking, with a large, black beard, and a shaved head, and he wore a small, funny-looking hat which sat atop the center of his head.
Sam noticed that walking several feet behind the guards and the emperor was Ogi, his tutor! Sam almost didn't recognize him. He was dressed in extravagant decorative robes, and he had a stone-still look in his face. He didn't turn to Sam or even acknowelege him.

Sam's excitement was bubbling over. He had never seen so many big, important, powerful people before. And all were decorated with fancy robes of every color imaginable.

The Emperoror was officially visiting the Governor on business, but it would be rude to simply discuss politics without first showing hospitality to Emperor Yamato. The Governor did a very good job of showing some of that hospitality: musicians, actors, jugglers... all came to display their talents to Yamato. Sam was delighted. It was like a carnival. Then dinner was served to all: Roast duck and noodles, Shark steaks decorated with fish eyes, Vegetables steam-cooked with rare spices from the west, Sushi wrapped in seaweed, and a spiced hot beverage and a sort of thin cake for desert. It appeared to be working. Yamato was, indeed, very satisfied with the food and entertainment of the Governor.

Sam couldn't hear what was being said between Emperor and Governor, but he often saw Yamato laugh heartily, and smile as the different dishes came out, or as a band started playing a new tune.

Then came the sparring... Yamato pointed to the center of the courtyard, where a circle formed, and several members of the Governor's household in turn, stood in the center, bowed to the Emperor, then bowed to each other, and started fighting. It was the first time Sam had seen a formal demonstration of swordfighting. The emperor clapped politely. Sam laughed at some of the swordfighters. He thought it was almost shameful that some of them would be displaying such lack of talent in front of the Emperor. They were making critical errors. One had a horrible footing as he faced his opponent, another would let his guard down at the wrong moment. Even Yoshi, the emperor's son, was fighting poorly.

Sam held the bridge of his nose and shook his head in disappointment. Yamato caught him doing this, and pointed him out of the crowd. "You, young man."

Sam's eyes grew large, and he was overcome with panic.

"Me?"

Yamato nodded, and pointed for Sam to take the ring with Yoshi.