I wrote this up about a month and a half ago. Thinking back over the last few years, and also about the plateau of what’s left of my life before me, I asked myself, “What is really important to me? What does a meaningful life look like when it is done?” It certainly would...
Read more →Today I did something that I rarely (if ever) do, and it was, well, hard. I told an old friend I was disappointed in him. The moment for the acknowledgement began innocently enough. I received an email from him which had a short blurb telling me about a friend he had known from childhood...
Read more →Anne Lamott says that if you want to be a writer, you need to sit down each day, and regardless of whether or not you are crazy or mentally dead or narcissistic, try and write at least a paragraph. Get one paragraph down of something, and let that stand, and aim to do it...
Read more →Tonight after work I ran a few errands to help get the house more ready to receive summer guests, and then when I came home, I decided to make a pot of goulash, and to listen to a podcast by Tom Nelson. Tom Nelson is the pastor of Denton Bible Church in Denton, Texas,...
Read more →Anytime I hear a song by Chicago, and specifically from albums 16 or 17, I am carried back to my sophomore and junior years in high school. I think this is in part because both albums had singles in heavy airplay as either new releases or recurrent singles during those years- Chicago was hot...
Read more →For many people, today has probably been a pretty normal (if not a low-key) day outside of a few major news items. Today, disco icon Donna Summers passed away. Tomorrow, Facebook drops its I.P.O. and reaps a whirlwind of capital. Those are the highs and lows of the news day for today, a...
Read more →On Friday morning, our team arose for our last full day in Puerto Rico, and again, we were happy to enjoy the day primarily as tourists. After a cheery breakfast in the facility’s cafeteria which was followed by the morning’s devotion, our group boarded the three vans and under sunny skies set out north...
Read more →On Thursday, our group got to take a break during the day from regular work activities, and enjoy some time playing tourists. It was also a special day for us because two people with us had decided to get baptized when we went to the beach- and today was beach day. After breakfast, we...
Read more →After maintaining decorum by posting notes five nights in a row while in Puerto Rico (6 if you count the day before we left), I ran into a mental block called tiredness and stalled on my up-to-the-day reporting. What follows is my effort to recover my memories of what happened on day 7. Day...
Read more →After maintaining decorum by posting notes five nights in a row (6 if you count the day before we left), I ran into a mental block called tiredness and stalled on my up-to-the-day reporting. What follows is my effort to recover my memories of what happened on day 6. After breakfast and a morning...
Read more →I lost grip on keeping up the blog daily yesterday. I was so tired last night I thought I would be able to recall day 5 today, and day 6 has had a slew of memories all of its own. I have a horrible memory, and have lost some of day 5. I’ll remember...
Read more →Today was Sunday, and so our team sent three parties to three different churches for services this morning. One group went to the church in the city we went to yesterday, Arecibo. Another group, which included my brother, went to a church in Ponce on the south coast. The group I was in went...
Read more →Today we got up at 7:45 and ate at 8, and then we headed out at 8:45 for the day’s engagement- a park party for children in a poorer section of Aricibo, a city about 55 miles to the west of San Juan, or an hour and a half from where are staying in...
Read more →It’s been a good day. We slept really solidly last night and got up late for breakfast, which is our M.O. After breakfast in the lodge- scrambled eggs, cream of wheat, and bagels- and a devotional, the different teams split off to their assignments. As part of the construction team, we drove to the...
Read more →Today started this morning at 3 am after a 4 hour night of sleep. A member of Jeremy’s church, Jim Weaver, came and gave us a courtesy lift to the Denver airport. We met up with the team- 21 in all- at the airTran ticketing area and then checked in between 4:15 and 4:45,...
Read more →Today was a drive day, Albuquerque to Denver. We left around 9:30 and got here around 5. We made one stop in Raton. The weird thing is this morning, picking up a backpack, I felt a tinge of pain behind my left shoulder blade. When we got to Raton, when I got out of...
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