Meme - rhymes with theme

Thanks Zephyr man for passing on an interesting set of questions.

[The photo is one of the four places I'd rather be. My parents' backyard in Colorado.]

Four Jobs You've Had: 1]Avon Lady; 2]Parish Pastor; 3]Personal Assistant (housework, clerical, driving- all for $6 an hour) for a retired University of Chicago Econ prof and his wife; 4] 1/3 of the LSTC's Dean of Faculty Secretary - (He's retired now. No names please. What a guy! "Don't disturb me for twenty minutes. I'll be doing my somnistics." Yep! Taking a nap!)

Four Movies You Could Watch Over and Over: 1] "The Philadelphia Story" (Cary Grant and Jimmy Stewart, what more need I say!); 2] "Corrina, Corrina" (I know it's a Whoopy Goldberg movie, but there's something about the story and her chemistry with Ray Liota and the little girl that gets me every time.); 3] "The Shop Around the Corner" - ("You've Got Mail" was a cute little flick but it has nothing on the original!); 4] "Charade" - (Much better than the remake of a couple of years ago.)

Four Places You've Lived: 1] A garage apartment- four small rooms above a two car garage- across the street from the old married student's housing at LTSS in Columbia, SC; 2] Ava, Missouri- home of the Missouri Fox Trotter's Association and the county seat of a county known by others in the area as "Booger County". I never learned why they call it that. 3] Boulder, Colorado; 4] Canoga Park, California- I was a "Valley Girl" before they had Valley Girls.

Four TV Shows You Love to Watch: 1] "Charmed" - It's a guilty pleasure; 2] "The Gilmore Girls" - Don't feel quite as guilty about this one. My dad even likes "The Gilmore Girls!"; 3] Old movies - The best reason to have Tivo is so that you can record old movies at 3:00am and watch them at a decent hour; 4] "Sunday Morning" on CBS - Now that I am not serving in a parish, I can actually watch this show before church. It's smart. I like it.

Four Places You've Been on Vacation: 1] Paris - We stayed in a totally cool hotel decorated in "20th century Parisian Garage Sale." Nothing matched but it was wonderful; 2] Summit County, Colorado when the snow was great! 3] Delawanna Resort 90 minutes northwest of Toronto - It's a little like the resort in "Dirty Dancing" without the dancing. 4] New York City with my daughter. We stayed at the Seaman's Institute. A great bargain and if you're Lutheran clergy they give you a 10% discount.

Four Websites You Visit Daily: 1] My company intranet site; 2] AOL to get my mail.... that's about it for daily visits.

Four of Your Favorite Foods: 1] Baskin and Robbins Chocolate and Peanut Butter Ice Cream; Chocolate; 2] My mother's Cornish pasty; 3] Good bread with real butter; 4] A good steak.

Four Places You'd Rather Be Right Now: 1] Bed - It's the first thing that came to mind; 2] Paris; 3] The hammock in my parent's backyard in the Colorado mountains when the temperature is above 60 degrees; 4] Drinking beer and eating chips at some Mexican joint with my best friend from Chicago.

The secret life of kids

Today my kid got a spew of instant messages from a "friend" at school. They weren't nice. It was the kind of thing that junior high girls have been doing to each other since the week after they invented junior high girls. But it stinks!

And somehow, it's worse when it comes into your house over the computer. Unless you block the offender, you're going to get a spate of unsolicited crap. And when you're a junior high girl, friendships are very mercurial. So one day you're best buds and the next day you're being addressed in a manner quite PG-13.

I remember suddenly realizing when my daughter was about 4, that she had a secret life that I knew nothing about. While she was at daycare she was making friends with other people that I had never met. She was having conversations and adventures that never quite got reported. Which is good. Children need to develop autonomy. It's part of growing up. But now, as she is approaching the teen years, I flip flop between wanting to know nothing about the secret life and wanting to know everything so that I might protect her.

Junior high girls are mean. And when someone is mean to my kid, I wish I could make it stop. And then I wonder, is she being mean to someone else's kid? I hope not. I hope the kid that I know is the same one that's going to school and sending instant messages and hanging out with her friends.

I will try not to embarrass my daughter.

This morning I told my twelve year old that I had started a blog. She seemed intrigued. After all, blogging seems more like something she would do...

"What's the blog about?" I knew I was in trouble.
"Well, I did write something about you." With that I received the pre-teenager eye roll. I knew I shouldn't have. After all, I promised to always warn her before I talk about her in a sermon. And now I was just willy-nilly sending things about HER out into the ethernet.

"It's anonymous. My name's not on it."
"Oh, what else is it about, Mom?"
"Religion."
"Oh. That's always good."

So I guess she'd prefer I limit myself to things theological but it ain't gonna happen!

Epiphany 3

Mark 1:14-20
Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea—for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, “Follow me and I will make you fish for people.” And immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets. Immediately he called them; and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, and followed him.

When I was younger, I always wondered why Peter and the boys would drop everything to follow Jesus. How could they abandon their nets, their jobs, their father!?! They didn't know Jesus was going to turn out to be such a big deal. (And maybe if they had they might have stayed home.....) The thing is, we miss so much when we look at the fishermen's call from this perspective. In Jesus' time discipleship was a formal relationship. With a formal call "to follow me." Calls were issued to young men who had been groomed from early childhood. Disciples were the best of the best. The cream of the crop. They were the kids who got A's in Hebrew School. The kids who really knew their Torah frontwards and backwards- quite literally.

But Jesus called these fishermen! They hadn't been their rabbi's shining light when they were kids. If anyone had ever thought they might make it as disciples, their lives would have been remarkably different. And yet Jesus chose them. Not the brightest. Not the best. Not the guys with the fancy degrees or the fine education. But Jesus chose them. "Come, follow me."

Mommy, come tuck me in!

Why is it that I am the only one who can "tuck in" my twelve year old? And it's not like I actually tuck the child in. It's a quick peck and a lowering of the tv volume and shutting off the lights. I tuck nothing! The blankets are loose!

I suppose I will miss the ritual some day when my presence is no longer requested. But then again, maybe not. She bellers from upstairs and I am to come running. It was one thing when she was trapped in a crib. But she's twelve!

She insists that she sleeps better if I tuck her in. So I guess while I still have this magical power, I should make the most of it. And maybe, we'd all sleep better if we knew that when we yelled, someone would drop everything to come and give us a good night kiss.

Why blog?

I asked a friend to explain to me why I would want to have a blog. He replied with this- "It's a place to vent and rant and say what you want semi-anonymously. I have too many opinions. One day my wife told me I needed to get a blog."

So here I am. My spouse isn't sure what a blog is. But sometimes it's nice to just write out one's thoughts and let them sail.