Saturday, October 31, 2009

Pukey McStabbyEye

Happy Halloween everyone! After Corin's first adventure in pumpkin-carving, we were invited to a friend's pumpkin party, so we did a second one with Corin, this time buying one of those kid-safe saws so that he could participate in the actual carving.

He didn't quite have the strength to push and pull on the saw when it was stuck firmly in the pumpkin flesh, but once I had popped out the eyes, he liked stabbing the eye sockets, repeatedly. It was pretty gruesome. And totally Halloween-y.



Also, since we had started the project with the eyes rather than scooping it out first, all the guts were left inside behind the eyeballs and the mouth, which people at the party thought was equally gruesome. We made him barf it out a little, hence the moniker Pukey McStabbyEye.



That's just so wrong.

Thursday, October 29, 2009

HAP-py duh-day, Apa!



I'm 34 today, twice the age of when I graduated high school. Weird.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Sidewalks

in the summer they walk outside
chatting
darting
boisterous

in winter
they scurry
hunched

in autumn they are mellow
tweed jackets
cups of coffee

they stroll

at peace

Saturday, October 24, 2009

Corin sings his ABCs

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Misidentification

The other night Amanda and I were reading downstairs while Corin was taking a nap. She heard something that might have been Corin, but might also have been the cat. "Steve, can you tell what that is?" she asked me.

I stared up toward the dim stairway, and thought I could see something there, but it didn't seem to be moving — maybe a sweater than had been dropped there. "I'm not sure," I said tentatively.

"I'm Corin," came the clearly offended voice from the darkness.

Friday, October 9, 2009

An insane generosity

What the Gospels MeantContinuing with my series highlighting interesting passages in "What the Gospels Meant," I have to say that I was really struck and convicted by Garry Wills' translation of Luke 6:27-38 (which parallels the more famous Sermon on the Mount but in Luke's version is a little more stripped down).

Maybe it was the fresh language Wills brings to it, maybe it's just that I've spent more time with the Mattew 5 verses than with Luke's framing of these core teaching, or maybe it's just reading it all squished together in one paragraph with no verse breaks, but it felt to me afresh and alive to hear this plea from Jesus of what he desires of us.
"I say to all you who can hear me: Love your foes, help those who hate you, praise those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. To one who punches your cheek, offer the other cheek. To one seizing your cloak, do not refuse your tunic under it. Whoever asks, give to him. Whoever seizes, do not resist. Exactly how you wish to be treated, in that way treat others. For if you love those who love back, what mark of virtue have you? Sinners themselves love those who love back. If you treat well those treating you well, what mark of virtue have you? That is how sinners act. If you lend only where you calculate a return, what mark of virtue have you? Sinners, too, lend to sinners, calculating an exact return. No, rather love your foes, and treat them well, and lend without any calculation of return. Your great repayment will be that you are children of the Highest One, who also favors ingrates and scoundrels. Be just as lenient as that lenient Father. Do not judge, then, and you will not be judged. Be no sentencer, and you will not be sentenced. Pardon and you will be pardoned. Give, and ample recompense of crammed-in, sifted-down, overtoppling good will be showered into your lap. The excess will correspond to your excess."
So often we get the Bible handed to us in little fortune-cookie sized snippets, and the fullness of what is being said is lost. A single verse can be rationalized away. The full passage makes it clear that Jesus is hammering home one point, over and over: God is insanely generous, and to be his followers, we must be insanely generous as well. Not generous to a church, or to an institution, or to a cause, but generous to people. Insanely. Absurdly. Foolishly — against all rules of nature and rules of man. God has poured out his benevolence on ingrates and scoundrels and his children will do the same.

That just can't be swept under the rug. That can't be dismissed as pie-in-the-sky. That the reality of God's kingdom that we must bend our minds around in order to understand the Almighty Father and his will for us as his emissaries. I for one know that my mind still struggles to bend toward His heart.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Celebrate good times, come on

I can't remember when it started, but some time back we said "Cheers!" to Corin and clinked glasses when we were all drinking the same thing (probably to convince him that he didn't need to drink directly from our glass but that the same thing was in his plastic cup). Ever since then, whenever we are holding two of the same thing, he always gets a big grin on his faces, bashes them together and says "Cheers!" whether it be grapes or keys or pens or books or what have you. It's pretty adorable.

[Addendum 10/9: Just now, Corin was holding a little felt baby doll in an orange onesie, and Corin, in an orange shirt, tapped it to his chest and said "Cheers!"]