The Sublime Roundabout

From my talk on Sunday, in case you missed it... (it was a good one, by the way...) ;-) In July 1776, the people living in what would later become known as the United States of America decided that they had had enough. In a sweeping document we would come to know as the Declaration of Independence, these brave men severed ties with their King and country and a nation was born. Integral to this document, and to the beliefs of the men who signed it – putting their own lives at stake, was the idea that there is a Creator, a divine Source of all rights as human beings, and that these rights are worth dying for.   Many of them would be given that privilege.   The British Empire, loath to relinquish its claim on these colonies, fought long and hard for the control that had already slipped away. The revolution had begun, and the shackles which bound America to Great Britain were cut. The revolution continued to progress and a decade later the Constitution was formed, bringing together...

...or, describing the indescribable... I don't know why I set myself impossible tasks. Perhaps I am not alone in this. If you're with me, please feel free to raise your hand. I won't be able to see you doing it, anyway! HA! There are some things in this world that simply cannot be expressed. Some things are at once too sacred, too pure, too personal, for anyone else to understand. On the other hand, we've all had those same kinds of experiences. So while the experience is unique, the fact that we've shared similar experiences is a unifying and uplifting thought. In that vein, I'd like to share some of my own experience. While I acknowledge that my experience is unique to me, my hope is that my experience will resonate with your own, reaching your soul and caressing your heart the way that the Holy Spirit does mine. We are often caught up in the experiences of the flesh, giving credence only to what can be empirically measured. If one cannot touch, taste,...

Love, Paul Simon... When I think back On all the crap I learned in high school It's a wonder I can think at all And though my lack of education Hasn't hurt me none I can read the writing on the wall Kodachrome They give us those nice bright colors They give us the greens of summers Makes you think all the world's a sunny day I got a Nikon camera I love to take a photograph So mama don't take my Kodachrome away If you took all the girls I knew When I was single And brought them all together for one night I know they'd never match my sweet imagination Everything looks worse in black and white

I close my eyes. At first, all I notice is the remnants of the bright world around me scorched on the retinas of my tired eyes. Vivid shades of magenta and purple and yellow and white, like old film negatives, bring light to the darkness behind my eyelids. It is not real light - just shadows of light that has already dispersed. Slowly I notice other things around me. The humming of the air conditioning. The gentle pressure of the chair supporting me. My arms resting on my desk. My feet snug in my shoes. Soft breezes blowing across my arms, barely even there. I hear sounds - sounds of construction far away, sounds of traffic down country roads, sounds of birds... Soon that begins to melt away. The light that had burned my retinas is purged from my eyes and all becomes darkness. I become aware of my breathing. I do not breathe deep - just slowly and gently pulling the life-giving oxygen into my lungs and propelling the used portion back out. I am aware of the gentle rise and fal...

And I love you so. The people ask me how, How I've lived till now. I tell them I don't know. I guess they understand How lonely life has been. But life began again The day you took my hand. And, yes, I know how lonely life can be. The shadows follow me, and the night won't set me free. But I don't let the evening get me down Now that you're around me. And you love me, too. Your thoughts are just for me; You set my spirit free. I'm happy that you do. The book of life is brief And once a page is read, All but love is dead. That is my belief. And, yes, I know how loveless life can be. The shadows follow me, and the night won't set me free. But I don't let the evening bring me down Now that you're around me. And I love you so. The people ask me how, How I've lived till now. I tell them, "i don't know."

The following is a conversation I've been a part of on a good friend's (N) wall: N ‎ "The foundation of morality is to give up pretending to believe that for which there is no evidence, and repeating unintelligible propositions about things beyond the possibilities of knowledge." (T. H. Huxley) Bill Cobabe This is an interesting quote. It seems to say - and I could be reading this wrong - that the foundation of morality is to give up belief (or faith). If that's the case, what is the basis for one's moral foundation? In my experience, the foundation of morality is the hope for a better world - and I'm not talking strictly about some eternal reward. Things like altruism, self-sacrifice and discipline, and a desire to improve the world around one's self are all centered in the hope and idea that such things are achievable, although not seen. In short, to quote John Lennon - You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. He was also ...

When I was in architecture school, someone made the observation that buildings tend to be fairly masculine in form. At first, I didn't know what was meant by that statement. Certainly there are some architectural forms that are more massive, stronger, or more phallic (some skyscrapers are quite obviously that way - I'm surprised no one has done a psychological treatise on the subject... there'd be tons of examples). But the person was lamenting the fact that architecture - and building in general - is typically carried out by men. The owners are men. The financiers are men. The designers are men. The engineers are men. And the guys actually building the thing are, well, guys. This is an interesting phenomenon... So the question was - how do we address this problem? Some smart alec suggested that we might put breasts on our buildings... I'm not entirely sure how that would look... And I'm not entirely sure that that would be a desirable form. What is a femin...

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday. You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far. Let our bending in the archer's hand be for gladness; For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.

Salt... A pillar of salt... If you've never been to the area west of the Great Salt Lake (and unless you're REALLY bored there's no reason to head out there) there's a place called the Bonneville Salt Flats. It's amazing - truly. Try to imagine a vast sheet of salt, perfectly flat and blindingly white. If you go in the spring time, when the ground is a little damp, it's possible to scoop out an enormous ball of salt - like a snowball. The salt is very fine-grained and the taste is a little less salty than normal table salt, although salty enough that you do not want to eat it. So there's Lot, evacuating Sodom, with his wife and daughters in tow. They're headed out to the hills, seeking refuge from the storm of fire and brimstone. They are told specifically not to look back on the destruction of their home and city, but Lot's wife cannot resist the temptation. She looks back and is turned into a pillar of salt. It is unclear (at least to me...

A little bit personal, if you don't mind. If you do, I suppose you can always surf on over to something more interesting... Or mundane... or with better/funnier content. I am not going to apologize for who/what I am. And that's really the thrust of this post. Life is interesting. We are influenced by genetics. We are influenced by environment. We are at once masters of our own destiny, but we are also subject to whims and changes and input that is not of our choosing or a result of our action. Some things really are just random. Not all - not even most. But some things are just random... What is NOT random is how I react to the various input. Regardless of what happens to me, regardless of whether it comes as a consequence of my own indiscretion or whether it is just as random as a leaf falling to the ground in a large forest, how I react to that is up to me. It may seem trite, but I find the thought very empowering. To illustrate the idea, imagine you are walking thr...