The Word Defunct Applies Here

I'm sure this will come as somewhat of a surprise to both of you who read my bi-monthly musings, but I have decided to hang up my hobby of writing for therapy because it has turned into just the opposite. It's too stressful, what with being one of the few souls I know without a home computer, let alone an ipod. This is just not the time, I suppose...

Not only are most of my thoughs completely not cogent or humorous at the moment, they are decidedly blah and not fit for consumption on a mass scale. "This too shall pass" always applies, but until then...

Many of you are wondering what the heck hole I have crawled under when I plan on emerging. I guess I am still digesting this year, and that has come at the expense of many friends here and abroad. You know who you are and I miss you. Thank you for your patience.

Oswald Chambers:
We have the idea that God rewards us for our faith, and it may be so in the initial stages. But we do not earn anything through faith— faith brings us into the right relationship with God and gives Him His opportunity to work. Yet God frequently has to knock the bottom out of your experience as His saint to get you in direct contact with Himself. God wants you to understand that it is a life of faith, not a life of emotional enjoyment of His blessings. The beginning of your life of faith was very narrow and intense, centered around a small amount of experience that had as much emotion as faith in it, and it was full of light and sweetness. Then God withdrew His conscious blessings to teach you to "walk by faith" ( 2 Corinthians 5:7 )...

Faith by its very nature must be tested and tried. And the real trial of faith is not that we find it difficult to trust God, but that God’s character must be proven as trustworthy in our own minds. Faith being worked out into reality must experience times of unbroken isolation. Never confuse the trial of faith with the ordinary discipline of life, because a great deal of what we call the trial of faith is the inevitable result of being alive. Faith, as the Bible teaches it, is faith in God coming against everything that contradicts Him— a faith that says, "I will remain true to God’s character whatever He may do." The highest and the greatest expression of faith in the whole Bible is— "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him" ( Job 13:15 ).

Still chewing on this one...Until next time, my friends - peace.

Gesundheit

Why is it the weirdest thing to me when i sneeze in a public place and a total stranger says "bless you."? I just cannot believe that this bizarre carryover from the middle ages is still a part of everyday life in 2005. I just sneezed out some more coffee dust (probably - i think that's what my problem is) and the guy next to me at the library pipes up with his blessings. Thanks, dude - i'm cool because i sneezed and i'm wearing my special garlic pendant around my neck. WHAT?

No! People don't even make small talk on an elevator going down from the 130th floor to the lobby, but people of all personality types and religious convictions are don't want to be left out of the opportunity to acknowledge that you just sneezed and that their good wishes for happiness and peace are with you. And then it's back to business as usual. People think they can just traipse in and out of my life with good tidings and peace on earth everytime they hear "aaah choo!" and i think something should be done about the insincerity of it all. Seriously.

Monochromatic Mealtime

Most people don't really seem too interested in the fabric of our marriage, an inside look at what makes it tick or how different, exactly, are we. They want to know what kind of cooking expertise I bring to our little home. How many different types of spelt bread i can make substituting olive oil for every igredient. How many times a week i open something with a can. How many varieties of basil I have growing in my window sill. Well, folks, we have windows, but we definitely don't have window sills (another blog, another time: why our apartment/townhouse resembles a 1980s beachside villa). Sorry. And i tried the basil-from-the-seedlings thing and they grew to tower just over 3 centimeters. Great.

So, I decided instead of trying to become a great cook, I'll just do what I know how to do. Incorporate food as table/room decoration instead of bodily nourishment through a failsafe method that I like to call edible monocromatimaticism. Basically, I just pick one of my favorite colors and cook four or five things of the same hue and arrange them on a white plate. Then Alex and I change into a shirt of a matching gradation and we dine. Bon colour appetite :)

Author's note:

Yes, that is a dominoes box, and yes we are avid players.

Blogging is so arrogant.

Nobody, I guarantee this, would write so much about minutae if they weren't totally convinced that their lives were more interesting or quirky or profound or illustrious than joe lunchbox's life. Just wanted to get that out there. I know for a fact that my life is not any of the above but i like my writing to ironically seem that i do. Make sense? It's all in the irony.

So how do you title a blog that is only truly pertinent to you and everything you without sounding vague and ambiguous in light of the fact that thousands of people who aren't you will be reading? Impossible.

I am writing this from the public bibliotheque where this computer and the thousands of books and dvds and other resources i don't need to know about since i'm not going for a ph.D are glorious manifestations of my tax dollars truly at work.

I have been grotesquely (if that is possible) out of touch with my consituents for a really long time now, and I realized that that is why i have had nary an interesting or funny thing to write about, and the reason my former blog grew mold on it. I don't know what i am going to write about, but darn it i have a new Social Security card and a new drivers license so a new blog was the next step.

How's married life. Magical and mystical and great even when it's hard. Which is why it's a far cry from dating life. Yeesh...Plus now I get to use my Crock Pot at least 3 times a week :)

Thank You note writing must commence in t-minus 30 minutes and counting or today is a failure.

So, I'm doing this. I don't get to write anything now with the buffer of at least an ocean or two between us (except for Judy and Genevieve - boo.) Scary, I welcome conflict, also or discussion - so bring it. Affirmation is good, too.