Social Etiquette~~~~ drawing lines of connection, not seperation.

I had a good friend from school meet me at a Christian coffee/cafe to work on mass transfer homework yesterday. It was nice to finally meet his wife, Patience, she works there. While we dug into 6-3.5, with very little success and lots of grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrs, Patience handed us both a homemade brownie. I had made my mind up the day before to not eat anything, except for my juice that i make, and there would be no if, ands or buts about it. However as i looked at the treat and thought about the intention of where it came from, my little ultimatum dwindled in comparison to the idea of her treating us and trying to give of what she had to give. I ate it gratefully and still managed to finish off the rest of my day following the previous goal. Anyways i guess the best part was how i got the idea of "little things" being so important to what makes life good or not. Then just moments later as i was focused on a deep thought, i heard "hey", "hi there", "hello". In my subconscious radar i will generally think my academic thoughts all the while i absorb the happenings around me. This man was making his way through the room towards the bathroom, and on his way, was trying to greet people he went by. The large table next to mine was filled with about 8 women who if i had to guess, would be church pillar type women. I mean ladies who all go to and are involved with the happenings in church social circles. I may be completely wrong too. Anyhow they were laughing and having livid conversation with one another in a group conscience, while the man who was not very well kept and a bit awkward, came up to them and said, "hello there" to them directly. The whole table pretended as if he didn't exist! It was so obvious and sad to see. The man paused and then went his way to the bathroom. On his way, he passed me but was looking at the floor. So while he was in the bathroom, i thought about how there have been times in my life where i avoided uncomfortable situations based on my prejudices and how much experience i have lost over the years. Then as i had just started to think about the chemistry again i heard "hey there", and looked up to see the man standing by me. We talked for quite some time and i came to realize that he was a bit different in how he processed life, but also got to talk about God and going to church and school and people he knew and some other very interesting things. But after a time he said "i better go, i am not supposed to bother the people" and i said OK it was nice to meet you and watched him leave. So i guess he probab;y goes there often and has been complained about for interrupting peoples important conversations. It kind of made me wish those women would have stopped for just a minute to hear him and realize that his day held memories too. I was glad that God gave me the chance to meet him and i hope he ends up with a good memory of talking to me too. Really in life all we get is our memories, not the stuff. I am seeing more and more just what it takes to make a difference in my own life. I look with eyes of hope and listen with ears of love and think with thoughts of service. The rest just works itself out. And when i don't use those simple tools, then things tend to go a way different direction. None of us are perfect by any means, but we can sure make the effort to live as such, following what we learn of how Jesus did it. So i guess it all comes down to really reading the Bible so as to understand The Ways of Jesus as best we can.

I found a new favorite old guy who made some lasting quotes, while doing my Bible study with my mom. We had so much fun going through the scripture together and hashing out our perspectives. In the process we heard a quote from this guy and both we're filled with a deeper understanding of Gods word, so we sought out some other quotes. We got to laugh and laugh with each other, I am so grateful she is my friend and mother!!!

"If you develop the absolute sense of certainty that powerful beliefs provide, then you can get yourself to accomplish virtually anything, including those things that other people are certain are impossible."

"The happiest people are those who think the most interesting thoughts. Those who decide to use leisure as a means of mental development, who love good music, good books, good pictures, good company, good conversation, are the happiest people in the world. And they are not only happy in themselves, they are the cause of happiness in others."

"If at first you don't succeed, find out if the loser gets anything."

"This is the first test of a gentleman: his respect for those who can be of no possible value to him."

The professor asked his students to discuss the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins' "sprung rhythm" technique. One young man handed in his exam reading, "Only God knows the answer to your question. Merry Christmas." Professor Phelps returned the paper after Christmas with the note, "Happy New Year. God gets an A—you get an F."

William Lyon Phelps (January 2, 1865 - August 21, 1943 New Haven, Connecticut)

Water, what is it good for?

I t holds that a large pole, aimed at a small piece  of fruit, high up a limbless tree, on a very windy day could best describe the circular reasoning that many people are engaging with respect to water allocation and management of the United States Midwest. With consideration of the overall issue, Steven Chu’s comment “There’s a two-thirds chance there will be a disaster and that’s in the best scenario”, may be the best gauge to guide a “which way should we go?” type question. Even before we do exhaustive data collection and analysis, we may be better served by envisioning if there is even a problem. With all of our current data and predictive modeling tools, even the most conservative evaluations have deemed a better than 50% chance, that needed water access will become a crisis; leading to a catastrophe if unaddressed.  It’s almost funny, not quite, that people in such areas like Las Vegas feel money can buy their way out of future hardships as they arise, and it also seems they would be willing to place an “all in bet” on what basically amounts to betting against the “house”.

Ideally we as a culture will break down the root issue and collaborate as a national community to inherently ward off the harmful scenarios which seem to be looming just around the corner. Every engineer knows the foundation to any system analysis where quantification is sought, needs to address an energy or mass balance. If we look at the realism of our future dilemma, it can be traced directly to the “out” portion of such a balance. This is to say quite bluntly that we must reform our understanding of what an acceptable amount of use is. So many functions of agriculture incur the use and or production of fuel that in turn creates economic cycles, but they don’t incur real additive benefit to the community at large.

We are capable of increasing our food production and decreasing the agricultural water drain, however, this would have impact on large stockholders who garner the majority voting power amidst a system of supposed equality. If a diligent interaction between what we as consumers use per day and what is provided, took place, we may have a model to account for allotment of water in a manner consistent with sustainability. Incorporation of infrastructure upgrade and reengineering of existing ideology will also boost the repair of, what in all reality, is not a crisis. When we are talking about a foundational staple of life, like water, even the remote threat of its extinction, should be emphatically labeled a catastrophe.

Hebrews 13:8 "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever" ~~~~The way the apostles sought Jesus and loved Jesus and the way He sought them and loved them holds the same opportunity and importance for me today, He is alive and real and ready for me to live united with Him. Praise you Father GOD for your love, keep me from sin and build in me a clear path to share your will. in Jesus name~amen~

inevitably cycles tend to due just that, cycle. Each time I pass by some familiar moment i either reminisce or fret about it. For what has been going on days now, i have wanted to pour my mind onto the screen about a Furry Fox and a Pair of Eagles, yet i keep getting diverted? Driving home tonight i realized; what was possibly going on, had to do with my inability to get my thoughts out. I guess i may have these other mental dilemmas stacking up, which are corrupting my connection to the images of the animals i want to get at. Reminds me of the codex the computer geeks use to scramble video data, only problem is they know the code and I haven't been versed in it.

i have made thousands of choices, millions, trillions--- well lots of them, over my time. In the early years i was so confident; that a second guess never occurred, even knowing that all of them weren't good ones, i still never hesitated. I basically just relied on the mental odds and was willing to hash out the errors as best i could. Lately i see how much damage that technique created amidst the flow of my river of intent, and i debate when can i actually trust my intuition? God has been so faithful to make all i do, come to a point of purpose and goodness in His will/plan, yet i know i am accountable all the same, to actuate my decisions in the best concordance of Him as I can. The hurts of being left when i need help most have only happened by others, God has a way of catching me when my knees buckle, just in time. He stands beside me when i am at full strength and have a strong stride going. Still when i am trying to place my hope and faith in someone to love it doesn't bode well when the buckle comes.  People get the best love from each other when they are simply living together on the same boat going to the same place. Of course that place has to be God's House or else it wont work :).  So why then will those same people guide my hand towards something they seek? Should we guide our own hands and just let that action be the guide to those around us? I love and want to honor others' concern and direction, but i can't tell what their motive is and I know I can't trust my own choices always, so how can i trust theirs? I truly know i can trust God, but what about when i am hearing Him in my own petition and not His revelation? Either way, He calls me to Faith and I will resound my love and belief in Him all the while i fret over these pressures of self and others which makes me wishy washy!!! Drats, that is exactly what I don't want to be!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Well I was driving home last Thursday about 4pm on the edge of town, but more so in the Hills, when a brilliant Red Fox the size of a medium to large dog bounded out into my lane. He looked right at my eyes as he pounced (wait that's only for cats) as he again bounded to the next lane of traffic where a vehicle coming the other way locked up its brakes and the noise of the tires dragging on the pavement forced the fox's neck to spin round at which point his body came to a sudden halt right there in the road. I stopped my car by this time and was just observing every detail of the moment with a calm embrace of what God was sharing with me. He has blessed me so often with amazing interaction to His creation that i just drop all my thoughts and pay attention when it happens. The Fox pondered for such a short moment, but i could tell it was an eternity to him, and them he twirled around with his claws scraping the pavement and leaped back where he had come from. In a frantic effort he sped his way up the rough slope to my right and found a temporary haven or better yet, vantage, to recollect himself. I could still see his eyes and almost feel his heart beat. As I drove on to my house so many thoughts bounced around till before i knew it, i was thinking about who knows what and for why! Didn't really give it any more thought. Saturday I was sitting at home reading this amazingly deep book about the evidences of our God and the truth of creation and Christ's life and salvation for us. Dr Guliuzza from church, gave the book to me in a very random manner during the previous week's church service, which somehow was just what needed to happen in order for my attention to be directed at actually picking it up and reading it. Thank you God for little things and your intimate knowledge of my inner most quirks and hang ups!! Anyhow, I got a call from my mom that Maranda (my sister), my dad and herself were all meeting for some tasty vittles at the Saigon restaurant and she wanted to know if i was able to come. I lept at the idea knowing that i needed to get going anyhow, because at 7pm we were going to have a prayer gathering at the church and i really was looking forward to it. Note, while reading in the book, i came to a full pouring out of tears down my cheeks, no sobbing, just rivers of tears flowing out. I have had this happen many times before, when I am in the midst of the Holy Spirit, so i wasn't in general shock, just mystified by the timing. The reading was just such clear understandings and well worded relations of the overwhelming truth of Jesus and all He did, does and will do. I am utterly grateful and humbled by it all and can't even try to express it. So again, off to meet the family I went and i am thinking it was about 3-ish in the afternoon. Coming off a hill nearing the towns edge, i was looking at a vantage of this large reddish-orange cliff of limestone and high above it were these massive figures against the vivid blue skyline. I immediately locked onto a pair of brilliant white heads and tails which were outliers of a pair of ominously large black bodies. These two Eagles were not the size of the ones i have seen in the past around the Black Hills, more like a pair of vastly transient creatures who came from, only God knows where. Each one was banking in perfectly, fast, slow motion with the other, it wasn't something that made sense, yet it did. The strength and purpose of their togetherness, won my emotion and thought with dazzling abruptness. Immediately i realized i was driving over the exact same spot where my buddy the Fox had experienced his turmoil and frustration just a day or so earlier. I couldn't help but think introspectively on my own being a bit, comparing the trials of that Fox amidst the hectic and unforgiving; almost alien surroundings, he found himself in while trying to get across the road. My introspect led me to the notion that i am here on this earth, which is my road to cross, and i feel just like he did so many times. Yet still I find myself hurling back and forth between all the decisions "I" have control over. In every one I get the same results, just different degrees of the different variables. A little more safety, but less of my hearts desire if i go this way; and more of the goal (i think i need) laced with fear and anxiety, if i go that way and so on and so on. The entirety of these thought proceses occur in a blink of an eye while my mind is busy just visually downloading all the images as they occur simultaneously relating them to the ones from before. Like the drawing force a light has on our eyes in a dark and deep vast night sky, my mind lept to the Eagles and their presence in what was basically the same place as the Fox. They would've been able to  see everything that had happened to the Fox, and been able to get involved with him had they chosen, but they also had the option of separation from the ordeal. When God opened the eyes of my heart and let me see Him and know Him, the Holy Spirit came to live in me. I think that is when i got my wings and also got my gift of separation from the inherent chaos my life can fall into. When I pray in Jesus name by the power of the Holy Spirit to My Father in Heaven, I am lifted high to a place where I can circle with GOD and see all of the mayhem below with clear resolve. My love of the souls below, who resemble the Fox, from this view is vastly stronger. I see so clearly how hard they strive to get what they are after when it isn't even there to be got. When i forget to pray and live in the truth which i have received, i drift lower and lower untill all i can see, is two dimensions being, what lay in front of me and that which lay behind. This whole loss of a dimension is my trap and prison where any cycle will still be just a fruitless yearning for what isn't even there. Father God, i want to think of You and know You and be lifted to where You soar and the cycles are true spirals of growth towards Your eternity. Eagles mate for life as I am His for life!!!!!!!!!! and then some!!!!!!!!!!!! Its the "and then some" where i will keep my eyes, not on the things of this world, like the fox when he loooked into my eyes.

~Isaiah 40:21-22
²¹ Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood since the earth was founded?
²² He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth,
and its people are like grasshoppers.
He stretches out the heavens like a canopy,
and spreads them out like a tent to live in.


 ~Isaiah 40:31
³¹ but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

Psalm 103

Of David.
¹ Praise the LORD, my soul;
all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
² Praise the LORD, my soul,
and forget not all his benefits—
³ who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases,
⁴ who redeems your life from the pit
and crowns you with love and compassion,
⁵ who satisfies your desires with good things
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

DURING a HIKE into THE night~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~o*)


I lock onto thoughts before i am sure of there origin. I graze upon spired mounds of fluffy chocolate like a cookie monster with no stomach. I slide along lonely little paths claiming comfort in the maze of visual layers. I bribe sedentary action with heated promises for a sip of joy in time, this time. I breathe and wait and eat and state the way with lighted horizons of veiled mystery where i can devour the moon with a sleek pair of chop sticks. I am always never alone

You intended to harm me, but GOD intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.______Genesis 50:20>

Father God i pray tonight for your love and relationship with me to grow! Thanks for being and reaching me in your perfect way that made no sense to me until after the fact. Today was one of those days I will always remember even though i wasn't on some grand geographic adventure. I just stayed in my hometown. We started by celebrating my Dads birthday at the Colonial House Restaurant with all the family, it has been a tradition for some time and the staff and owners treat us like royalty, well family anyhow :)   It was so good to see my sister and her children there with open arms and a want of just being together. Then with full bellies it was off to church on a Saturday! The church health team put together a prayer summit of sorts. 50 plus lovers of Christ sat in a large circle praying and speaking scripture and singing and crying and laughing and loving and thinking and listening and sharing and shoe swapping and eating and hugging and praying and singing and communing and thanking and just being Gods children and brothers and sisters in Christ our Savior!!!!!!!!!! It was just what the doctor ordered. I am decided that every single SOUL on this planet has hunger, spiritual hunger, yet only a few have figured out where to eat!!! Today we were at an all you can eat buffet! Father God i pray that we will be faithful to heed your challenge and your call, to show the others where the plates and forks and cups are so they can get in line to dish up. Use me my King as you see fit and thank you for showing me the way of living in the light. This all led me back to my cabin to share homemade chili (which i chopped of my left thumb in the making) with a group of Christian men who have made a commitment to being more than just a title of Christian men. We prayed and ate and listened and studying and sang and trusted and shared and planned and dug and made decisions and prayed and gave thanks, it was a perfect ending to a perfect day. To God be the glory for He is HOLY, HOLY, HOLY!!!!  There is just something when we are alone, just men who I know inside love God and want to be good people, that is so unusual to me. I am decided that I want it to be oh so usual!!!  My chains are gone, I've been set free--- my God my Savior has ransomed me!! I don't have to live in the past, I get to remember the past and fortify my future with it. The people i choose to be around makes all the difference in my life and consequently the way I affect other lives. Thanks to a great friend who holds a piece of my heart and whose inspiration of writing has shown me the way to thought expression. JANUARY 7th 2012 out!!!
HOLY IS THE LORD GOD ALMIGHTY !!!

Sound Carpentry makes all the difference

It just so happens that I will be finishing with all the mental cramming a final semester of college can throw my way, at my grandfathers desk. I hadn't thought much of it until today when we haled the wooden old style executive desk up to my house from Hot Springs. My Gramps is gone almost a year now and I feel just as close to him today as I did then. He had such a distinct character and way about him that I can sense him just by thinking. This desk would have made him very happy in its new use and I think getting to sit here will stamp a new flavor on my memories that are yet to come. Thanks Gramp for all your love and sound wisdom about the duties of life, they are still guiding my choices and will always.