no wait…

i remember a short spell when i may have let some info slide on one of those discount goods sites. an invitation from my young nefew who may have received some recompence for my visit. i really don’t remember giving whoever it is my phone number but apparently i must have. stupid, i know. must have been a momentary clouding of my usual crystal clear online protocol. things you do for family!

so maybe i did sign myself up?

you see, whoever it is on the other end of whatever it is i inadvertently signed up for, has been calling my home telling me i have won some sort of trip that involves a cruise or disneyland or some combination of both. you’d think winning a trip would be grand, but i know from experience that there’s usually a catch to most trips i “win”. why can’t they give me the tv or the car or even a free donut for  boston creaming out loud!

so, assuming a hidden agenda, my good wife has deftly dealt with several calls from less than forthcoming agents. i was in the room once and the agent tried to pass herself off as a friend. oh, hey. it’s kathy. can i speak to garry please. shan didn’t take the bait but it took several more questions and evasive answers to get the purpose of the call. i declined to talk and the agent was kindly asked to take us off whatever list our number is on.

well, today was the first time i was around to pick up. didn’t get the guy’s name, don’t even know what company it is that wants to hook me with a freebie, but as soon he said disney something happened deep inside me. could have been digestive issues. i got my back up real fast. this is the third call and three strikes and your out. these people seem adamant to prove to me that i gave them my information. i realize i have been denying this up until now. funny thing, if i did give my phone number, i still fudged my birthday – 1993 baby!

still, the dude made me mad. i don’t care if i signed up or not, please stop calling me and take me off your list. my voice climbing in pitch as i realize the guy is talking over me the whole time. let me tell about your trip, he says, you are going to have such a fun time. really? you are aware of my recreational preferences, disney trip guy? i don’t want the trip, i say. i don’t like disney. i am sorry i ever signed up. please, for the love of all that is good and pure, stop talking! the previous may not be verbatim but i did end by yelling don’t you ever call me again! agent still droning on about something else that i didn’t care about. if i had a rotary phone i would have slammed it down but had to settle for fiercely poking the end button instead.

it was at this point i to see both kids looking at me with these looks on their faces – something between bewilderment and awe. hmm. these people keep calling me, i say, i tried to tell them to stop but they just keep calling. is shouldn’t have yelled, should i?

we all go back to what we were. moments later the doubt rolls in. what if it’s actually a free trip, all expenses paid?

moments after that: whatever. disney doesn’t have a soul.

that and i can’t afford airfare.

Time management, forward thinking, planning for the future are a constellation of practices that have alluded me most my life. So, although my heart’s desire has always focused on creating, my inability to schedule appropriately has consistently left me with little time and energy to do so. I have barely been able to produce the minimum requirements of my role – sermons, emails, outlines for future series. Sure I cranked them out, but often at the last minute and less than my best. Flying by the seat of one’s pants is definitely a valuable skill, but after a while take offs and landings get rather choppy, painful even. My habits have been hard on me.

Something changed for me this fall. I began to practice the discipline of looking ahead with more intention and resolve. And, low and behold, I discovered that simple exercises, like keeping a solid agenda, are  liberating. Creative energy begins to flow.

Here are some very practical disciplines I am engaging in 2012 to allow for more creativity – in my work, my writing and within my relationships with family and friends:

1. Protect my mornings for study, thinking, dreaming, writing
2. Boundary email and internet surfing.
3. Everything makes it to a calendar and a to do list – all events, meetings, tasks, responsibilities – personal and professional.
4. Allot time for these things and respect the times (+/- 5-10mins)

That’s some of what I have been doing and resolve to continue in this New Year. I already feel the potential packed in a day, a week, a year. This is how I hope to make my first blog post ever (about creativity, no less) a reality in 2012.

I’ll let you know if and when I develop concrete goals for getting some writing done… but this little piece is a start.

thanks for reading.

i find it troublesome when christians create caricatures of others – exaggerating some aspects of a persons character or work while minimizing other features. this trend to grossly oversimplify another is a denial of the God-given complexity of our humanity. the degree of agreement on some issue or another shouldn’t determine the degree of grace and thoughtfulness one brings to bear on the argument. speak with candor and illuminate truth for certain, but for the love of God, love your neighbour! allow that others may be as complex and nuanced and intricate and sinful and redeemed as you are.

why is it that internet debates get ridiculous so quickly? this is not just within religious spheres – political discussions go south pretty quick, too.

that is all.

anykind. anytime. anyplace.

monday
day off. worked out at ungodly hour. got kids to school. groceries. some other stuff i can’t remember. tried to take care of sick wife. scored 2 goals at hockey. ice cream. bed. 8/10

tuesday
got up at an ungodly hour to read. got a kid to school. back to work. meetings times a lot. forgot about sick wife. sanded built in shelves. cleaned office fish tank. bed. coughed up sawdust. 8/10

wednesday
up at an ungodly hour to workout. family walk to schools. reading and writing at the library. took home useful books. tried to pay better attention to sick wife. weekly confession. dishes. board meeting. good falling asleep talk with sick wife. 7/10

i wish it was that easy

thursday
didn’t intend to get up at ungodly hour. boy up at ungodly hour. no kids to school. sick wife to blood test. back at library. returned mediocre books. arrived late to move stuff onto a truck. moved stuff off truck into storage unit. wrestled surprise piano off truck with another skinny guy and older gentleman with a bad back. home with bad knees no worse and back still in tact. killer mexican potluck. sat in friends living room. stole great expectations. to bed late. there’s a kid in my bed! solid 9/10

just like 1998

friday
slept through workout. felt only sort of bad about it. oldest to school. library then meeting with adminner then retrieved oldest from school. forgot lunch. ate popcorn. wrestled with googledocs version of ppt. sick wife to work. odd leftover combo for supper. wrestled two pint sized people and totally dominated. frittered on internet. 6/10 for most than up to 8/10 to finish off.

that about sums up the last 5.

tomorrow
up early? drive shan to work. hang with kids. dig a trench. to camp for AGM. reunite with shan! kids to bed. watch leafs. bed. projected: 9/10 if leafs win, a little less if they lose.

sunday
up early. breakfast with fam. to next. sing. preach. enjoy the peops. potluck. probably go home hungry. maybe play road hockey. do some marriage prep. projected: between 0/10 and 10/10. who knows…

a slice of my life in all it’s beautiful regularity.

this about sums it up.

beaming.

all fatherly ego inflation aside, the thing that makes my heart glow is how her  mother and i watched her confidence grow. water is scary place for

the ill equipped and ela’s relationship with the stuff has been rather tenuous. nerves were palpable. not anymore! although my darling still holds a healthy respect for the deeps, she knows she can kept her head above water regardless of the distance between her toes and the bottom, if only for a short time it is longer than she thinks. geesh, she’s even jumping off diving boards for nemo’s sake! this wasn’t the case just two short months ago.

i’ll be the first to say that confidence is a slippery fish. when it’s there it’s there and when it’s not, well even the easiest things feel out one’s depth. i hope it’s not a stretch to say that we’ve all had times when sureness in ourselves has all but sunk. but every once in a while, we come across something that comes easy, and life is good.

life is good here.

today i am here solo. have been swinging by on my own from time to time in the last few weeks. sometimes to work on my course, but more often to think and pray. i have been finding this silly little spot a sacred space. i didn’t know that God decided to meet folks at 275 queen street, but i know we’ve had a few rendezvous recently.

today i couldn’t wrap my mind around another day in the big empty building, cold and dark. i jotted a note to tim to say where i was in case he came by and headed over. i nestled into a sunny booth with a familiar royal blue mug of bitter brew. the cups are small, but the refills are steady so i really don’t mind. today i felt a sense of expectation, like i was waiting for a familiar face to show up. i thought maybe i was waiting for tim, or brett, a bell worker who takes coffee breaks here over the best toast in town. but as i opended my buechner book, i looked across the table to the empty seat and realized that i was not alone. with grattitude, comfort and some tears, i read. the words i heard were how we all long to be saints, which is what being human really means, and that such an endeavour is not nearly so hard as it may feel. that in the midst of it all we come across a pearl for which all others pale in comparison. that as much as we pursue the kingdom of joy and life, it pursues us.

i’m not sure why God has chosen this author as a voice to speak with me, but he has and he does. a thin place is what the celts called such moments. you know, those times and spaces where the spiritual seems to be so close to the firm reality of things. where tables and benchseats, mellow waitresses and coffee, black type on white pages convey the very presence of God.

thanks Dad, i needed this…

these and many more, every year on channel eleven. every year it cracks me up. will ferrell knows how to milk the awkward shtick.

sometimes i wish i was a human raised by elves…

sponsor me here! it’s all for a good cause – raising awareness and funds for prostate cancer research.

word.