PeaceBang

PB and EC in ME

I’m spending a couple of days with The Eclectic Cleric up here in beautiful Portland, Maine. Tim is getting around very well in his wheelchair (thank god I have a small SUV, ’cause it fits handily in the back). We watched a Seadogs game last night and had a great time. Today we went out for breakfast and then went to Staples to get our “school supplies.” I will have you know that the EC writes with chubby Ticonderoga pencils and that he erases his mistakes with big, neon nubby erasers.
Also of scandalous report: he favors paper clips in extremely silly shapes.

We’re having sushi for dinner tonight but only if he takes a nap first. Timmy, are you reading this?

Meet Ups

Have any of you ever attended a MeetUp? I’m a big believer in social networking as a positive way to create instant community, so I try to attend them a few times a year at least. I like the democratic nature of these things: loosely organized, open to anyone, very reliant on people’s flexibility and good will. Sometimes the organizer is a dingbat and fails to make the group easy (or possible) to find. Sometimes you wind up on a sort of blind date with one other person who shows, even though eight people said they’d be there. Sometimes it’s a great, rowdy time. Sometimes it’s a great, rowdy time that turns into a depressing display of alcoholism and loneliness and you have to back out the door and make a run for it. Sometimes the movie/music/dancing/event is awesome, sometimes it’s dull or pretentious, and sometimes you drive around looking for parking for so long you give up in frustration and go home.

I still want to attend local Spanish language MeetUp but I haven’t gotten up the nerve. The folks who sign up for it seem to be nearly fluent and I’m nervous that I’d sit there sucking down sangria and thinking of grammatically-correct phrases five minutes after someone asks me a question or directs a comment my way. “Si! Muy bien!” ::staring down at my burrito:::

But this new Meetup looks right up my alley. I think if you do it right, you probably don’t even have to find parking… you can just attend on the astral plane. I wouldn’t even have to wash my hair.

Everything is Broken

After a big storm the other day, the stove broke, my two satellite receivers had to be replaced, and my modem seems to have burnt out too.

So I’ll be off-line for a few days (believe me, I could use it!) but please keep commenting and reading. If you don’t see your comments right away don’t despair like that woman who wrote a comment about how she was rich and how all the anti-rich people commenters to one of my posts were causing her to bleed from her soul and didn’t anyone CARE? I didn’t have a chance to moderate her comment for 24 hours but by that point she had already posted again saying that she had no choice but to conclude that no one DID care. I tried to e-mail her to say “Listen, don’t take it personally, I was out of town and no one has even seen your comment yet, let alone had a chance to respond,” but she had made up the e-mail address AND the domain name so the e-mail never went through.

I’m tellin’ ya.
See you soon.
Peace.
Bang.

At the New York Public Library

A friend and I went to see the Gutenberg Bible at the New York Public Library recently and it was marvelous. We marveled at it, and over the fact that one page of it gets turned once a month or week. I don’t remember because in a display right behind the Gutenberg Bible was the REAL, ACTUAL Winnie-The-Pooh and friends!!

Guess which display we spent way more time squealing over!

Also super cool in the same gallery was the portrait of 18th century kick-butt-and-take-no-prisoners feminist Mary Wollstonecraft.

Did you see how Piglet is all small and flat and made of something silky and how he kind of looks like a little cushion? Also, you can’t see it in the photo but Eeyore actually has a real pin in his tail.

Girl On a Bike

A friend and I were having a bit of a giggle this past Sunday at the expense of the Serious Weekend Cyclists I refer to as “Codpiece Gents.” You know these guys. All dressed up in their Lycra shorts and alien headgear, wearing $600 cycling shoes, a skin-tight mesh shirt with some Italian or French logo on it, and taking themselves DEADLY SERIOUSLY. They whiz in front of your car hell-bent for nowhere in particular, they congregate loudly and self-importantly outside your favorite coffee joint, and they ride bikes that cost more than your car. They have very tight tushies, low cholesterol and a resting heart beat that puts yours to shame, and I’m sure they’re good to their wives and children (because as my gay male friend pointed out, they’re not gay, they just really like displaying their fit, fit bodies).

They make me laugh every time I see them. “Go, Spandex Boys, go!” I say to myself as they peddle furiously by. Because, you know, they’re just. so. serious. I like to cheer them on. They mostly seem to be Captain of Industry types and I’m sure they really need the release that biking gives them. I get it, I just think it’s unintentionally hilarious.

Thinking of these guys is what made me fall instantly in love with the gal in New York City yesterday.
I was sitting on the steps of the New York Public Library — you know, by the lions — waiting for a friend when I saw her. A beautiful girl in a skirt riding a simple bike — a Schwinn Breeze for God’s sake — the kind of bike you ride when you’re just trying to get somewhere. She rode fearlessly down 5th Avenue in front of a bus — no helmet, no Lycra, just a girl on a bike trying to make it to a date.

Here’s the bus she arrived just ahead of before she got off the bike and hauled it effortlessly up two levels of stairs like this one,

And here she is with her guy and her green (!) Schwinn Breeze,

I don’t know who you are, intrepid and beautiful young biking gal, but thank you for making me so happy and for giving me such a wonderful memory. I should advise you to wear a helmet, but I’m not going to. Because like the old Billy Joel song says, I love you just the way you are.

Why I’m Loving On Rev. Gidget Right Now

PeaceBang reader Rev. Gidget sent me a link to a trip to Turkey hosted by The Society For Biblical Studies. I am doing the whoo-whoo happy dance because this is EXACTLY what I wanted at EXACTLY the perfect time, and how often does that happen??

I have been searching for a week on-line for something that was religiously-themed but not Bob Jones University material and here Barb came to my rescue with this totally perfect option and for that I owe her a million billion thanks and also some cocktails on me when we next see each other. Can you tell that I’m breathless?

On a related note, did you check out the faculty of the SBS? I know! Wotta bunch of babes, eh? So much for mainstream America’s idea of the stereotypical egghead Bible scholar! Smart, fit and gorgeous isn’t what I expected but I ain’t complainin’. It’s just… well, can I keep up with these Indiana Jones hotties? Good thing I have almost a year to work my walking legs and touring tootsies, and NO CUTE SHOES are going with me on *this* one. We’re limited to one bag, anyway. What, no separate suitcase for my toiletries? What if I want to give myself an Aveda tourmaline face masque in Kudasi? What if I want to paint my toenails in Athens?

In all seriousness, though… there’s a focus on the god Asclepius on this tour, people! And he and I are like THIS.

Excuse me, I must go do the happy dance again. Max will join me, as he’s very good at it (think Snoopy dancing to Schroeder’s music).

Sabbatical Thoughts

I can’t imagine anything more amazing than being granted a paid sabbatical from one’s work, but I must say that the planning for it is far more time-consuming than I had anticipated. I have this sense that this is THE BIG OPPORTUNITY and want to cram in every bit of travel and learning possible, only to remember colleagues’ advice not to over-plan.

Some ministers take classes during their sabbaticals, or return to seminary for a semester. I’m in a very different place in my continuing education: having just completed coursework for a Doctor of Ministry degree, I should probably avoid the classroom for my sabbatical.

I still want to travel the USA and podcast and blog “Some Good News About Religion” by driving to visit you all and see you in your church/houses of worship setting. I want to hear the ridiculous, the divine, the heart-breaking and the triumphant stories about religious community. But I do not relish the idea of spending 8 weeks on the road.

So far, I envision this:

Early January: teach an intensive course on worship at my seminary. I love teaching and I haven’t offered the class yet this year.
Later January: go somewhere Spanish-speaking and warm, take an intensive Spanish language course, and rest for 2-3 weeks. Any ideas for locations, escuelas?
Mid- February through March: Travel the USA and collect stories for “Some Good News About Religion.” Start by driving South down Eastern seaboard, cut across the South/Southwest, drive up California, return home by Northerly route. (Eek, this sounds exhausting.)
April: Travel to Partner Church in Transylvania for a week or so and then travel to Turkey for Bible-themed tour (the latter is a deep desire I’ve had for a long time). Again, any ideas, recommendations?
Two weeks in May: Home, rest, re-entry.

This might be way too crazy and over-ambitious.

Funeral Arrangements

Since I’m getting on a plane on Sunday, I decided to update my funeral arrangements and obituary for the first time since 2006. I changed a few hymns, provided more phone numbers, and added a few items for my obit.

I made it explicit that SweetieBang has care of my four-legged children and should preside over distribution of my possessions. Rev. Perpetua is entrusted to be Major Domo for a memorial service, with a team of minister buds I hope would help her in any way she needed. I find that I still want to be buried in white pajamas with a cotton quilt tucked around me, in a pine box (a romantic notion — I know by law I’ll probably have to be put in a stupid vault). I would like it if friends would put sprigs of fresh rosemary and lavender on top of the casket or in there with me. I don’t want to be embalmed if there’s any way to avoid it — I left instructions to my friend Bob the undertaker to “keep me on ice, if need be!”

I chose music and wrote out all the details of my biography so no one will have to compile all that nonsense on my behalf. I left SweetieBang a big passel of emergency numbers since he would have NO IDEA where to start if I perished.

This is a really satisfying exercise. Have you done it? It’s not legally binding or anything, but it’s not for that purpose anyway. It’s about not leaving people you love to try to figure out what the heck to do to dispose of your remains (if there’s any of you left to dispose of) or to discern how you would like to be memorialized when they’re blind-sided by grief and loss. So seriously, do it. For them.

Whirlwind

Hola, chickadees!

I am currently on a five-week sabbatical from church and taking an intensive course in the spiritual discipline of discernment. I leave on Sunday for the Festival of Homiletics.

It was SO HARD not to go to church yesterday… but it helped that I’ve had a stomach bug and a bad back for a few days. It took the strength of ten men not to call my DRE and ask, “HOWDITGO?”

This time away from the rhythms of church is interesting. I sometimes can’t figure out what day it is. I read for three to four hours a day, spend hours thinking and figuring things out (how is God really calling me and my congregation to use my sabbatical time next year? What does it mean that my life has changed so radically in the past six months? How does the body respond to letting go of consistently hurtful and even abusive relationships?) and write papers. I am working on a 20-page paper that is due for another class. If it wasn’t for SweetieBang and PuppyBang, I’d probably stay in my pajamas until 2 pm and eat cereal for every meal. Having the guy and the dog here give me different kind of energy and a focus outside of myself, thank Gods. I use laundry and cooking as welcome distractions from brain work (although I don’t hesitate to yap at SweetieBang if I need him to contribute more in that arena).

I await the birth of a healthy, precious Baby Philocrites. I hope to fit in a Washington, DC trip in July for ChaliceChick’s birthday soiree. Life is so sweet, and having things to look forward to make it even sweeter. Some people counsel always to live in the moment but as far as I’m concerned, some moments aren’t worth giving that much attention to. Most moments these days are, and I’m so grateful for that I could toss a bunch of flowers in the sky just for God.

Easter Joy With Bologna Ears and a Tail

He is one year old.

He came to us already named Max. It’s a name that I love because of the character Max Bialystock in my favorite movie, “The Producers.” SweetieBang loves it for its reference to “Where The Wild Things Are.”

I have wanted a dog forever but vowed that I would never get one while I was single — too busy, away from home too often, etc.
SweetieBang is just as insane about dogs as I am and we planned to get one this summer; maybe a French bulldog or a yellow lab or some kind of labby mix. But of course that’s never how it works. Greg works right by the local shelter and as anyone hankering after a dog will do, he stopped in to have a look. And there was Max. And Greg fell in love. He came home and woke me from a nap and said, “Come with me to meet Max.” I read his mind immediately, jumped into my coat and we sped off right away, because I know how it is when your animal chooses you. I had to see this little guy. I had to see his little bologna ears. I adore beagles but SisterBang always warned me that they’re a HANDFUL so I never seriously considered trying to be a Beagle Mom until I met Max.

We know that beagles are incorrigible, willful dogs. We know he will bay and howl and dig and require lots of walks, lots of attention, and obedience training. Also an outdoor fenced in run. And a crate. We will spend weeks carefully introducing him to Ermengarde and she to him (he lived with a cat before and likes them — she, of course, will initially hate him). I’m sure he will chew shoes or furniture and pee and poop in the house until he’s potty-trained (what kind of dog owner doesn’t do this immediately with a puppy? We are disgusted! AND… it doesn’t help knowing that Max’s former owner was a local minister!). There will be times I rue the day I ever looked into his brown eyes and saw him nuzzle his whole little body hopefully against Greg even though I was the one holding the treats.

But he is a cuddly, sweet, affectionate pup who might be the tiniest bit not-so-bright but we love him and are brimming over with excitement to bring him home on Tuesday and make him a huge part of our lives.

So this is my Easter joy. At long, long last I will fulfill my heart’s desire to become a doggie mommy. May God bless you all with new life.

(This really isn’t the best photo. He looks kind of funny and bow-legged here and he’s not. But you get an idea of his beautiful markings. Also, jeepers creepers, where’d he get those peepers? *thump, thump*).