Going Home

My cousin’s funeral is set for Tuesday, March 14 at 10 am.  I was fortunate enough to get a 6 am flight on Tuesday scheduled to get me into RDU at 8:30, so even if there are delays, I should be able to make it.  Then the meteorologists decide there’s going to be a nor’easter in the City.  They forecast blizzard like conditions from Monday midnite thru Tuesday midnite.  We’d spent Monday in Albany lobbying politicians for more money for housing.  So I’m thinking I’ll come home from Albany, maybe hit the gym, maybe not, and head to the airport about midnite in case there really is a snowstorm.  That way I can beat it, and hopefully there won’t be too much accumulation before my 6 am flight.

On the way to Albany I get a message from the airline that my flight has been cancelled.  I start to rebook, but we lost the signal, and because I’m a genius I didn’t think it was that big a deal.  We go to Albany, we have a VERY productive meeting with a couple of State Senators, and get on the bus to come home.  I use my phone as a hotspot instead of relying on the bus’s wifi, and look at the airline’s options.  There’s a 4 pm flight and an 8 pm flight, both out of Newark.  The 4 pm isn’t even possible since we didn’t leave Albany til after 2;  the 8 pm could possibly work.

Long story short:  traffic was a bear, which slowed us down.  I made a conscious effort to remain calm and rely on God’s Will.  We got off the bus, I got in my car and amazingly zipped through 5:00 traffic in the South Bronx.  I’d told myself that if I got home by 5:30, I might have a chance.  It was 5:29 when I pulled into the parking lot.

I go into the house and can’t find the duffel bag I’d wanted to use.  I found another one, and managed to stave off the OCD enough that I didn’t go through every pocket in it reminiscing about what I might have used it for.  Instead, I put in my robe and stoles, grabbed some stockings and some dressy-ish boots, (the funeral is at a Missionary Baptist Church with a pastor whose own preferences overruled those of the family and who actually had an opinion on what type of collar I should wear), and my good black preacher suit.  Come to think of it, I should have taken a different one, but the one I took is my favorite.  Of course the jacket and skirt were in two different places, but I managed to pull them together, a collar, a gift for my brother, stuff it all in a bag, and skedaddle.  By this point I’m not watching the time. 

The bag doesn’t have wheels, and I have to schlep it to the train, with my laptop (including not-yet-completed remarks) slung across my back.  My metrocard is around my neck where I keep it for easy access.  Get to the train station, and a train is pulling up.  Except I can’t unzip my coat to get to my metrocard.  I look like a 5-year old standing there trying to unzip my coat while the train pulls out of the station.  Next train is 6 minutes later.  Plane is due to take off at 8, board between 7:25 and 7:45.  Six minutes means a lot.

But I get to the next train and get to Penn Station.  I wander around NJTransit because I don’t see any schedules or fare machines.  Go to Customer service who tells me there’s a train now on Track 10. I go to track 10, passing a ticket machine on the way and getting a round trip ticket to Newark Airport.  I meant to get money, since I forgot to bring some from home and tipped the Albany driver with my last, but the two Chase ATMs I saw were both out of service.  So I get my ticket and go to the train which is full.  No problem, I’m standing, even though there’s a lot of traffic pushing by me.  Finally decide to go to the upper level of the packed train where I immediately find a seat.

The journey to EWR was uneventful (except for the fact that my NJTransit ticket to Newark airport included the Airtrain  -- I thought I’d have to buy a separate ticket for it!), but I was on standby.  Somehow United failed to put my TSA pre-check status on my standby ticket.  It’s now 7:25 or so, I think boarding has started, and these people at Newark literally sent me walking around in a circle before I got to the TSA line.  There not only did I have to take off my shoes and take out my laptop, but my scarf fell out of the bin and got caught in the rollers. After we got that untangled, this little girl kept feeling me up.  She explained what she was gonna do, but it was basically feeling me up.  As always, I made awkward jokes about how much she seemed to like it and who should pay whom, but it didn’t serve to make her move any quicker.  She even swabbed the palms of my hands and it seemed the machine took forever to tell her there was nothing on them.  I’m thinking I’m not getting on the plane.

Then I go to the gate, which is located on bumblefuck lane in west hell.  Seriously.  It was like gate 120-something. And while there were a lot of little cart thingies, the people who were spozed to be driving them all seemed to be talking to each other. I had no confidence they’d get me there any quicker than I would get there walking, so I walked.  And walked.  And walked. And walked.  I even lamented loudly at how ridiculous it was to have a gate that far away.

I finally got to the gate and waited behind a couple of people, only to find out I was at the gate for the Los Angeles flight.  I finally got to the correct gate.  I’d checked the app, which had gone from 7 available seats to zero, and where I had gone from #6 on the waitlist to #7.  It didn’t look good.  But the woman at the counter told us to hang out.  I told God I would trust God’s decision.

Turns out there were 6 available seats on the flight.  I was #7 and the guy I was talking to was #8.  Somehow, we both made it onto the plane!! Seems three people failed to show up.  I ain’t saying it was the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, I’m just noticing three people failed to show up….

There were obstacles on every side.  Every rational indicator suggested I would not make it.  But I’m writing this from 30,000 feet (did I mention I got a window seat?), as we prepare to begin our descent to RDU where I’ll go to be with my family as we prepare to say our final goodbyes to our beloved cousin, father, husband and friend.  I’ll be talking about Faithfulness.  He was a Marine, and Semper Fi was their motto.  I’mma be talking about the faithfulness of God.  I know what I’m talking about.

What I Learned at the Spa

So it seems my latest obsession is with Korean Day spas.  There is a long-standing camaraderie of women at the Harlem Y -- for over 30 years we've sat in the nude, sweating, and steaming, sometimes scrubbing and massaging one another, and always discussing the world's issues.  Vestiges of that camaraderie (though it has waned tremendously as the neighborhood has gentrified) are what keep me at the Harlem Y rather than the gym where people eat while they do reps.  We share our womanhood as we share our communal care about our bodies.

And one day, when either the steam was coming up nice or wasn't coming up nice, or when the sauna was hot or it wasn't hot enough -- on one of those days the discussion turned to Spa Castle, some place in Queens.  Various women raved about it, enough that, even though it had scandals (including a man being found dead in one of the pools, after which it closed down for about a year), I was interested in checking it out.  I never buy anything at retail, so when a Groupon offered 40+% off, I bought one.

And it was great.  Apparently it's based on the concept of a Jjimjilbang, which you can read a wiki about here (or if the link doesn't work, just Google Jjimjilbang, or "Korean Day Spa.").  It's set up just like that, down to the color-coded uniforms.  Spa Castle had a bunch of pools:  100 degrees, 104, 106, a chill pool, a cold pool -- and a massive jacuzzi area with chairs built into the walls.  Position yourself properly in the chair, hit a button,  and you have a personal jacuzzi-massage!  It was fabulous.  The pools were all same-gender, and they required you to enter them nude.  There was lots of showering and scrubbing before getting into them, though it IS still a bunch of naked women in water....  Granted, I've been in the gym for decades and am no stranger to nudity (I actually met a nun in the steam room at AAR once; we had a delightful chat in the steamroom and later, when we saw each other during the conference, we both remarked something like "I didn't recognize you with your clothes on!" which made us the butt of jokes for the rest of that evening...) -- I'm no stranger to nudity, own whatever body issues I have, and am comfortable in my skin.  But in the spa, I very quickly I realized that pretty much EVERYBODY owned their body issues and was comfortable in their own skin.  I mean, here we are parading around in our birthday suits, and all we're concerned about is "is there any conditioner left?" or "how hot is that pool?" or "how long til I can get a massage/body scrub?"  Usually when I'm walking around a locker room with no clothes on, I'm aware of my breast cancer scar, and it's a badge of honor.  In the day spa, the only thing I thought about my breasts was to notice how they floated and wonder whether they'd hold me up if I were to pass out from the heat of the pool.  The upper floors of Spa Castle were co-ed.  Fortunately, I'd been told to wear a bathing suit under the uniform they gave me, so I was good to go in the various saunas and in the co-ed pools and Jacuzzis.  Spa Castle had outdoor pools, but since the air temperature was in the 30s, I didn't choose to brave them, though many people did.

Back at the Y, I raved about how I'd finally gone to Spa Castle, and someone told me about King Spa in New Jersey.  Sure enough, a coupla weeks later, I bought a Groupon for King Spa.  It was very similar to Spa Castle, with a couple of exceptions:  King Spa doesn't allow kids in the pools, it didn't appear to be as trendy and crowded as Spa Castle; King Spa didn't serve or allow alcoholic drinks; and it had more varieties of saunas and less pools.  It was a mellower, more chill vibe for me.

So I'm laying on the floor in one of these saunas (they have like a Rock Salt sauna, a Mineral Salt Sauna, a Yellow Ocher Sauna, an Amethyst Sauna, a Gold Pyramid Sauna, an Ice Sauna, and a bunch of other saunas with Korean names that I don't know what they mean.  There's even a little female-specific spa/herb bath with mugwort that the lady says is "good for your v-jayjay." Most of us did it out of curiosity, but one of the women said she was doing it because her friend told her that it enhances orgasms).  So I'm laying on the floor of one of these saunas.  The heat comes through the floor as well as from something in the middle or top of the room.  And I'm laying there, still and quiet, and somehow I'm able to pray and commune with God in a way I haven't done in over 30 years.  (Sidebar:  I'm really into the triune person:  body, mind, and Spirit, and I have to engage with God in all three areas or else I don't feel complete.  I realized this about myself when I was a martial artist, and I try now to maintain a strict exercise discipline, but they really need to be intentionally integrated -- you need to recognize when you are exercising that it is also a form of worship, or else it's just exercise.  The spiritual discipline is different from the purely physical one).  But I've digressed again.  As I was laying on this floor, struggling to surrender my body to the intense heat, I came to realize how incredibly broken I am.  My public persona is sort of a gloss over bandaids, duct tape, and dental floss, which all hold me together.  My life is so busy (Burdened Under Satan's Yoke), and chaotic that I have not been consistent about addressing that brokenness. I can feel it, and can duct tape and gloss it over, but at some point I need to go in and repair that brokenness.  For me, the repair doesn't happen in communal experiences, it doesn't happen through external stimuli, it doesn't even happen in supplication to God.  For me, the repairing of my brokenness happens when I calm my body and mind, open those inmost parts of my spirit, and allow God to touch and heal me in those places.  And it's not just allowing God to touch me in those places, but being still and calm and quiet and open and present enough to receive GOD'S healing touch, rather than trying to interpret it, or to put my spin on what I feel -- there's a difference between feeling the Power and Presence of God and going out and babbling about it versus feeling the Power and Presence of God, connecting with it, and surrendering to it -- even when it's contradictory to what I'd thought or wanted or imagined.  It's like in that sauna is where I can:
Be Still And Know That I Am God.
Be Still And Know That I Am.
Be Still And Know That.
Be Still And Know.
Be Still.
Be.

The Spa is where, after studying and napping and scrubbing and showering and massaging and exercising and eating and all, I can subdue my flesh, consciously and intentionally make my spirit available to God, and just Be.  In that Being, God enters in, miracles happen, and brokenness is repaired.

And that's what I learned at the Spa.

Superior Attitude, Superior State of Mind

My first tendency, sadly, is often towards self-destruction. For the first time in 15 or 20 years, this morning I actually thought I might like to smoke a joint. Then I thought I'd like to get a carry permit.

Of course, neither is a viable option for the person I am, and the only reason I mention them is because they reveal the psychic and emotional mayhem that is upon me. I'm struggling to not let 60 years of stuffed rage boil over. Didn't we go through this when we, as little kids, integrated schools in the 60s?!?!? Why are we going through it again, since even back then we knew we had to work together to change for the better???

I can't watch TV or listen to the news. I'm walking around in a fog like some kind of zombie. It does occur to me that maybe this is the way the racists felt during the Obama years. Maybe our last eight years were an unimaginable horror for people who thought the 50s and 60s were when America was "great," and who envision a great nation of straight, white, male-led, chaste-female-populated (wait. Would Melania be disqualified?), non-physically challenged -- maybe we should just say Aryan? -- people who are unwaveringly conservative in both their social and theological viewpoints. The country has just resoundingly indicated it wants to go back to those times, and I'm just not doing it.

So now I'm struggling to find a positive, peaceful, and productive way to indicate that. And I will. There's so much to process, and right now if I let go of the numbness, that 60 years worth of stuffed rage resurfaces.

And as long as I'm aware and in control of it, maybe that's not such a bad thing. Whether socially, psychically, or spiritually, we are clearly in a battle now. I was a good enough martial artist that I always fought above my belt level. I'm remembering that my most effective fighting style was to take a hit or two (not too many or too hard) while studying my opponent and letting them think they had the upper hand. Then when they got sloppy and overconfident, I'd execute and usually decimate them, even above my belt level. Thinking back on those days, I remember a line from a Stephen Segall movie: "We're outgunned and undermanned, but we're gonna win. Know why? Superior Attitude. Superior State of Mind."

Superior Attitude. Superior State of Mind. I ain't quite there yet, but I will be soon. I'm in the corner for a minute, but this is just round one. We just getting started.

Seeing Clearly; Take Me To Church

So I was cleaning my contacts, and I stumbled.  I thought I mighta torn it, but I looked at it and it didn’t look torn, so I put it in the solution and let it soak.  Contacts are 35% to 75% water, so as long as they are in the solution, they’re fine.  When I put them on, they were fine, but as the day went on and they dried out, they irritated my eyes more and more.  I barely made it through a midday meeting, got back to my office, and took out the lens.  As I did, the tear became evident, and I threw the lens out.  With no spares or prescription glasses at work, this left me with one contact in and one out. In one of my eyes I am legally blind without correction, and the other one has nearly normal sight.  Thankfully, the normal eye was the one that had the torn contact, so even with the torn lens out, I could see just fine.

Went to a game and saw my favorite ballteam struggle to win a game I’d thought they would win easily.    It seemed the opponent had this very effective defensive play in the paint.  My team seemed unable to figure it out, and kept falling for it over and over. But they finally got their act together and won by three points.  A W is a W.

After that I went down to the vigil at the Stonewall Inn.  The Stonewall is known as the epicenter of the Gay Civil Rights Movement in America, and, short of traveling to Florida, it seemed to be the appropriate place to go to stand in solidarity with the gay community.  I still maintain that terrorism directed at gay people is a human tragedy, and in stating that, I reaffirm that gay people are as much a part of humanity as anyone else.  It’s not intended to be exclusionary, like the #alllivesmatter hashtag strives to invalidate the #blackliivesmatter movement; but rather, I maintain that homophobia – and all hatred – are problems for all of humanity; while they manifest in horrible ways with the group bearing the brunt of the hatred, this continuing hatred hurts ALL humanity.

And at the Stonewall tonight, I saw a lot of hurt.  Maybe it was the smell of alcohol coming from human pores – I don’t do well with that  --  or maybe it was the young man rambling on for so long that I couldn’t tell whether alcohol or grief was the impetus for his conversation that everyone needed to “be who you are, don’t be afraid.” Maybe it was the group on the side of the vigil having a loud personal conversation while the young man was trying to speak to the crowd, or the people coming for photo ops but not paying respect, or maybe it was the way white guys shifted uneasily when I was in the crowd behind them, or the fact that the crowd was overwhelmingly white (wasn’t this an atrocity visited upon people of color?  Where are the mourners of color?).  Whatever it was, what I felt all around me was the pain of a people.  It was for Orlando, yes, but I felt the kind of pain that alcohol wouldn’t make go away, the kind of pain you feel when you’re trapped inside someone else’s impression of you, the pain that can’t be abated by conversations or mementos demonstrating how important you were.  I’m not sure exactly what it was, but I am sure that I felt – or rather, sensed -- pain all around me.

So I left the vigil after a while and went wandering around.  I came across a couple of guys talking about how homophobic the national climate has become.   One was talking about how nothing was going to interfere with his right to party, but the other one was like, “Guuurrrrlll!! It’s so bad out here, I might even go to church on Sunday.  I’ll be like, ‘Pastor, Can you save me?’”  Of course I had a conversation with him about how Jesus could save him, and how, if any pastor told him differently, he should run out of that church and find another one.  He might have been a little tipsy;  he was more interested in his new box of Fig Newtons than he was in what I had to say, so we chatted a bit more, I reminded him that Jesus loves him just as he is, and we parted ways.

But that encounter remains with me.  Christopher Street at 10:30 on a weeknight night was almost as busy as 125^th Street on a Saturday afternoon.  I would go so far as to say it’s busier than mid-morning on the main streets of all but the largest American cities.  There were scores of people walking around and eating and shopping and hanging out, in addition to those gathered at the vigil.  Clearly, I only had an interaction with a couple of them, and while a good number of the out gay people I know are devout Christians, this encounter took me right back to the party days of my youth, when Hozier’s “Take me to Church would have been the closest we’d come to singing an anthem.   While they seemed a little too old to be club kids, these guys had the club mentality, and what struck me was that going to church was only something they considered as an act of desperation!!  Even then, the thought that they could be saved by God was a concept with which they had some passing familiarity, but which they could only jokingly apply to themselves.  While I didn’t think of the song at the time, I’m betting these guys know every word to “Take me to Church.”

I’m not sounding some sort of spiritual alarm, nor trying to evoke any mass hysteria among the "saints of God."  But I do echo the words of a Facebooker named Cody Lewis who, on June 12, posted the following:

“Just so we are clear, the tragedy in Orlando wasn't caused by Islam or Islamic ideals, it was caused by you. YOU, the guy who has gay friends but won't defend them in front of others. YOU, the mom who kicked out her child for being gay. YOU, the pastor who preaches hate over love every sunday. YOU, the politician who votes against gay rights only to give blowjobs in airport bathrooms. YOU, who don't stand up for what is right and allow innocent people tge same rights as you. YOU, the weekend christian who posts about their daughters bathroom safety when their own pastor is the one with his hands where they dont belong. You did this and the blood of 50 people is on your hands. Jesus and Allah didn't have anything to do with this, this is your fault. Welcome to America, are you ashamed yet?”

Church, our children are dying in the streets.  They believe themselves to be outside the Arc of Safety, outside the reach of God’s Love, because our infantile and twisted theology has caused us to preach hate instead of love, to greet them with judgement instead of joy,  and to drive them away instead of welcoming them with open arms.  If the Blood of Jesus TRULY gives us Strength from day to day, if it TRULY reaches to the highest mountain and flows to the lowest valleys, then why in the world do people who don’t look, act, or love like us feel so utterly rejected by us?

Decades ago, before I formally accepted my call to ministry, I wrestled with it.  Part of the wrestling was because I worked in an environment that served people with HIV. I’d started working in the field when this new medical mystery called GRID (Gay Related Immune Disorder) was discovered, and God led me to work in research labs where the disease was studied, in dermatology offices where scores of young men came in, terrified they might have Kaposi’s sarcoma, and literally disrobing in front of me, an office assistant, begging for some sort of diagnosis.  Later, after working in a palliative care clinic, I found myself once again working with people nearing the end of their life’s journey.  It was in Harlem, and over the years dozens of gay young men died in our arms or in our care.  In perhaps 60-70 percent of those cases these men, in their times of greatest need, were abandoned.  I couldn’t help but notice how many times the “saints of god” abandoned their own flesh and blood to die, taking the stance that this terminal disease was a judgment from god and that they, the parents shared the judgement.  The Biblical stories of the lepers kept coming to me (‘but somebody had to take care of them, didn’t they?” “Child, hush”), and as I wrestled with this call to ministry, I just wasn’t sure I wanted any parts of an organization that could cause a person to abandon their dying child.  Fortunately, there were saints who loved the Lord and loved their children, and who believed in the Grace of God for all.  Those saintly mothers, though few and far between, helped give me some limited willingness to unite myself with those who (with their mouths, anyway) carry the label of Christ followers.

Sadly, it’s 30+ years later, and we’re still struggling with the same sorts of spiritual abandonment regarding lifestyle.  The church is still abandoning those who are Gay or Lesbian or Bisexual or Transgender or of any sexual orientation that it does not understand.  Rather than extending the love of Jesus to everyone, we decide, then pick and choose to whom we think that love should be available.  Instead of bearing the Light of Christ, we go forth with the judgement and accusations of the enemy, and when we do, we serve the enemy’s purpose – to atrophy the Body of Christ.

When I started writing, this was gonna be about gay people.  I thought I was gonna compare gay people to that torn contact lens, and talk about how, even though things may seem fine, if something's just a little bit out of order, it irritates us until we have no choice but to examine it and see that we have a big ole tear in what we thought we were looking through.  But see, the problem with that analogy is that gay people aren’t disposable.  So no matter how uncomfortable you may be around gay people, THEY aren’t the issue.  Instead of behaving like gay people are the issue, maybe we need to fix our contacts:  maybe we need to take the styes out of our eyes.  Maybe we need to remove those things in our vision that irritate us.  What if we don’t have all the answers, and the hermeneutical lenses through which we’ve been reading the Bible are not correct?  What if it’s not gay people who are the problem, but the way you look at them?  We don’t have to pluck out our eyes (Matt 18:9), but we DO have to pluck out the torn and broken lenses, pluck out the styes,  and throw them away.  Maybe we will find, just like I did with my physical eyes, something we could not have imagined:  that, even with our familiar but defective lenses removed, without the sty in our eye,  we can still see quite clearly.

I wonder if we can see our way to reach out to our LGBT Brothers and sisters, and to lovingly welcome them, responding to their pleas to "Take Me To Church"

Here is the link to the video.  https://youtu.be/MYSVMgRr6pw

And here are the lyrics:

My lover's got humour
She's the giggle at a funeral
Knows everybody's disapproval
I should've worshipped her sooner
If the Heavens ever did speak
She is the last true mouthpiece
Every Sunday's getting more bleak
A fresh poison each week
'We were born sick, ' you heard them say it
My church offers no absolutes
She tells me 'worship in the bedroom'
The only heaven I'll be sent to
Is when I'm alone with you
I was born sick, but I love it
Command me to be well
Amen. Amen. Amen

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

If I'm a pagan of the good times
My lover's the sunlight
To keep the Goddess on my side
She demands a sacrifice
To drain the whole sea
Get something shiny
Something meaty for the main course
That's a fine looking high horse
What you got in the stable?
We've a lot of starving faithful
That looks tasty
That looks plenty
This is hungry work

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

No masters or kings when the ritual begins
There is no sweeter innocence than our gentle sin
In the madness and soil of that sad earthly scene
Only then I am human
Only then I am clean
Amen. Amen. Amen

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

New Shoes

So, before Prince died, yesterday's news was spozed to be all about my new shoes.  I was -- I still am -- so excited, not only because of the shoes, but of how they showed up in my life.

A while ago, I was going to Costa Rica.  Danny told me to get Tevas, as they are a great shoe for the sorts of vacations I like -- one minute you're wading at the beach, or getting drenched in a torrential downpour, and a coupla hours later you're hiking through the jungle.  Tevas and similar shoes dry quickly and allow you to keep moving without having to change shoes.  They're also light enough that they don't weigh you down in water -- if, for instance, you were rafting and fell out of the raft, you could still swim in them.

So I didn't find Tevas the first time;  I found some Clark's of England that were made very similar to Tevas.  They are the light brown ones in the picture above, and have seen me on jaunts throughout Central America and the Southern and Southwestern United States.  They're great shoes, but are starting to show their wear.  

So I was thinking how I'd like a pair of Tevas and wondering if Skechers made this kind of shoe (it's basically a closed toe, closed heel sandal).  I looked at the Skechers outlet, but didn't find what I wanted.  So I'm driving back to NYC from Pennsylvania.  I have this random thought that "hey, PA has outlets.  I should stop at the outlets."  I Googled outlets near me, and found that there was one within 20 miles or so.  I went to it, and saw that not only was it an outlet, but it was also a casino.  At that point it occurred to me that there was nothing there for me, but I said, "well, there's a shoe store.  Let me see if I can find a pair of Tevas and a pair of Skechers like the Tevas."

So I go into this shoe store, and while it wasn't apparent at first, that's exactly what I found.  There was one pair of each left in my size, so I snatched them up!  In the photo above, I'm wearing the Skechers (they're olive green).  They are more comfortable, appear to have a slightly wider last, and have a bit more padding on the insole.  The Tevas (brown, on the right) are a bit slimmer on the last, but they have AWESOME arch support and a VERY firm sole -- they're the perfect shoe for hiking n the rainforest.

So.  I have my shoes, which I'm now wearing to work because I love them, and that's that.  There's absolutely no point to this post;  I'm just happy to have my three pairs of Teva/Teva-like shoes.  In a perfect world, my life would be such that these would be the only shoes I'd ever need....

Trip to Nicaragua, Day 2

Today was a pretty great day.  We started out early in the morning with the scooter guys bringing us two scooters.  They were nice little scooters and they did a preliminary check to see if there was any damage.   Something told me to take pictures but I didn't --  I was so excited to get on the scooter and ride it,  so we had breakfast which was huevos rancheros  -- which was fried eggs,  salsa , some gallo pinto,  something like cheese, and some white bread. The beans and rice tasted like it had grit in it;   other than that it was very good.

After breakfast we took off!  We first went to a little place called eye of water over there Ajo del agua and we swam there until a group of very loud Americans came and made it uncomfortable. There was a guy selling coconuts and so I had a pipa – drank the coconut water and ate the flesh.   Sophie had a Coco Loco which was rum and sweetened condensed milk inside the pipa.

After that we went to Charco Verde. (my notes say” someplace I forgot the name of and I don't remember what we did there either”).  We went into a Nature Preserve and hiked around .  We saw a huge Lake, and  we met a woman at the beginning of it just sitting and looking.  We went exploring, walking around the lake.  We came back and saw the legend of big boy (Chico Largo).  Charco Verde means Green Puddle in English and I think it refers to the lake.  There were two beaches, and while we saw the other one, we had a hard time getting to it.  So we roamed through the jungle a while, and then we came out to the touristy side.  We found a restaurant, but realized we’d never found the butterfly farm that was advertised at the entrance to the nature preserve.

Oh, well.  At the restaurant we had ceviche as an appetizer.  We each ordered one which was a mistake – they were huge and spoiled our dinner.  My dinner was beans and rice,  chicken , plantains and salad.  My notes say Sophie had something similar, but my memory says she had seafood soup.  Whatever.  We took to go bags and left.  Then we went back to Eye of Water (Ojo del Agua) and took pictures of Sophie.  After that we went to the beach at la Punta Jesus y Maria (the point of Jesus and Mary) to watch the sunset. Then we raced home, in the dark. It was hard for me to hold the scooter on the road with the strong crosswinds but somehow we made it.  The boys were there to pick up the scooters.  They claimed we had damaged them,  they claimed we were late,  they claimed we didn't put enough gas in them and so they ended up charging an extra $30.

Sophie was furious but by this time I was very tired.  I realized it was a hustle and I just chose to pay them even though I told them I was only paying them because they were hustling us and I was tired.  It's unfortunate because I should have have taken the pictures as I wanted to but this is what happens when you don’t follow that still Small Voice.

We came into the hotel whose name I still don't remember and then we had a lovely conversation with the  lawyer and his wife Blanca Julia. We talked about the fraud committed by the motorcycle boys and how if we had called the police (As Sophie wanted to do) we would have won. We also talked about being Christian.  The lawyer seems very interested in this and we had a long conversation about Christianity in the first world versus Christianity in developing countries.  It was fascinating.  It's interesting to me that so many North American Christians associate religion with things, with “God loves me because I have a big house,”  or “God loves me because I make a lot of money”  or whatever --  Prosperity Gospel. However I am seeing people who struggle on a daily basis just to exist and these people are no less fervent about the fact that God loves them. Their security is based on their relationship with God and not upon  material things, and I think that's wonderful.

In light of the current American political situation, and in light of the fact that Christianity is growing so quickly in the Southern Hemisphere, and in light of the fact that Christianity there is so different than what is practiced in the Western Hemisphere or the northern hemisphere, I can’t help but re-think what it means to be a Christian, what it means to walk with Christ.  I’m reminded of Donnie McClurkin when he sings about trusting in the Lord, and he says “Will you trust me,Child, Come what may?  What if it hurts?  What if you cry?  What it if doesn’t work the first time that you try?  What if you call my name and don’t feel me near?  Will you still believe in me, or will you fear?”  I see people who believe, no matter what, and it sort of is in contrast to those of us who act like God is our personal genie or good luck charm….

I’ve started editorializing and have left the commentary on the day, so I’ll end here.  These four blog posts were all I wrote from  the trip. I spent a lot of time just soaking up experiences rather than documenting them.  Perhaps next time I’ll seek to balance the two (experiencing versus documenting) a bit more.

Must I be Carried To the Skies?

Must I be carried to the skies

On flowery beds of ease

While others fight to win the prize

And sail through stormy seas? 

No,  I must fight if I would win

Increase my courage,  Lord

I’ll bear the toil, endure the pain

Supported by Thy Word

As I'm traveling through Nicaragua,  which is incredibly poor,  I see and sense a joyous determination in people .  It makes me think twice about Christians who always say  -- you know,  who always sing songs such as the above about the struggle,  about working hard for Christ,  but who also like to surround themselves with luxury hotels and meetings, who are always going top shelf on everything -- and I'm beginning to find these things increasingly incongruent.

We are here doing some vacationing, but it's an ecologically responsible vacation and we're staying in places that fit in with the environment so they may not be as fancy as some other places, but the idea is to blend in with, to preserve and to honor that which God has put on this earth.

I can't help but wonder why some of our traditional African American churches are not more ecologically responsible.  I can't help but think about how some of our African American preachers always have  to have a chauffeur and have to have certain things for them just in order to preach God's Word where I see people who live without material comforts, without all the amenities, who are standing only on God’s Word on a daily basis…

Trip to Nicaragua, Day 1

We left San Jose on a 7:30 am bus.  We were both sleepy and neither of us remembered to bring food.  We didn’t think that would be a problem, but then, we didn’t realize that the bus would be a six hour trip with no stops.  We also didn’t realize we were supposed to have been at the station an hour early.  Thanks to the privilege of youth and/or beauty, the ticket people made concessions for Sophie, and we were allowed to board.

While we were paying taxes and going through all the assorted formalities associated with crossing the border in a Central American country, Sophi was able to go and get a ham sandwich for me.  Unfortunately, she doesn’t eat ham, so she got some chips, and she got water for both of us.  This held us over until 3 pm when we were at the Nicaraguan border and the driver let us get some trail mix out of my bag. 

The border crossing was incredibly tedious.  It was slow,  it was disorganized,  and we were there about 45 minutes.  They collected our passports, then we had to go through customs and get our declaration stamps, then we had to come back out to the bus and get our bags.  Then they took them through an X-ray machine,  then we reclaimed the bags and loaded them back on the bus.  Somewhere in the process they took our passports (something I’m always leery of, but especially in Central America) and then we waited in the sun for about 30 minutes until they decided to come and bring us our passports.

During this time the vendors swarmed upon us trying to give us money to change, trying to sell us phone cards,  trying to sell peanuts,  cashews, and I don’t know what else.  We did buy something to eat that was a tortilla with white cheese and onions in vinegar.   It was horrible.   They had sandals for sale,  they had people driving little rickshaws, all kinds of stuff.  While it was pretty fascinating to watch, it was indicative of the poverty of the region and the desire for US dollars. Quite frankly, I was kinda OD’d on this from the coupla days I’d spent alone in Jamaica.  You develop the ability to deal with it, but it still grieves you in your spirit.  There’s just SO much desperation.

We got back on the bus and rode another 40 minutes or so to Rivas, where we got off. There we were accosted by people with rickshaws trying to give us a 40-minute ride to the ferry terminal for $10. Thankfully we found a Christian taxi driver who decided to take us for $8. We got to talk about the goodness of God on the way, as I began to realize that our Christian jargon is just that, and that I am deficient in that jargon in Spanish..  We drove to the ferry terminal and got off to buy our tickets to the ferry across to the island of Ometepe. Of course there were people trying to be tour guides,  trying to sell us tours and all manner of nonsense. They tried to get us into hotels, sell us packages, and all sorts of stuff.  Had I not been with Sophi (or had I not done my research and known there were accomodations on the island in ALL price points), I probably would have listened to them, but we ignored them and got on the ferry.

The ferry was a very choppy ride, about 45 minutes,  but it was enjoyable and we got good pictures of the volcano. After we got to the volcano we were once again accosted by people trying to sell us rides and this and that and the other.  We decided to go with a guy who had a van and was willing to take us into the island for $5 apiece.  He also took us to a hotel where we got rooms for $10 a night.  The rooms are very basic  -- there is no AC,  there are private bathrooms but I don't know what is going on with the shower --  but it's $10 a night so I can't really complain.  We were going to contract with the taxi driver for tomorrow but instead we've decided that we're going to rent scooters and drive around town so we'll see how that goes.

It is quarter to 9 in the evening and I am exhausted so I am going to go to bed., I just wanted to write (or dictate) these thoughts down before I forgot them.

My Fellow Geeks Will Appreciate This....

Most people who know me know that much of my spiritual and theological undergirding is the direct result of the late Bishop Thomas Lanier Hoyt, Jr.  I’ve written and spoken extensively about his influence on my life, about him taking time with the weird little smart kid, about him answering all my ridiculous 10 year old questions (with examples I would remember for the rest of my life), about him following and looking after me even when I’d gone astray, and about how, upon my return to the fold, he willingly wrote a recommendation for me to attend seminary (I used him as a personal reference, not yet realizing his academic stature).  He’s always been there to encourage and shape me, both spiritually and intellectually.

So I go to seminary and I do ok.  My final GPA of 3.9 was not too shabby, especially considering it included a B+ in Hebrew.  Much more significant than my grade point average, though, were my Church History professor, Dale Irvin, and picture of a jade stele (the Nestorian Stele), which showed evidence of Christianity in China way back in the 700s.  The idea that Christianity was being embraced by the Chinese that far back (actively embraced, not a Chinese parroting of a Eurocentric story in English) – the concept was revolutionary to my mind, as was the global nature of Christianity SINCE ITS INCEPTION.  Prior to that awakening, I’d suffered from the misperception that Christianity was a religion of the West; I can’t even describe my joy in realizing that Christ really was a Christ for ALL People – and always had been!

So this Church History professor worked with me and suggested I pursue a Ph.D.  I remember this quite vividly, as it was one of few times I have intentionally been rude to a professor:  without a word of response, I turned my back and walked out of his class when he said it. Still, he labored with me, nudged me, and encouraged me.  Email was in its infancy, and we spent hours in this new medium, trading emails with all sorts of philosophical and theological conversations.  He was like mind candy!!  He introduced a group of us students to the American Academy of Religion, and in 2003 invited me to join an international group of scholars who came together to form a new, non-Eurocentric telling of the story of the Christian Movement.  This HWCM (History of the World Christian Movement) group collaborated around the country and around the world (that was how I first saw Alaska, on a trip to Malaysia in 2004).  Together the HWCM group developed a new way of telling the Christian story.  Within 10 years it become the norm for teaching church history, and through Dale, I was part of it!!  I remember how terrified I was on my first trip down to Princeton (“I’ve gotta go to a meeting with all those smart people!!”).  My fears were quickly allayed, and I actually got to meet, have personal conversations with, and count as friends some amazing scholars from all around the globe.

Fast forward a decade.  After many discussions with Bishop Hoyt regarding Church, Academy, the need to publish, and the false construct of tension between faith and intellect; and after years of serving as a teaching assistant and research fellow with Dale and in the Center for World Religion at New York Theological Seminary, I’m considering a Ph.D.  Dale suggests I talk to David, one of the members of the HWCM group.  “Oh, yes,” David responds.  “I was actually thinking of contacting you to see if you’d be interested in helping me research (the reader for HWCM) Volume 2.”  Now that right there is enough to make me do backflips, but as I was considering the opportunity, I looked up Dave’s credentials.  It appears he was recently elevated to Bishop in the denomination headed up by one of Bishop Hoyt’s classmates, Bishop Charles E. Blake, Sr.  Though I still can’t say Bishop Blake’s name without remembering how I met him at Bishop Hoyt’s sickbed, I thought on the connection and said to myself, “Wow!!” Bishop Hoyt would be really happy at this turn of events!”

And then I looked at David’s credentials a bit more, realizing that not only did Bishop Hoyt’s former classmate appoint him chair of their denomination’s Commission on Education, and not only did he serve on the National Council of Church’s Faith and Order commission like Bishop Hoyt did, but on his CV, he actually lists participation in a research project directed by Bishop Hoyt!!

I think I started dancing then.  I’m excited and grateful to have had my theological groundwork laid by the late Bishop Thomas Lanier Hoyt, Jr.  I’m excited and grateful that his recommendation helped get me into New York Theological Seminary, where I met Dale, who has continued to nudge and nurture and prune and push me. I’m ecstatic when I think about the fact that a casual comment from Dale led me to David, who is my friend and, whether or not we move forward on this project, completes the circle of Bishop Hoyt’s influence not just upon my personal life, but upon my spiritual and intellectual formation.

That is enough, but I’m bi(or tri)vocational.  My secular life involves providing housing and services for people with special needs.  Presently my Board and I are looking at three separate possibilities, any one of which would enable us to expand -- to multiply --  our services beyond the 71 families and 145 single adults we currently serve. 

I’m not sure words can do this justice.  I’m wandering around, doing oddball me, and about a week after wrestling with some issues and re-declaring to God that I’d do whatever God decided (honest, God.  I’ll be obedient this time...), all these connections started coming together.  They all sit at the intersection of faith and intellect, or of church and academy, or at the nexus of intellectual exploration and practical application.  Separately or together they seem, in my life anyway, to be evidence of the fact that God continues to smile on me, yes, and that Bishop Hoyt still has his eye on me.  Together they are still looking out for me, and still expecting great things from me.  That realization has me wanting to run and jump and scream and shout.  It gives me gratitude that is inexpressible.

In Sickness and In Health

So my lungs are on fire, it hurts to breathe, and the only way I can avoid being a mouth-breather is to keep a supply of wasabi peas nearby.  I opened my mouth to speak this morning and some guy’s gravelly voice came out.  Most cold medications, even in the correct dosage, make me high; the only thing that worked was Buckley’s and they’ve taken it off the market.  So I’m walking around with wasabi peas.

In general, I don’t do “sick.”  There was the bout with cancer over a decade ago, and I remember saying then “but I don’t even catch colds!”  I might get the sniffles if I don’t fully dry my hair after a swim, and lying down with a wet head when the temperature is under 40 gives me a kinda sore throat.  But all of that is dis-ease, the state of one’s body being out of its natural rhythm.  It does not escape me that the current dis-ease that’s come upon me is the direct result of that:  I haven’t been working out consistently, and have pretty much abandoned my largely plant-based, generally healthy diet for the typical American suicide food. 

I want to be clear here:  when I'm eating and exercising properly, I can swim 3-4 nights a week, go out into freezing weather with my wet hair stuffed under a cap, and the most that happens is I get the sniffles.  I fail to work out and eat properly for about a month, and suddenly I can't breathe through my nose, my lungs are on fire, I'm tired and achy and alternating sweats with chills.... You do the math.

Because I know what I’ve gotta do.  As a matter of fact, the first thing I did today was to go on my neighborhood stroll – I’d had a 1 pm meeting which needed to be rescheduled, then had like four mini-meetings before I got out of the house.  During my two mile stroll, I had a couple more, then I forced myself to make the rounds of some of my buildings, and now I’m in the office.  Still can’t breathe properly, but getting the body back into its natural function of movement is good.

Our organization provides services to people with mental, physical, emotional, and/or health challenges, and we serve a population that traditionally has had very limited access to healthcare.  I’m painfully aware of how dis-ease and unhealthy living impact quality and quantity of life.  No matter how sick we may be, we are in these earthen vessels, these temples of the soul, that are our bodies.  If we were to treat them (both our bodies and our souls) with the same care and reverence with which we treat, for example, our homes or our physical possessions, I can’t help but believe this world would be a better place.  If I’m eating toxic food every day, if I’m not moving my body to circulate the toxins of this industrial world out of that body, then the toxins remain and can’t help but manifest themselves in my body and, more often than not, in my spirit.

(As a side note, it just kills me to worship/fellowship/embrace a culture that says it loves God but makes no allowances for the wellbeing of the temples that house God’s Spirit among individuals.  But I’ve always been a little weird.)

I see a lot of sickness, a lot of dis-ease, in the physical and spiritual realms, all around me.  It’s been my privilege to know, work with, and/or be exposed to some visionaries who routinely lead their congregations in acts of prayer and fasting; my thought is that this should be a regular, routine, proactive measure for EVERYONE.  In the late 70s, I trained as a martial artist.  The focus was on wholistic living, integration of mind, body, and spirit.  While I lacked sufficient discipline to completely embrace the lifestyle forever, some things did stick.  I learned way back then that: human anatomy isn’t really designed for consumption or digestion of animal products; and regular fasting (2-3  days a month) can have unbelievable metabolic benefits.  Again, I did not embrace the lifestyle completely;  I’m an unapologetic omnivore, but routinely spend from 30-365 day periods abstaining from meat.  Fasting one day a month is no longer something about which I’m intentional; my body has gotten to the point where there are intervals when it simply doesn’t want food.  Thankfully, my body also knows what foods it needs, and I’ve learned that when I have odd cravings, it’s likely because there’s some sort of deficiency in my body.

Don’t get me wrong.   I’m a big believer in Western medicine.  I just think that when it’s laid atop a foundation of proper movement and healthy eating, that it becomes more effective.  Given the many unhealthy behaviors in which I’ve engaged over the years (routinely ceasing food intake, for instance, did not stop me from becoming morbidly obese), I cannot help but believe that this foundation of regularly cleansing my insides played some part in our being able to successfully fight off the cancer that later attacked.  I'm not saying wholistic living cures cancer. I'm saying that having developed a healthy baseline and adhering to it for years quite possibly made the difference between life and death, EVEN THOUGH I TEMPORARILY ABANDONED IT.

So this has kinda wandered around, but the bottom line is that we all get one body, and we get to determine how we use it.  Not everyone is physically able to do a five-mile walk, but each of us is able to challenge ourselves, to push past what we thought were our limits, and to journey on towards wholeness, and to a spiritual and physical stability that abides with us, in sickness and in health.