In heaven, I hope I will sit on the porch swing, all day long.
"White shores. A far green country, and a swift sunrise" is how Gandalf describes it.
Saw this quote via someone's Facebook status, of all things:
Love means doing all we can, at whatever cost to ourselves, to help people be enthralled with the glory of God. When they are, they are satisfied and God is glorified. Therefore loving people and glorifying God are one.
Hot off the presses:
1. My friend David's recent blog post entitled "Why I Go to the Monastery" has had me thinking all morning. Each year David visits a monastery in remote New Mexico "to be loved on by God". He writes that he exits the world in order to re-enter it more deeply. What a fantastic post.
2. "You're welcome, world. Love, the internets." is an other amazing blog I've been enjoying lately. Like my brain, its a random mishmash of very fascinating thoughts, maps, websites, reflections, and photos. I am so glad to have found her.
3. Google Wave, people- its the future. Will Google solve ALL the world's problems?
4. I will not be getting the H1N1 flu shot. I made this decision after learning that the shot was hastily tested on only a few hundred adults, and after hearing interviews with several scientists and physicians who say they are very concerned that there will be a repeat of the swine flu vaccine fiasco in the 1960's that resulted in hundreds of people becoming paralyzed as a result of the degenerative neurological sydrome Guillain-Barre. Does it really seem like a smart idea to rush a vaccination with no long-term testing into the general population, much less to ask pregnant women and children to be the first in line?
There's also the issue of mercury. In the case of a disease as terrible as, for instance, polio, I think putting a small amount of mercury into a person seems justified. But for a disease that seems to be no worse than regular, yearly flu? I'll pass.
I live in a very strange nether world revolving around money. Here's why:
I work for a non-profit that cares for orphans and vulnerable families. We run schools in Kenya. We run transitional housing for kids about to age out of government orphanages. We send single moms to college who were previously homeless. We just sent our 2 millionth pair of shoes to orhpans.
So I work with the very poorest people there are. They're desperate. As in, don't eat everyday, that kind of desperate. As in, they're in orphanages because their parents gave them away due to extreme poverty. As in, receiving a new pair of shoes is the greatest day of their life. A few times a year I get to visit them on trips with donors, and almost every other day I am reading their stories in reports from our field staff, or on our website, or on the news.
Then I work with rich people. Really, really, super rich people. Lots of them are very nice. Lots of them are very loving, and generous, and they give away more to charity in a year than my husband and I make combined. I am writing them thank-you notes, and grant proposals, and planning events and trips so they can learn about or even meet those other people, the ones with no shoes.
And its just all about money, all the time. How far behind budget are we? How much should we ask for? How much did they give to that other charity/university/hospital, so maybe they have a little for our orphans, too? What does it cost to expand X program to include X more kids?
Lots of times, I wish I was the one holding babies, while somebody else scrounged up the money.
We have a little game that has become something of a tradition, and a really fun date.
As I've mentioned before, we have been using a Dave Ramsey-esque cash budget for several categories of purchases such as restaurants, groceries, shopping, lunch money, "fun money" (money you can spend for anything you like, no questions asked), etc.
A few times we have come to the end of the month and had a handful of grocery money left, so we play a little game. We go to Central Market, the swankiest, most high-end, slightly cringe-inducing glut of luxury grocery shopping ever to hit Dallas, Texas. Here are the rules:
1. We each get a certain amount of cash but not a penny more, and we leave our wallets at home (to avoid temptation).
2. Buy whatever you want.
Our strategies are different. I usually try to buy lots of low-priced items. Ben usually likes to buy one big purchase that is a luxury.
When we played this game a few days ago, the above photo documents our haul. We each had $9 or $10 to spend.
K bought: organic granny smith apples from California, tomato basil soup, Annie's organic cheddar shells 'n' cheese, and authentic English shortbread fingers.
Ben bought: sushi, and organic fancy shmancy ginger ale.
Top it all off with The Internationalist and The Reader (can you guess which of us chose each movie?!), and you have yourselves a Blockbuster Night ladies and gentlemen!
You're going about your day. It's an ordinary day. Your phone rings.
The person on the other end of the line says he's with the MacArthur Foundation, and you've been selected as the winner of the Genius Grant, one of the most prestigious awards on our entire planet. Like, Nobel-Pulitzer-Congressional Medal of Honor-caliber prestigious. .
He further tells you you were nominated by an anonymous person, and that you've been evaluated over the past few years. There are no nomination forms, no grant applications, no interviews. You never know if you've been nominated until you get the call.
And you've won $500,000, to be paid over 5 years. And there are no strings attached. You can do whatever you want with it- no reporting, no evaluating, no expectations.
It happened to 25 people earlier this month. And it happens every fall to between 20 and 25 people.
One of them is 32. Rebecca Onie is a health entrepreneur who started a ministry addressing the connections between poverty and poor health, and plugged college students in to repair the unmet needs (housing, transportation, child care, etc) that keep the poor sick.
Hello friends. It's my birthday! It has been a delightful day so far for many reasons:
1. Dinner date with husband last night. He took me to Gloria's and endured FOUR STORES worth of shopping for the one item I asked for: curtains.
2. Red velvet cupcake from The Cupcakerywith birthday candle.
3. Lunch with parents at Mattito's.
4. Brief shopping with Mom.
5. Savannah's bridesmaid dress came in.
6. Going to happy hour with dear friends.
7. Wore my favorite red shirt and lots of lipstick.
8. Gave myself a birthday gift by not fixing my hair:)
9. Cards from friends and family, and happy texts, and emails.
Very best part:
10. To this minute, $876 given to Buckner via my Facebook Cause birthday wish.
Tufted, chandelier, French chair. What more can I say.
Magical.
Is it the color combo? No countertrop space, though.
Those baskets would be a great way to hide all those bottles, sprays, etc.
Thank you, Brabourne Farm, for your delightful room ideas this week.
Really interesting: Brian McLaren over at Sojourners (see link at right) wrote a fascinating article today about knowing your environmental neighborhood. Not as defined by your school district, zip code, or city, but by your watershed. Do you know where your water comes from? Or where what you put down your sink goes? A watershed! And you can find it at this nifty government website.
Now, nobody will ever ask me this of course. But it is valuable to know simply because it makes me more aware of my connection to, and dependence on, the interwoven creation around me. Maybe if I know my watershed's name (it's "Upper Trinity", by the way) I won't dump my leftover bug spray or Clorox down the sink.
Also, that website allows you to see what citizen groups are at work doing cleanups, advocacy, etc in my watershed. There are 4 groups working to make sure my watershed is clean! Thank you!
One last tidbit: Earlier this week a group called the "Yes Men" pranked the New York Post by releasing 10,000 copies of a spoof version centered on the topic of climate change all around New York City ahead of the UN meeting going on there this week. While the spoof was a joke, the group says every fact and article in the paper is 100% true, and their purpose was to print news about global warming they feel is left out of the mainstream news.
This group apparently does lots of satire, "culture jamming" and shows up impersonating officials- from major corporate CEOs to the World Health Organization. Their website is hysterical- they have had their impersonators give satirical speeches in major conferences, on TV, and at major world events before when everyone in the audience thinks they are the real person. I love it.
Off to eat my birthday cupcake!
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Kisses from Katie is the most amazing blog I've discovered in a year. She and Nie Nie are tied for first place in the "most inspirational woman in the whole world who I feel like I know but don't actually know because we're best friends only in blog-land" category.
You know that prayer we pray? "On earth as it is in heaven"? Katie lives it.
She reminded me of a song I've heard before, and loved. God, "every child in Africa is yours."
Her blog recently included this quote:
"What, therefore, is our task today? Should I answer 'Faith, hope and love?' That sounds beautiful. But I would say - courage. No, even that is not challenging enough to be the whole truth. Our task today is recklessness. For what we Christians lack is not psychology or literature... we lack a holy rage - the recklessness which comes from the knowlege of God and humanity. The ability to rage when justice lies prostrate on the streets, and when the lie rages across the face of the earth... a holy anger about the things that are worng in the world. To rage against the ravaging of God's earth and and the desruction of God's people. To rage when little children must die of hunger, while the tables of the rich are sagging with food. To rage at the senseless killing of so many, and the madness of militaries. To rage against the lie that calls the threat of death and the strategy of destruction peace. To rage against COMPLACENCY. To restlessly seek that recklessness that will challenge and seek to change human history until it conforms to the norms of the kingdom of God."
-Father Kaj Munk, 1944
"Now that I have seen, I am responsible. Faith without works is dead."
Katie is asked often about her life in Uganda:
"As a young single woman, don't you think living in Africa is dangerous? Are you afraid?"
She responds:
I am more afraid of America.
Matthew 10:28 tells us not to fear things that can destroy the body but to fear things that can destroy the soul. I can literally feel my soul suffocating in the safety of Brentwood (Tennesse) and all it's numbness, complacency and comfort. Scary.
C.S. Lewis puts it this way:
"I shall feel rather nervous meeting a lion," said Susan.
"That you will, dearie, and make no mistake," said Mrs. Beaver, "if there is anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking they're either braver than most or just silly."
"Then He isn't safe?" said Lucy.
"Safe?" said Mr. Beaver; "Who said anything about safe?! Of Course He isn't safe. But He is good. He is the King I tell you."
(The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe)
PS.
My head spins as I think about the health care reform details. It is dizzyingly complex. However. When I'm about to throw up my hands and say I don't care, we should scrap the whole thing, I'm reminded- Something has GOT to be done. Here's why:
Dark walls. Glam. What incredible textures, especially on that tufted ottoman- what is that, fur? Feathers?
Incredible. Exposed brick and dark and bookcases.
Thank you Suz for posting Inspired Room's "Clean Enough". You could waste your whole life making every inch of your house flawlessly germ-free, but really, "clean enough" will do.
I know that technically the first day of fall isn't until next week. However, TODAY is the first day of fall for me. Here's why:
1. Currently wearing a sweater.
2. Aforementioned sweater is oh-so-fall mustard yellow. I'm practically the color of a grain harvest.
3. I ate chili for lunch. At a legit tailgate/chili cookoff.
I am really, really, into Queen. Yeah, I know, its weird. I blame my dad for playing all that 70's rock music. I grew up listening to Billy Joel, Eric Clapton, Paul McCartney, and, yes, Queen.
Good clean fun.
I LOVE this idea below of using a door frame piece as a sort of headboard. Plus, don't you just want to jump and dance with her?
What a garden bliss!
Commencement Speech given by Paul Hawken to the University of Portland
When I was invited to give this speech, I was asked if I could give
a simple short talk that was “direct, naked, taut, honest, passionate,
lean, shivering, startling, and graceful.” No pressure there.
Let’s begin with the startling part. Class of 2009: you are going to
have to figure out what it means to be a human being on earth at a time
when every living system is declining, and the rate of decline is
accelerating. Kind of a mind-boggling situation… but not one
peer-reviewed paper published in the last thirty years can refute that
statement. Basically, civilization needs a new operating system, you
are the programmers, and we need it within a few decades.
This planet came with a set of instructions, but we seem to have
misplaced them. Important rules like don’t poison the water, soil, or
air, don’t let the earth get overcrowded, and don’t touch the
thermostat have been broken. Buckminster Fuller said that spaceship
earth was so ingeniously designed that no one has a clue that we are on
one, flying through the universe at a million miles per hour, with no
need for seatbelts, lots of room in coach, and really good food—but all
that is changing.
There is invisible writing on the back of the diploma you will
receive, and in case you didn’t bring lemon juice to decode it, I can
tell you what it says: You are Brilliant, and the Earth is Hiring. The
earth couldn’t afford to send recruiters or limos to your school. It
sent you rain, sunsets, ripe cherries, night blooming jasmine, and that
unbelievably cute person you are dating. Take the hint. And here’s the
deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the
time required. Don’t be put off by people who know what is not
possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was
impossible only after you are done.
When asked if I am pessimistic or optimistic about the future, my
answer is always the same: If you look at the science about what is
happening on earth and aren’t pessimistic, you don’t understand the
data. But if you meet the people who are working to restore this earth
and the lives of the poor, and you aren’t optimistic, you haven’t got a
pulse. What I see everywhere in the world are ordinary people willing
to confront despair, power, and incalculable odds in order to restore
some semblance of grace, justice, and beauty to this world. The poet
Adrienne Rich wrote, “So much has been destroyed I have cast my lot
with those who, age after age, perversely, with no extraordinary power,
reconstitute the world.” There could be no better description. Humanity
is coalescing. It is reconstituting the world, and the action is taking
place in schoolrooms, farms, jungles, villages, campuses, companies,
refuge camps, deserts, fisheries, and slums.
You join a multitude of caring people. No one knows how many groups
and organizations are working on the most salient issues of our day:
climate change, poverty, deforestation, peace, water, hunger,
conservation, human rights, and more. This is the largest movement the
world has ever seen. Rather than control, it seeks connection. Rather
than dominance, it strives to disperse concentrations of power. Like
Mercy Corps, it works behind the scenes and gets the job done. Large as
it is, no one knows the true size of this movement. It provides hope,
support, and meaning to billions of people in the world. Its clout
resides in idea, not in force. It is made up of teachers, children,
peasants, businesspeople, rappers, organic farmers, nuns, artists,
government workers, fisherfolk, engineers, students, incorrigible
writers, weeping Muslims, concerned mothers, poets, doctors without
borders, grieving Christians, street musicians, the President of the
United States of America, and as the writer David James Duncan would
say, the Creator, the One who loves us all in such a huge way.
There is a rabbinical teaching that says if the world is ending and
the Messiah arrives, first plant a tree, and then see if the story is
true. Inspiration is not garnered from the litanies of what may befall
us; it resides in humanity’s willingness to restore, redress, reform,
rebuild, recover, reimagine, and reconsider. “One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began, though the voices around you kept
shouting their bad advice,” is Mary Oliver’s description of moving away
from the profane toward a deep sense of connectedness to the living
world.
Millions of people are working on behalf of strangers, even if the
evening news is usually about the death of strangers. This kindness of
strangers has religious, even mythic origins, and very specific
eighteenth-century roots. Abolitionists were the first people to create
a national and global movement to defend the rights of those they did
not know. Until that time, no group had filed a grievance except on
behalf of itself. The founders of this movement were largely unknown —
Granville Clark, Thomas Clarkson, Josiah Wedgwood — and their goal was
ridiculous on the face of it: at that time three out of four people in
the world were enslaved. Enslaving each other was what human beings had
done for ages. And the abolitionist movement was greeted with
incredulity. Conservative spokesmen ridiculed the abolitionists as
liberals, progressives, do-gooders, meddlers, and activists. They were
told they would ruin the economy and drive England into poverty. But
for the first time in history a group of people organized themselves to
help people they would never know, from whom they would never receive
direct or indirect benefit. And today tens of millions of people do
this every day. It is called the world of non-profits, civil society,
schools, social entrepreneurship, non-governmental organizations, and
companies who place social and environmental justice at the top of
their strategic goals. The scope and scale of this effort is
unparalleled in history.
The living world is not “out there” somewhere, but in your heart.
What do we know about life? In the words of biologist Janine Benyus,
life creates the conditions that are conducive to life. I can think of
no better motto for a future economy. We have tens of thousands of
abandoned homes without people and tens of thousands of abandoned
people without homes. We have failed bankers advising failed regulators
on how to save failed assets. We are the only species on the planet
without full employment. Brilliant. We have an economy that tells us
that it is cheaper to destroy earth in real time rather than renew,
restore, and sustain it. You can print money to bail out a bank but you
can’t print life to bail out a planet. At present we are stealing the
future, selling it in the present, and calling it gross domestic
product. We can just as easily have an economy that is based on healing
the future instead of stealing it. We can either create assets for the
future or take the assets of the future. One is called restoration and
the other exploitation. And whenever we exploit the earth we exploit
people and cause untold suffering. Working for the earth is not a way
to get rich, it is a way to be rich.
The first living cell came into being nearly 40 million centuries
ago, and its direct descendants are in all of our bloodstreams.
Literally you are breathing molecules this very second that were
inhaled by Moses, Mother Teresa, and Bono. We are vastly
interconnected. Our fates are inseparable. We are here because the
dream of every cell is to become two cells. And dreams come true. In
each of you are one quadrillion cells, 90 percent of which are not
human cells. Your body is a community, and without those other
microorganisms you would perish in hours. Each human cell has 400
billion molecules conducting millions of processes between trillions of
atoms. The total cellular activity in one human body is staggering: one
septillion actions at any one moment, a one with twenty-four zeros
after it. In a millisecond, our body has undergone ten times more
processes than there are stars in the universe, which is exactly what
Charles Darwin foretold when he said science would discover that each
living creature was a “little universe, formed of a host of
self-propagating organisms, inconceivably minute and as numerous as the
stars of heaven.”
So I have two questions for you all: First, can you feel your body?
Stop for a moment. Feel your body. One septillion activities going on
simultaneously, and your body does this so well you are free to ignore
it, and wonder instead when this speech will end. You can feel it. It
is called life. This is who you are. Second question: who is in charge
of your body? Who is managing those molecules? Hopefully not a
political party. Life is creating the conditions that are conducive to
life inside you, just as in all of nature. Our innate nature is to
create the conditions that are conducive to life. What I want you to
imagine is that collectively humanity is evincing a deep innate wisdom
in coming together to heal the wounds and insults of the past.
Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only
came out once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, of
course. The world would create new religions overnight. We would be
ecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead, the
stars come out every night and we watch television.
This extraordinary time when we are globally aware of each other and
the multiple dangers that threaten civilization has never happened, not
in a thousand years, not in ten thousand years. Each of us is as
complex and beautiful as all the stars in the universe. We have done
great things and we have gone way off course in terms of honoring
creation. You are graduating to the most amazing, stupefying challenge
ever bequested to any generation. The generations before you failed.
They didn’t stay up all night. They got distracted and lost sight of
the fact that life is a miracle every moment of your existence. Nature
beckons you to be on her side. You couldn’t ask for a better boss. The
most unrealistic person in the world is the cynic, not the dreamer.
Hope only makes sense when it doesn’t make sense to be hopeful. This is
your century. Take it and run as if your life depends on it.
Last night my friend Jillian Edwards debuted her new CD at Common Grounds in Waco, Texas, the favorite coffee and chill spot for all Baylor Bears. Her trusty harmony-singing sidekick is Kelsey Taylor, and they are so very talented! Check out Jillian on Tangle, MySpace, and Facebook.
Welcome to today's round-up of NINE inspiring ideas in honor of yesterday, 09/09/09.
1) This fabulous bedroom via Desire to Inspire. I love those high-hung, soft curtains, the doors to the little patios, the library feel, and the fireplace. This may be one of the favorite bedrooms I have ever seen.
2) This dreamy pink bedroom via Brabourne Farm. Love the wrought iron, love the fireplace, and what a sweet design on the back of the chair.
3) This power suit via Carla Zampatti. Matrix-meets-evening suit.
Confession is admission, recognition, declaration, and agreement that we have participated in the wrong order of things — in ways that don’t further the Shalom of God. And then we repent and say we want to return to the order that God wants.
Knocked my socks off! Comforting and convicting at the same time.
For such a large piece of art, framing would be a big investment. But Kimba made her own out of door framing and corners in a few easy steps. PLUS she links to where you can buy these muted maps from Natural Geographic.
Do you have any idea how widely the costs vary on medical procedures? Neither did I. Did you know you can haggle the costs down, ask for a discount for paying in cash, and otherwise "shop around" for best prices on medical procedures? We would never buy a car without shopping around at different dealers, so why should we spend tens of thousands on medical procedures without cost-comparing? This site lists costs nation-wide. As a test, I looked up costs for hernia repair surgery in Dallas, TX. Costs ranged from $1,000 to $2,500 - that's a big difference!
7)Texas Price Point is a very similar website run by the Texas Hospitals Association, but it is limited only to Texas facilities' prices. Its purpose differs slightly- this website makes you chose a specific procedure AND a specific hospital, and it helps you estimate what your bill will be. For instance, delivering a full-term baby via an uncomplicated Caesarean section at Baylor Hospital in downtown Dallas costs an estimated $10,387 and requires an average 4.3 day stay. The Dallas county average is just over $12,250 with an average 3.7 day stay.
Kelly Wearstler. That copper color is growing on me, and we all know how I feel about black high-gloss floors.
John Bessler. I dream of wide-planked wood floors. I love how the drapes pool.
Desire to Inspire. Looks like a perfect place for cozy community.
Jennifer Worts, above and below. I love the leaded glass below- but the lead is in white, how interesting.
“Humility agrees and is glad that everything we have is a free gift of God, and that this severs the root of boasting in our distinctives. Whatever talents, whatever intelligence, what ever skills, whatever gifts, whatever looks, whatever pedigree, whatever possessions, whatever wit, whatever influence you have, put away all pride because it is a gift, and put away all despair because it is a gift from God.”
Internet Monk makes a really interesting point in his most recent blog post about how in the gospel of Mark, the opposite of faith is not unbelief, but fear. This alone was extremely convicting to me.
He goes on to make the interesting observation that the media, as it continues to grow and become increasingly competitive, is frenzied to get attention, influence, and viewers, and that one way it does this is to engender a state of perma-crisis. Everything becomes a giant crisis now that needs immediate live coverage, viewer polls, and analysis from a large panel of experts.
I like cable news. I watch a lot of it. More than an hour a day, I'd say. When it comes to fear, and my Lord's loving instruction to fear nothing, but to cast all my anxieties on him, what effect does my heavy, steady diet of crises have? I think you can guess whether all that news makes me more or less anxious, more or less peaceful. I would never in a million years advocate sticking our heads in the sand or being uninformed- the past is prologue, after all, but still.
"To be free does not mean to be great in the world, to be free against our brothers and sisters, to be free against God; but it means to be free from ourselves, from our untruth, in which it seems as if I alone were there, as if I were the center of the world; to be free from the hatred…to be free FOR others. God’s truth alone allows me to see others."
(Dietrich Bonhoeffer, "On Freedom": July 24, 1932)
No, not this kind. No, not this Ruby, either. For the uninitiated, this is Ruby, the 700 pound woman trying to lose weight and find love on TV.
This is my Ruby secret weapon. Bobbi Brown lip sheer in #6 Ruby.
There is something very feminine and powerful about putting on lipstick.
Ruby brings instant confidence before a big meeting.
In other news, apparently everyone is getting gaga for fall. I object. It is not fall. It is hardly even September, and all good Texans know it is summer here until at least Halloween. I wear shorts on Thanksgiving, people.
However.
I'll consent to a little early season-changing love, because, after all, fall is my favorite season. Some fall inspiration: Anyone for a late summer picnic? I'll fetch my plaid blanket. While I'm at it, I'll re-do my guest room, straight out of a Ralph Lauren hunting expedition.
No discussion of the change in seasons would be complete without a reminder to keep in our prayers dear Satpack (who moved to Nairobi yesterday), Smiller (moving to Madrid within days), the Philosopher (pining away for Peru), and Dr. & Mrs. Pinson (having no less of a life adjustment in scenic College Station).
For the uninitiated, this is 
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