Flying Pigs behind the horizon

7;47 AM

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First, a little background …

Last night I was re-reading Mark 5:1-20 and then this morning Luke 8:26-39. Both of these narrative recount Jesus’s encounter with a demon-possessed man in the land of Gerasenes.

The afflicted man “lived among the tombs and could not be restrained, even with a chain.” “No one was strong enough to control him. All day long and throughout the night, he would wander among the tombs and in the hills, screaming and hitting himself with stones.”

How’s that for creating a visual? But then it gets even better:

As Jesus approached the man saw him, rushed forward and fell down at his feet shrieking, “Why are you bothering me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? For God’s sake, don’t torture me!”

When Jesus asked “What is your name?” the spirit inside the man replied Legion, for I am many [a Roman legion consisted of 3000-6000 soldiers; in other words, a big bunch or a whole lot].

Then the spirits begged Jesus not to throw them into the bottomless pit, and Christ gave them permission to enter a herd of pigs feeding nearby instead.

The demons obeyed, entered the pigs, and the entire herd of two thousand plunged down the steep hillside and drowned in the lake. The healed man asked to go with Jesus, but Christ told him, “No, go home to your friends, and tell them what wonderful things the Lord has done for you and how merciful he has been.”

But instead of being thrilled by the miracle they’d witnessed, the local townspeople (who were certainly Gentiles, since Old Testament law considered pigs unclean. Pigs couldn’t be eaten, or even touched, by a Jew.) were badly frightened, and “began pleading with Jesus to go away and leave them alone.”

Hmmm. I mean, Hmmmm. What’s that all about?

Wouldn’t ya think that after living with such a dangerous, chain-tearing freakazoid in their midst for so long the crowd woulda been absolutely thrilled that Christ could order the demons to leave a man just by using his voice?

Nossir, the local folks were scared silly, “for a great wave of fear swept over them.” But what were they so afraid of, after all?

You Can’t Make a Silk Purse from a Pig’s Ear

The Life Application Study Bible suggests two reasons for the crowd’s fearful reaction to what was they’d seen: (a) They were frightened by Christ’s awesome power, and were worried (b) Jesus might take a stroll through the neighborhood, and destroy a few thousand more pigs. And being Gentiles, pig-farming constituted the bulk of their incomes and livelihoods.

Casting out demons is one thing, but seeing their silk purses plunge down a cliff to drown in the lake was something else entirely. The possibility of taking a huge “drop” really struck a financial nerve.

Like, “Hey Jesus, thanks for everything … but we’re fine now, so would ya mind catching a gear? And the next time you’re passing by, please do.”

Reckon those old hog farmers recognized supernatural power when they saw it, and were scared witless that Christ might leave them broke and pig-less? I think you’d have a hard time arguing that the town folks grasped the big picture, and had their piggish priorities in order.

Yeah that’s Cool, but …

Have you been thinking So What? for the past 10 paragraphs? Have you been wondering, in this day and age, what demons have to do with anything? Maybe you don’t believe in demons, but maybe you do know a little bit about sin:

“The demons’ goal was to control the humans they inhabited. Jesus’ goal was to give people freedom from sin and Satan’s control.”

I can imagine the people crossing their fingers and thinking, Getting rid of sin is one thing, but don’t let it be my pigs that you send wind-surfing off the nearest cliff, thanks. Because I love the pigs I’ve got.

We Still Wanna Go Out and Bring Home the Bacon

Take a look back at the awesomeness of Christ’s power: the demons recognized Jesus soon as they saw him, and his voice alone was sufficient in its authority to command literally thousands of Satan’s finest from the man they’d been torturing for years.

So what do ya think he can do with the sins in our lives … if we’ll let him?

But naah, we might be more like the townspeople who’re frightened of losing their slop-swillers and beg Christ to be on his way, hoping he’ll walk off into the sunset and just leave us alone with our sins.

Pork Futures Spiral Downward in Mixed Trading

Especially with the sins we consider tiny and pleasant, the ones we’ve convinced ourselves aren’t really so bad … the ones that “aren’t really hurting anybody” … the ones we keep secret in our certainty that “nobody knows what I’m doing.”

Pigs Can’t Fly ... or even walk away from a landing

And neither can pigs have Godly marriages, be Christ-like in their relationships, manage or be the steward of their finances, or keep themselves from wallowing and settling for the slop pigs love and know best.

-all Scriptural quotes from The Life Application Study Bible, New Living Translation

The Immersion Method ... and gettin' wet all over

The fastest way to learn a new language and culture is by The Immersion Method.

The Immersion Method literally means moving to a foreign country (where no one speaks English) where you speak but also think in that language ... and bypass the slow clumsiness of learning by translating grammar and new words, idioms and useful phrases (like, "Bwana, choo ni wapi?"*) back and forth from English ... like we did in high school ... which only taught us to HATE foreign languages.

It's called The Immersion Method, like duh, because you're submerged, completely covered, dunked, engaged and 100% occupied and focused on your new surroundings.

The Immersion Method is a lot like trying to negotiate your way across a pitching, unsteady dock, losing your footing and plunging over the side into a wet new world (yep, done that). Suddenly the clothes you were wearing no longer fit, no longer feel comfortable at all or look quite as good as you thought they did ... so you peel out of the old and change into something new.

The Immersion Method means Gettin' wet all over.

Trying to live life just getting by, enjoying the old customs and habits you were used to, or trying to keep in contact with your former language in situations where Everything's New, is like taking ten giant self-defeating steps backward.

That is, if you believe The Immersion Method really means gettin' wet all over.





* "Dude, where's the bathroom?"

Fatigue is an enemy - updated 6:35am

"Fatigue makes cowards of us all."

It took four days to get there but I finally realized I've been sick.

I figured something was wrong when I started falling asleep in the middle of the morning, then again around 3:30 ,even though I was dragging myself to bed by 9pm and sleeping for 8 hours.

The symptoms, accompanied by some "gastric distress," kept up for days but I blamed dehydration, the heat, my own cooking, anything other than accept my strength had ebbed to dangerously low levels ... leaving me with only the strength of four men (when I'm used to having the Strength of Ten).

Probably just a low-grade virus and today I'm feeling much improved. But here's the dig:

I was too tired to read, too tired to work, too tired to watch TV or log onto the computer ... and by the end of a day doing nothing but sitting still I was literally too tired to walk to the back of the boat and lie down.

"It is not whether you get knocked down. It's whether you get up."

Man, your mind can wander around, and maybe even start doubting, your life's priorities when you're too tired to even turn off the TV.

"Dictionary is the only place where success comes before work. Hard work is the price we must pay for success. I think you can accomplish anything if you're willing to pay the price."

You start wondering what life would be like if your bleak outlook was permanent, instead of something temporary brought on by a tiny virus.

"The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather in a lack of will."

Fatigue can turn tiny inconveniences and annoyances into what feels like overwhelming burdens. "I'm too tired," "I'm not excited any more," "I've already done my part," "I'm not sure that's really important" and "What are you telling me for?" are all symptoms.

We might even feel too fatigued to notice it's happening.

"The harder you work, the harder it is to surrender."

So long as we're feeling good and the dice are rolling our way we feel capable of facing and handling impossible challenges.

"Some of us will do our jobs well and some will not, but we will be judged by only one thing- the result."

But what happens if we start getting feeling fatigued and tired along the way? What happens when we feel like quitting?

"Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit."

We won't be defeated by obstacles or adversaries; we'll be defeated when we accept I Feel Tired as an excuse, and lose track of the most irreplaceable, precious thing we've got: time.

"We didn't lose the game. We just ran out of time."

If that's what we allow to happen, and let fatigue distract us or "modify" our goals toward what's easy, convenient and certain.

"Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection then we can catch excellence."

And isn't that worth working for?

-all quotes from Vince Lombardi, professional football coach

Sure she's a brunette ... but what about trying a redhead instead?

Just Friday morning boat drivel, spilled over stale coffee and too many open Browser windows ...

Calypso is hot. I mean she's really hot. By the time Saturday night rolled around last weekend I started thinking she must be the hottest boat around. She's so hot it makes you start thinking about peeling off clothes and jumping over the side to cool down.

I mean she's hot like a Krispy Kreme oven is hot. Hot the same way a deep fryer is hot. I mean hot like you find out when you grab the skillet you left burning on the stove with your bare hands is Hot.

If she was any hotter I'm pretty sure I'd melt, drip down through her drains and get pumped over the side from her bilge.

That's the hot I'm talking about.

By 3:30 PM last Saturday the temperature inside the salon was a bacteria-killing 104 degrees F ... and stayed that way until well after 7 PM, when she finally cooled down to 98 F. Didn't even have to turn on the water heater to have all the hot shower I wanted.


I like to think one of the main reasons Calypso gets so hot is because she's a sexy (can I say sexy?) brunette. That is, she's got a black canvas top and that makes her a brunette.

But her stunning, head turning black coiffure works like an inverted convection oven in the summer, and starts cooking the interior contents (meaning, me) soon as the sun peeks over the horizon.

That she's so scorchingly hot isn't the only problem in our relationship: like so many other svelte brunette femme fatales, Calypso also tends to be something of a drip.

(Back in 1984 the textile industry was still in the infant stages of creating truly water-proof fabrics. Meaning that 23 years later, here in 2007 when it's raining outside, all you gotta do is step out into Calypso's bridge to enjoy an invigorating open-air Performance Shower that not even the boldness of Kohler can match.)

Her canvas top leaks like a cardboard aquarium is what I mean, and the briefest summer shower turns the helm into a floating fiberglass shower stall.)

I've toyed with the idea of replacing Calypso's canvas with one of the new wonder fabrics like Sunbrella (which wouldn't seem at all like an expen$ive extravagance if you've ever left the top at home and driven your Jeep back from Highlands in a rain squall. At night. On a first date. Which I have.)

Which finally steers me around to the point of what this unnecessarily long and drawn-out nonsense is all about: If I ever actually replaced Calypso's top, would I keep the same color? Or try going blond ... with a white top instead?


Can it really true that Blonds Have More Fun? Maybe ... but keeping a white top clean and sparkling with flocks of sea gulls circling overhead makes me much doubt it.

Never even considered going redhead until I saw this ... so whaddya think?


Hmmm. I kinda like the breezy, tropical "Let's Go to the Bahamas This Weekend" flavor ... but redheads can be notoriously ambiguous and a touch temperamental. (At least, based on my experience, uh oh :-)

You've probably lost all interest in this silly subject by this time and have already started reaching for the mouse to click yourself off to another page. That's why I saved the best for last, in case the free-spirits among you may already have asked: What about going topless?


Indeed. "Yaaa," sighed the train's Conductor, "that could be the ticket right there."

Not every boat has the shape to cruise around in public au natural with her helm exposed ... but I think Calypso's got the curves and the stuff to make it work and have every other middle-aged boat owner drooling with maritime envy.

Now all I gotta do is work up the nerve to try it, and hope the the weather cooperates with our plans.

ps. Of course once the top was off I could never figure out how to get the canvas snapped back on, not even with three helping hands and the Instruction Manual open for assistance ...

But Hey, Stay COOL yourself ... and Have A Great Weekend!

pss. Guzzling down beer because TGIF is stoopid. And forget about eating out tonight because all the restaurants in town will have waiting lines stretched out to Clemson Boulevard. Driving to Gville to go clubbing is for sorority pledges and mutt-hugging slick-haired wanna-be's. Add this to tonight's schedule instead ... it's for one of the best causes around.

And remember Papa loves ya, always ... but that's still only second best.

Big Software News

GPL 3 will finally be released tomorrow, months after the original March 15 deadline. And I say it's about time.

The other thing I say is, What the heck is GPL 3???

It's not gonna hurt to laugh every once in a while ...

Fun with Words Department

Back in my days as a private pilot I noticed no one ever used words like "Crash." The official terminology for such an incident was "an Off-Airport landing."



The most important thing to remember about flying is Any landing you can walk away from is a good landing.


Similarly, in Formula 1 motor racing what we'd call an accident is instead called a "shunt."

So there ... doesn't that make everything better? :-)


PS. No matter what you may have heard, Driving a boat is much safer than driving a car.

New Arrival

Put down your coffee and click HERE fast & often!

Congratulations P and L!

The end of intrigue?

I'd never heard of the idea of married couples having "Date Night" until three years ago.

Like all new ideas, "Date Night" took some time to work its way through the calcified neuron tunnels in my brain pan and even though I'm not married, Date Night makes such good sense I gotta wonder why nobody thought of it sooner.

---
Remember what romance was like back in high school? The thrill lasted for about five minutes after finding out that so-and-so really liked you, too. Then all so-and-so's flaws, irritating habits and clinging-ness dimmed your starry-eyed pulse and Restlessness began clawing its way through your daydreams ... and forced you to confront the realization that, "Hey! He/She's boring and irritating to be around ... and now I know I can do a lot better!"

Romance tended to wear think pretty quickly back then.

And so the search started all over again for someone "better" who's not only more attractive, but more intriguing, more mysterious and perhaps even more elusive ... someone who'd not only start our hearts a-fluttering, but also someone with the juice to keep the fluttering going and going and going, in ways we never get tired of enjoying.

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Do we really fall in love with a person, or with the ooey-gooey way that person makes us feel?

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Ugh, then along comes marriage ... usually for a barn-full of wrong reasons ... accompanied by a sense of finality, closure and uncertainty: I'm no longer single, no longer free to pursue romance, and no longer free to feel attractive or even desirable.

Sounds like an ALARM going off because the marital boiler lost all its steam.

The harsh, unavoidable realities of sharing life with another person sprout seed pods like kudzu in an untended tomato patch. Ignored and overlooked long enough, the spreading vines find nurture in the marital manure and reproduce themselves until the undergrowth becomes neck-deep ... and threatens to suffocate everything underneath ... including communication.

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Mary Pickford was the original Queen of Hollywood. Newspapers called her "the most desirable woman on earth" even though she was married and, unusual for Hollywood, remained faithful to her husband, Douglas Fairbanks, until his death.

The point is that what made her irresistible to men wasn't her promiscuity, but her absolute fidelity. Every man on earth (especially those Lotharios brash enough to actually try) knew he stood no chance, none whatsoever. It was her total unattainability that made Mary Pickford so obsessively intriguing.

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Especially in affairs of the heart, men seem helplessly lured and attracted to The Unattainable, Impossible Challenge. We can't help or deny it. It's in men's nature to try and test themselves, to succeed and satisfy his ego's questions and resolve any doubts about his abilities.

Men yearn to find a noble and perfect cause, to rise up from the anonymity of their peers, to take action and announce to the world, "Step aside, losers. I can do this."

And is there anything on earth more compelling and uncertain than pursuing a woman's heart?

---

Who am I to offer advice, particularly when it comes to marriage? Just seems to me that if a wife was worth pursuing once, she's certainly worth pursuing again and again for a lifetime. In part because men tend to forget

Young and ancient, innocent and corrupt
In every woman
A mystery.

- John Fowles, The Magus

A man might think he's caught a woman, but her heart isn't something he can keep and hold onto with his hands.

just LOST

Been catching up on season 3 of LOST.

There's been some great lines at places you'd least expect. Here's just one:

Kate- "Jack told me not to come back because he didn't want me to get hurt."
Juliet: "He saw you. You and Sawyer. The reason Jack told you not to come back wasn't because he didn't want you to get hurt. It was because you broke his heart."

I'll keep the change

Been noticing something peculiar over the past few weeks.

The times I was most likely to remember hurt came from gnawings of humiliation, wounded pride and self-pity. A convenient scrap book of memories with multiple pages devoted to stinging events like getting bullied in middle school, relationships that ended badly and suddenly, stupid goals and ambitions that seemed so CLEAR at the time & things I screwed up ... right on down to pets I've lost and still missed terribly.

Revisiting those chapters once or twice a year was more than plenty, thanks, and I learned to keep that volume tucked safely away on a shelf because those real-life situations were written in stone and no amount of wishful thinking could change the fact that they'd happened. Indulging in and re-living feelings of humiliation and helplessness was like opening an engraved invitation to Start the Personal Pity Party.

That's changed a little bit.

Now the times I'm most likely to feel helpless and notice my eyes blistering come while remembering seeing people I cared deeply about hurting, and being absolutely unable to do anything to make it stop.

Times when I'd willingly, even eagerly, have taken the hurt myself to stop what was happening to someone I loved. Because it tore something inside me apart to witness the pain caused to someone else.

---

By the time they're old enough to tie their own shoes little boys are taught not to cry when they're hurt. Only girls are allowed to cry, crying is for sissies and nobody wants to get called a sissy. But not crying ain't the same thing as not hurting ... so a man's unresolved hurts and feelings of helplessness learn to channel themselves into an incessant rage and willingness to strike back directed at the easiest, least-resistant target.

Himself.

You coulda done something to keep that from happening ... but you didn't. And while it was happening you still didn't do anything to make it stop. Feeling helpless creates a ravenous, seething rage that's forever marching inward, like an an enemy army that gives no quarter, takes no prisoners ... and never seems to get tired of attacking.

---

We feel most helpless when it comes to feeling helpless over someone we care deeply about. Even when we'd be willing to change places with the person who's hurting inside to make their pain stop and disappear, there's nothing we can do. We're trapped as witnesses on the outside, and instead of helping all we have to share is an awareness of our own helplessness.

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Imagine, though, if you could change places with a friend or loved one who's hurting so much it seems like they're dying on the inside. You love that person so much that you'd gladly, willingly allow yourself to be hurt in their place - knowing their pain would instantly disappear. All they've gotta do is ask.

Imagine how you'd feel if they refused. Imagine if they said, "Nah, I don't believe you can do that," said they were "Too busy right now to stop hurting" or angrily explained, "I deserve feeling this way and besides, it's comforting because pain is all I'm used to."

What if they said, "You must want something from me in return, because nobody could possibly love me that much ... and I refuse to be in your debt"? Would you shrug and give up, turn your back and go on about your business, and be happy with looking the other way?

No, you wouldn't ... and neither does Christ. He already suffered and died in our place, and he's ready to make the guilt and pain stop ... right now.

It just seems there's one thing that's the hardest for people who've known nothing but suffering to get past: first you gotta ask.

A bit rough around the watery edges

I heard that a tornado crossed Highway 187 this afternoon but dispersed before hitting the marina.

Dock 4 broke completely loose and actually came to rest against Dock 3. Dock 10 also broke loose and wandered around until finding the shore. Dock 6 broke loose and it's a big step up now to get to the ramp (I know this because I finally bought groceries).

Just happened to have a camcorder handy; you can see some of today's fun here.

Meanwhile in Arusha ...

Forget for a minute that the weatherman says it's only 92 degrees here in The Electric City. Merely stepping outside for a minute will confirm there's a meteorological scandal cooking somewhere in the ionosphere ... because it sure feels more like 115 degrees to me.

What about Arusha?

Hee hee, at noon today the high was only 64 degrees F (that's 18 C) with a relative humidity of only 67% and last night hit 55 degrees F.

Man, you'd practically need a sweater.