First Impressions

Santa Cruz, if you're trying to impress me, it's not working! Yesterday, the wind was a serious task master, blasting pedestrians with bullets of sand. The granules attacked my skin with the vengeance of a thousand mosquitos. I pulled out my sunglasses not because of the brightness but to save my eyeballs from the sandy assault. The sun was being shy, playing peek-a-boo with the clouds, but the heat wasn't hiding behind anything! The humidity makes my hair a force to be reckoned with and the temperature spreads open my pores as sweat slides down the contours of my face.

Today, the clouds have invaded. Their arrival has lowered the mercury and beaten down the sand with the force of their rain. I am thankful for the relief, but a glance out the window and I wonder how I'm going to tackle the puddles, ponds, and new oceans that are gathering in our yard and in the road.

The casita where I now live is cute and pleasant. Between the large windows, lie naked walls waiting to be adorned. Between the uncovered walls, the floor starves for lack of furniture. My bedroom is occupied by a bed and one extremely heavy chair, but in my head it is filled with tall and short shelving, as well as a full length mirror. Against one side, there is a desk and two of the corners are graced with the fronds of two palms. Above the desk, there are five beloved faces, a quintet of favourite photos of my nieces and nephews.

Alison is my housemate. She is petite and blonde. This morning she went to her mission office but often she seeks out remote places to administer her medical skills and offer the hope of her salvation. Her love and faith bursts forth within minutes of talking with her. Her place may be void of tables and chairs, but when it comes to personality and warmth, she is amply furnished.

As I await what this weekend may hold, I am also anticipating the next several months. I am here to stay this time, there will be no return to Cochabamba, except to visit. My mind is buzzing with the novelty of it all. My thoughts dart from one idea to the next, as I visualize what could be done for the house and the ministry. The weather is not overly impressive, but Santa Cruz is saturated with possibility and potential.

Laugh Out Loud

First, I just want to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my beloved, OLD friend, Yvonne Lammers a.k.a. Welmers. Love ya!

Now, laugh out loud to yourself, by your self.

That´s what I did when I read David Crowder´s final ancedote as he wrapped up his book "Praise Habit".

After bending to the flattery of a friend, he purchased a red T-shirt that was labelled "Ancient Chinese Secret" with the supposed aged wisdom hidden in "Chinese" markings below it. The same day of purchase, he wore the shirt to a meeting of pastors.

Following the meeting, another friend commented on his bravery. He didn´t understand until he turned the T-shirt sideways and realized that the markings read, "Go "F" yourself!"

While I laughed at the poor misfortune of the well known worship leader, I was reminded of another story that my pastor´s wife told me. While visiting a pool, her husband, the pastor, had not brought his bathing suit. On an impulse buy, she bought him some styling trunks covered with palm trees. After a time of splashing and playing in the water, he waded onto the dry land, shook off the wetness, and revealed a whole lot more then he intended. The water had turned the tropical trees into naked, bathing beauties.

These situations would be embarassing to anyone, but somehow, it´s stinking hilarious when it happens to someone in the ministry. I like how Crowder draws an analysis between his humiliation and semiotics (the study of signs and symbols of all kinds, what they mean, and how they relate to the things or ideas they refer to). He had examined that T-shirt with a serious amount of perusal, but he never saw the hidden message. Someone else had to point it out to him. My pastor and his wife could never have known that there were nude women lurking beneath the trees unless the water had revealed them. Once discovered, all they could see was the underlying message. The initial impression was lost and the real intent of the "symbols" became blaring and obvious.

It is our tendancy and responsibility to examine the signs and symbols around us. Still, we don´t always notice the actual truth of our own situation unless someone else helps us to look at it from a different angle. Sometimes, I am embarassed by what God, family, and others have to point out in my life, but I still need their insight...I still want their insight. To paraphrase Crowder, the real message, the thing that is scribbled barely legible, and underlying is always there. We need rescue by others and mostly, by God himself.

This is where I am. Trying to unscramble the signs and symbols that surround me and determine what they mean for my life and my future. If you perceive something that I´m missing, turn my T-shirt sideways or throw me in the water.

Pastime or Sport?!?

It is time to lay this eternal argument to rest, is baseball a pastime or a sport? For twelve years I played community and church baseball and for the same amount of time was told, mostly by soccer players, that what I was doing could not be classified as a sport.

This past weekend, I was once again confronted by this fallacy by a bunch of basketball fiends. They argued that the sport of my youth was really only a pastime, America´s favourite, but nonetheless, a pastime not a sport. One advocate declared that he was going to blog about this topic...I thought I´d try to beat him at his own game.

Although we established and argued the definitions of sport and pastime, I want to print them here for the rest of my readers.

SPORT - physical activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in
competitively.
- an activity involving physical exertion and skill that is governed by a set of rules or
customs and often undertaken competitively.

No one can deny that baseball has rules, customs, and competition. The main argument of those who hold the orange and black striped orb was that there was no physical exertion involved in baseball. I will concede that their is less physical exertion in baseball, but the definition does not quantify the amount of physical exertion needed in order for it to qualify as sport. A swing of the bat, the pursuit of a flyball, and a dash around the bases for a triumphant grand slam all require physical exertion. I recognize that these exertions come in spurts, but what of those who play soccer or basketball but are put on and pulled off just as quickly? Does the brevity of their play mean that they are no longer involved in a sport but a pastime? Length of physical exertion does not serve to define sport.

PASTIME - an activity or diversion that occupies one´s time and thoughts (usually pleasantly)
i.e. Sailing is her favourite pastime

Here I change my argument slightly in order to state that baseball is a pastime and a sport...as is basketball...unless you opt to argue that basketball is not a pleasant activity that occupies one´s time and thoughts. And, if you argue that baseball is simply a pastime while basketball is a sport, let me add that the dictionary also defines sport as an active pastime, therefore identifying sport as pastime and pastime as sport.

I have concluded that baseball, basketball, soccer, and a variety of other activities (i.e. golf, although I detest admitting it) are all pastimes and sports.

p.s. My country of origin does not diminish the validity of my arguements nor does my use of the noun/verb "rusk".
p.s.s If any of you can tell me what a rusk is and what it means to rusk something, I´d be obliged!

Uniform Injustice

I was mad.

My Spanish teacher made me read a short story and the ending peeved me off. It was the account of a little boy, Willy, and his mother. She sold drinks under a make-shift blue tarp on the side of a street and cleaned a couple of houses in order to provide for them both. They were poor and typical. One day, the principal at Willy´s school announced that they would be entering into a parade. Wanting to display their finest, each student was required to participate in a new black pants, white top, and jacket. A new suit and tie were an out of reach luxury for Willy and his single mom. Upon discussion, the director conceded that Willy could be involved as long as he had a new white dress shirt. A mother, eager to please her dear son, sold her most precious possesion, pearl earrings, so that her beloved could join his classmates. The day of the parade arrived and both were excited and emotional. Just before the students marched into the streets, the director decided that the jacket-less Willy made the school look bad and determined that only the fully suited would participate. A dejected Willy stood, stifling his tears and sucking in his bottom lip, watching as his peers pranced to the beat of drums and tossed their batons into the air.

I turned the last page and saw that it was blank. I turned another and it too was void of words. I went back to make sure that two pages weren´t sticking together...nothing. I was left with this image of a hurting and rejected child who had done nothing to merit this type of treatment.

I was mad.

After summarizing the story and my reaction to my teacher Susí, she asked me if I would have changed the ending if I were the author. After a contemplative pause, I concluded that I would keep the ending as it was. The author wanted to make a point, and he did so with punch and precision. I can still feel the impact of his literal fist in my gut.

Injustice exists. Little boys can´t participate in parades due to poverty. Directors favour appearance and presentation over compassion and empathy. Little children prostitute themselves while adults reap the financial gains of this perversion. Men abandon the women they impregnate, leaving them to sell meagre drinks on the sides of streets. The onus is on us to change their plot. We must fight for their happy endings. We must struggle to fill in the blank pages with words of hope and a better day.

The ugly head of injustice is turned by the neck of negligence and ignorance, mostly of the down and out. In our arrogance, we neglect "living praise". "Living praise is to embody the things that God is concerned with, ...our living must bring rescue from the trampling boot. Justice will be our concern because it is God´s concern....It is picking up those who are marginalized and whose voices are unheard and saying, "Look! Look!" (David Crowder, Praise Habit). An even better book says this, "Woe to you Pharisees because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue, and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without leaving the former undone." Luke 11:42

The most stirring scenes for me in the movie Narnia are the moments when Aslan roars. A shiver races through me and my armhairs stand at attention during these gutteral utterances. It is the sound of justice about to be delivered, the sound of an end about to be written. We are of those who have the "happily ever after", but only the Lion can scribe "the end"...the end of injustice. When He roars, when the last page is turned, may my pen be a sword that battles on behalf of the marginilized.