2011 Family. Friends. National. International. Random. Memories are different in each person’s eyes, mind, ears and heart: time to stir mine.  Arab Spring. OBL. Gabrielle.  Cleveland. Gratitude. Life.  Grover & friend in Cleveland just after surgery. Time Turner.  I Remember Mama. Tunisia. Political Clowns. Occupy. Libya. Egypt. Gilad. Nisreen. Iran. Joplin. Tahrir. Tuscaloosa. Yemen. SEALS. Harry Potter. USCG. Pakistan. Annie & Jennie. Euro. W-S. Raleigh. Bay High, Oxford, Emory. Iraq. 9-9-9. Norway. HNEC. Sesquicentennial 1861 - 2011. Bible Study. Earthquake Tsunami Nuclear. William & Kate. Steve Jobs. Nittany Lions. Burial at Sea. Syria. Atlantis. HNES. North Korea. Jelly Bean. Afghanistan.  http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/30/a-sad-fearful-raging-year/?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=thab1 Merry Christmas.  + Time. Stirred mine. Stir your own. Happy New Year:  I wish you joy, health, hope,  life, peace,  happin...

Not usually an FSU fan, but v. ND made it easy. 0-14 to 18-14. Still not a Noles fan, but what a fantastic game. Automotive News on line this morning had a link to Vinsetta Garage that linked to AutoWeek’s website and an article on Auctions America’s disposal of the Lee Roy Hartung collection.  The 1950 Edwards R-26 Roadster. Photo by Auctions America. 1950 Veritas BMW with coachwork by Spohn. Photo by Auctions America. Everyday isn’t about religion. Some days are about football. All days are about cars. TW+ 

Highlight of Christmas has always been the Christmas Eve service and family gathered. Nearly everyone was here. Joe leaves this morning on a 6:30 flight for NC. To celebrate early with Joe, for supper last night Linda fixed traditional New Years Day dinner -- hoppin’ john, collard greens, rutabaga.   hoppin' john ingredients black-eyed peas ham bone  chicken broth instead of water garlic powder white rice Sadness when everyone is gone -- having beloveds here is Christmas happiness -- a noisy house, and gratitude for a Christmas that a year ago was not expected for me!! Sunset down front -- looking west over neighbors' dock. Next project. Tuesday morning Bible study for Lent Term 2012. They had enough of Saint Paul, maybe we’ll study Mark and John. Mark, our first and oldest gospel. John, newest gospel and totally different from the synoptics. Stir in a bit of Anglicanism. Scripture, Tradition and Reason. lex orandi lex credendi.  TW+

Nostalgia Decembers years ago, we lived in cold, wintry climes. Not always, but often. Rhode Island, Washington DC, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania. Bare trees, bleak sky. Bitter cold, freezing wind, overcast and drear, icy roads, snowplow scraping by during the night, and the salt truck rumbling by, sidewalk and driveway to shovel, icy windshield to scrape. A freezing car to shiver into for the drive to work through filthy snow piled high on either side of the road. Nostalgic: my heart and mind would be in Florida, Bay County, along St. Andrew Bay -- where, in nostalgic vision, it would be a proper December, damp, chilly fog in the evening and early morning, yielding to a warm day, sunshine, even balmy. Longing to be home. From my upstairs front porch looking across the Bay, Tuesday morning was overcast, damp and chilly, foggy mist on the Bay -- just as my imagination had visualized all those evenings and mornings years ago. Made me nostalgic for my December days of nostalgia for home. N...

The Holy Name     January 1 Eternal Father, you gave to your incarnate Son the holy name of Jesus to be the sign of our salvation: Plant in every heart, we pray, the love of him who is the Savior of the world, our Lord Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, in glory everlasting. Amen. IHS  Holy Name of Jesus   A monogram of the name of Jesus Christ. From the third century the names of our Saviour are sometimes shortened, particularly in Christin inscriptions (IH and XP, for Jesus and Christus). In the next century the "sigla" (chi-rho) occurs not only as an abbreviation but also as a symbol. From the beginning, however, in Christian inscriptions the nomina sacra, or names of Jesus Christ, were shortened by contraction, thus IC and XC or IHS and XPS for Iesous Christos. These Greek monograms continued to be used in Latin during the Middle Ages. Towards the close of the Middle Ages IHS became a symbol, quite l...

Every Christmas is different, every family gathering is unique from all others before and all others that will be. Each time, the dynamic has changed, there are new sounds, a different mix of voices. Everyone is older than last time. Children have grown and matured. Someone has relocated to a new job and lives at too great a distance to be here. Someone else is gone forever, leaving an empty chair that cannot be filled. There may be a new baby, or a visitor.  December 25, 2011 was my first Christmas without my mother. It was different, made me think wanderingly of Christmases long ago and far away. Christmas 1969 my ship was at sea in WestPac, off Vietnam. There was no email or cellphone in those days, but you could sign up, get on the list for a phone call home, and I did. Someone will correct me, but seems to me it was single sideband, not like a phone call at home, it was back and forth, you spoke, and when you paused the channel switched to the other end. Bit awkward and ten mi...

Deck the Halls with Bows of Folly Fa la la la la la la la la Carroll the Ancient Yuletide Troll aka CtAYT or  ς τ 8 came in wee hours with gifts for Beloved Kiddywinks who are expected late morning. Late breakfast awaits them, Kringles of various sorts and flavors, tea, coffee, milk, juice. Before they arrive at 2308 WBD,  ς τ 8 will depart to officiate ten-thirty worship, which this year doubles as both Sunday morning and Christmas Day service. No long sermon. More, homilette. One of many blessings and joys of being Priest Associate at Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, PC is feeling most welcome. Another is zero parish administration. Another is being able to focus on my interest, Bible classes. Another is being able to help in any way the rector wants or needs, which is a blessing and joy to me, and includes officiating at HNEC this morning.  Christmas Gift. Joys and blessings of 2011 were family and friends, loved ones all, who flew me to Cleveland in January, visite...

Decent coffee this morning. Cup upstairs in bed about three thirty while finishing up everything in the August 29 issue of The New Yorker . Read the fiction short story and articles about the fiat dollar, tarot card art, piece about people gathering to update Wikipedia articles, letters to editor ... everything but theater, book, and movie reviews. Coffee from the upstairs Keurig, which is not well stocked, so used a re-run cup plus a spoon of instant. Had it in my Hog Mug that Joe gave me years ago. On the side it reads “Harley-Davidson Classic Tank Designs Circa 1935.” Being one of my treasures, it’s kept upstairs and no one is allowed to touch it.  Downstairs for the second cup of coffee and breakfast: one slice whole wheat bread, smear mayonnaise, slice fresh pineapple, folded over. Just like the good old days. The Good Old Days were not reality, they were just a short time of my growing up years to remember passing through; everyone looks back on the good old days, and they...

Joe subscribes to The New Yorker and delighted me by bringing a stack of current back issues as an early Christmas surprise. It has been my favorite magazine since first finding out about it traveling on commercial airlines, what, fifty years ago? Every article is excellent if a bit lengthy, the fiction is invariably engaging, the cartoons are without equal, the poetry is good, especially when it’s elusive. Imaginative, artsy covers. A relaxing airplane trip and a good visit to the doctor’s office are ones that yield a copy of The New Yorker in the magazine rack. Doesn’t matter about the age. My style typically is to read through start to finish except in a waiting room, when it’s a quick thumb through to catch all the cartoons, then start the fiction piece and try to speed read it before my name is called.  Only one of the magazines Joe brought has been opened so far, August 29, 2011. Excellent: Letter from Damascus, telling first hand what's going on in Syria. The Life and Times ...

A happy memory of my five years as priest at St. Thomas by the Sea is being a block from the Gulf of Mexico. My office opened to the outside and the door was frequently hooked open for the salty air and breeze. And the sound of the sea, which some days could be deafening, being close enough to hear individual waves crashing ashore. Opening to the upstairs front porch, my bedroom here has the same advantage of salt breeze, though coming four miles across St. Andrew Bay the roar of the surf is muted and distant. Just so this morning. Yesterday’s weather was intermittently stormy and the Bay choppy, but we made our journey. Five to seven foot seas in the Gulf discouraged that trip, so instead of going outside we made the inside run down to the Old Pass, getting as close as we could in shallow water and cold rain to cast ashes. Just as well: inside was the route Annie & Jennie sailed to the Old Pass that last night January 7, 1918. Walt, Joe, John, Megan, Jack, James, me. Psalm 139...

Christmas: the Kingdom of Heaven When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. (1 Corinthians 13:11, KJV) If Easter is the core theology of Christianity, Christmas is its enchantment. Growing up I longed for a White Christmas, gazing hopefully at the sky, knowing full well it would never snow. And time, tantalizing time . A clear memory is a Christmas Eve, 1940s, Panama City, playing outside barefoot, short pants and no shirt, agonizing that bedtime would never come, Christmas Eve the longest day of the year, waiting for Santa Claus, Christmas dawn an eternity away, By that time of childhood, Christmas was a season of dichotomy, reluctant knowing but choosing to believe anyway because faith is choice not knowledge and wisdom not folly, fearing that Santa knows and bypasses doubters, a stocking of coals and outer darkness awaits unbelievers. Besides which, forbidden to spill the beans to still ...

Titus 2:11-14 The Message (MSG)   11-14 God's readiness to give and forgive is now public. Salvation's available for everyone! We're being shown how to turn our backs on a godless, indulgent life, and how to take on a God-filled, God-honoring life. This new life is starting right now, and is whetting our appetites for the glorious day when our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, appears. He offered himself as a sacrifice to free us from a dark, rebellious life into this good, pure life, making us a people he can be proud of, energetic in goodness. Titus 3:4-7 The Message (MSG)   3-8 It wasn't so long ago that we ourselves were stupid and stubborn, dupes of sin, ordered every which way by our glands, going around with a chip on our shoulder, hated and hating back. But when God, our kind and loving Savior God, stepped in, he saved us from all that. It was all his doing; we had nothing to do with it. He gave us a good bath, and we came out of it new people, washed inside a...

Nutty as a Fruitcake In a hundred years it won’t matter when I lived, because, obviously, I will be as gone as George Washington is gone, as gone as the Roman centurion at Calvary is gone, as gone as Abraham. Sometimes I wonder whether there is any consciousness after death; that is to say, any consciousness of life on earth. The church already believes that there is Something not Nothing: if that is so, what is the nature of it? My life has been at a good time for me, not least due to modern medical science saving my life with a tonsillectomy, an appendectomy, and open heart surgery. And also because of my fascination with modern electronic gadgets, one of which, being typed on at the moment, has me instantly in touch with any connected person anywhere in the world, and can take and transmit my photo as I sit here, God forbid. George Washington would be astonished, not to mention Abraham.  But when it comes to gadgets, my love for automobiles is all surpassing -- especially love f...

In our gospel reading this morning, Luke 1:26-38, Mary is surprised by the same angel who recently visited Elizabeth’s husband Zechariah with like news from God: Mary will bear a son. Luke tells us her response: πως εσται τουτο επει ανδρα ου γινωσκω. Literally, “How shall this since man not I know.” Every English translation renders it differently, some more delicately than others, but what Mary says is that she has never been with a male. Thus we have the Doctrine of the Virgin Birth. We shall discuss it in our Sunday School class this morning. Come join us. Mary Stuart Poole Library, 9:15 a.m. TW+ Fra Filipo Lippi, The Annunciation

My father died suddenly and unexpectedly in July 1993, and we were not quite sure why. Just before Christmas a year and a half earlier, he had had emergency open heart surgery for valve replacement and bypass grafts, and he probably took his meds faithfully, but he refused to follow through with any sort of exercise program as his cardiologist recommended. During our usual Fourth of July family reunion he apparently picked up a cold, or the flu, or perhaps something that caused infection, we never knew. Mama took him to hospital and he died suddenly a day or so later. Mama and I were with him in the hospital when he had a sudden event, and I remember the physician saying, "I don't know what has happened, but it's catastrophic." He died a few minutes later, to our shock and my mother's total devastation. He was 82. His ashes have been in the columbarium at Holy Nativity. My mother died in July 2011 at age 99, and her ashes have been beside his. In my mother’s will ...

Stirrer Christmastime through the 1940s into the ‘50s my job was stirrer. Candy stirrer. Mama’s kitchen was alive with smells. Fudge. Toffee. Date roll. Pecan roll. Divinity. My job was stirrer. Gina and Walt probably helped later, but my growing up years the stirrer job was mine. Stirrer got to lick the spoon.. Stirring was hard work, stir until it stiffens and nevermind the elbow. But stirrer did not have to share the spoon. Mama made candy sure as Christmas came round. And sweet tradition lives on. Christmastime these years, Tass makes peanut butter balls and Jeremy bakes bite-size mince pies and Christmas cake.    TW+

Mark Haddon’s the curious incident of the dog in the night-time stirred me to read a spot of bother. Haddon gets inside the head of George, Jean, Katie, Jamie, nearly everyone. But not David. David? The war in Iraq was declared ended a few minutes ago. Personal memories of my country ending a war. Newsreels of Dachau. Mushroom cloud. Helicopters desperately lifting people to U. S. Navy warships offshore as Saigon was overrun. Marine barracks at Beirut Airport 1983. Blackhawk Down 1993. Victory declaration aboard USS ABRAHAM LINCOLN 2003. Afghanistan? Sunday School this week: Virgin Birth. Sermon? Roaming a junkyard while singing “On the Wings of a Nightingale” the Everly Brothers rescue a 1957 Chevy Bel Air convertible. Is there a ’57 Chevy in my sermon junkyard? TW?