In the towel

At the start, before everything, at the very start - there needs to be love. Love doesn't have to come after understanding, love doesn't have to follow knowing, getting, grasping, likeing, wanting - any other verb- Love is the start.
And yet more often than not we bypass love to move on to those things that are easier. We move on to expressions of love rather than love, we hold on to emotional responses rather than love. Rationality, logic, understanding a 'desire' to 'help out' can all oddly enough be enemies of love - and yet for me, and I suspect for most of us, these things come easier than the root.
It's easier but ultimately not sustainable to love after any of these other things - I think at least.
Caring and 'getting along', initially pose as love's co-pilots - so it's rare when we have these two that we stop to question if we really can love one another. We think that these will steer us into love, but more often than not they just 'exist' in a blahze sort of manner - in a ditch like-stagnancy that does little more than allow us to float our dingy on.
We, as relational beings, crave this love. And it is phenomal the ammount of hurt we will cause to get it. It is this love that we need in a community context, this base level of love - not neccessarily understanding, just plain 'ol love; yet it is this love that we at times seem to do everything to avoid. We dodge in word, action, thought, mis-action, lies. In the course of two months, I have had a bit of an outsiders perspective in seeing a group of people dodge this love in truly original ways.
Much of our failings at this really cannot be solely pegged on 'us' per say. Everything wrong with creation does truly pull us from knowing this kind of love. Suspician, hurt, real tragedy, mis-understanding; the cards are not often stacked in our favour. We are almost "too big," too dramatic for having this responsibilty of love.
One of the mysterious elements to this pursuit is that; wrapping our heads around what it means to love, understanding how we show it etc. should not actually be our primary focus. The most challenging thing about this kind of love is that it is both passionate and patient - it cannot be self-driven and it cannot be bastardized by contrived expressions.
It is such a process of radical confidence in the source of such love, and such a rigorous (for me at least) reduction of anything else, that I think this kind of love is probably what part if not all of this life is all about.

Speaking of Awkward

I have no crutch except the desire to please everyone

The self preserving, selfishness of the human condition has been revealed recently to me in what I had thought was nothing more than a social oddity – that of the awkwardness.
It should have been so obvious – my intelligence, self –awareness, social currency – all completely mocked, blinded and bound up through this disease. I am as happy as the people I surround myself with – or so seems to be the myth that I often carry.
I will avoid at all cost the awkward situation. I will talk, I will lie, I will sing and I will run all to hope that the awkward turtle swims past me without causing ME harm. I am plauged with having extra sensitivity to such situations, the radar for me tends to be a warm feeling in my throat which works its way to the upper stomach. Yeah - it's bad.
So when the unavoidable awkwardness of this world decends, I'll take any self-centered port in the storm.

A man named Forest once blessed me as being an agitator for God, and cautioned me from being an agitator of the devil. I've typically linked that to my unique ability to send mis appropriated emails at late hours of the night. But now I think there is more to it.
I think part of what he meant by that is that awkwardness persevered, awkwardness recognized and pushed through, agitation that is listened to and dealt with can ultimately have the scent of God on it – as weird as that may sound. Awkwardness avoided, agitation brushed off can just socially smell. I know it true in my life and wont go so far to blanket the notion to all situations but let's face it, Jesus was potentially the most socially awkward person around (I bet it was awkward when his parents asked him how his day was and he told them he destroyed the temple..)

You'd be surprised at just how primal our adversions to those things which may cause us social harm are. Atleast in my life I am stunned to the depths that I can dig all in an effort of social self preservation.

I'll just leave that awkward comment with y'all -

walking in memphis

"Yes, I know, I've talked with him, we prayed about it – it's alright"

The condition of Christians is caught up in a world where prayer has turned from process to purchase. Marketing masters have seeped our soul, and our Christian consumption has become satisfied with a commissioned based sales process. Prayer is no longer passionate patience, or a persistent petitioning – it is now the equivalent of using "words" to solve our problems, as sticks and stones break our bones.

To use the vernacular of my workplace – if you are dissatisfied with your current service you can call in to your provider and lodge a complaint. Depending on time of day etc. you may receive a few credits on your account (a few months free, new accessory) – but more often than not, you'll get some rookie who will tell you to suck a lemon.

Faced with this, you can do one of three things:

1) Hang up, call back and hope that you get a better 'agent' – odds are high with enough persistence, either your service will improve, or you'll forget that it was ever a problem.

2) Switch providers – it's easy enough, so long as you're not in a commitment.

3) Cancel service all together

Our reference for suffering is similar to mushy fruit at a produce stand, we expect customer satisfaction or we'll go
elsewhere. And in someway, this is how we have begun to pray.

This is not however a blog post to point out suffering extended – I am frightfully and thankfully aware that I cannot preach about those who wear the white robes of expired promises. Nor am I trying to address the need for patience, I'm not trying to solve the question of every 15 year old - "why does God take longer than a week to answer my prayer...?"

I can only write poorly on that character that I have come across a lot this summer: the concept that a whimsical prayer will make our Ying come back to our Yang. I'm not calling for a reduction in faith – if anything this summer has taught the opposite. I think it's a fleeting cry for an enlargement of what our concept of faith can be – sure it's in response to a frustration to the flippancy in which both I and those around me often approach our problems; but, I think it's something more than just that. To begin a partnership of faith in which prayer is no longer about tossing the marble and hearing it roll down the tin roof of reality – how that looks for me is different than you I'm sure. I guess it's (wow) expecting it to be tough, at least that's what I've felt in the past few weeks – that I expect prayer almost to be part of the battle, it's messy, complicated and not to be checked off the list when 'done.'

So there it is, no 12 point step for effective prayers, but just a realization I guess that I'm peering into a hole and I have no idea how far down the looking glass I really am going.  

 

 

devils and dust

I've got my finger on the trigger, and tonight faith just aint enough, when I look into your eyes, there's just devils and dust.

Sand and Spirit, Sand and Spirit. It's become increasingly difficult to tell one from the other and it seems like ultimately despite a world that wants clean divisions between the two - we are condemned to live in a fractured, yet not neatly split world. It's that space between knowing, and not just guessing, but really actually knowing that sand has blown off the rock, and spirits remain - and yet feeling the weight of ultimately what we really are - life blown dirt.

Now every woman and every man, they wanna take a righteous stand. Find the love that God wills and the faith that he commands. Got my finger on the trigger and tonight faith just aint enough. When I look inside my heart, it's just Devil's and dust.

Grammatically incorrect ramblings spill over as emotions pour into prayers into songs and into complicated actions. I am stuck in between this place of seeing a mirage, feeling a weight of deisre to reach it, and living in a dull, dirty reality. Every now and then God has given me an opportunity to see this rock without sand - but it makes this dusty city all the harder to bear.

It's not with a weighted spirit that I bear it, seeing him in the whirlwind seems to be part of my schtick. I can't say I know if I'm any good at it though - my hands covered in dirt and my spirit sometimes lacking.

Got God on my side, and I'm just trying to survive, but if what you do to survive kills the things you love, fears a powerful thing - turns your heart black you can trust. It will take a God filled song, fill it with devils and dust.

To the difficult

Again, while I know maybe 1 or 2 people are reading this, I would encourage you to tell you colleagues, co-workers, inmates, 'partners' to feel free to submit their work place poem. It can be mad, sad, funny, stupid, profane or prophetic....whatever --- I've started it because getting mad is both neccessary and let's face it a fact of our vocational life. How we deal with the anger and how long we hold on to it is up to us (yes, thank you, I've been watching Oprah). My poems right now often focus on anger - they are dumb, but they stop me from being angry at various things/people. So, if that works for you. DO IT - don't get mad - get poetic.

To the Difficult:

It is said that you can catch more flies with honey

But if you pour vinegar on them, you can kill a fly pretty easily 

Flies loves honey, and vinegar is only good on french fries

So how do you decide if someone is a fly or a fry?

In order to decide if one is a fly or one is a fry one must have a very keen eye

And a keen eye is hard to come by - I tell you no lie

So whether your dealing with a fly or a fry

And if you're trying to decide which condiment should apply

It is best to remember that with too much of one dressing

All insects, plants, food and animals will eventually die

And then you wil have no one to curse - as they will have all waved goodbye.

To the Internet....

Our website is troubled - oh is it ever. And I am stuck in between FTP protocols, server hosts, joomla software, godaddy and domain names. 

I encourage you, the anonymous internet lurker, rather than get mad when things go wrong, to get creative. Nothing is more satisfying than firing off a well written prose. Please do not hesitate, oh non existant community, to submit a poem of your own. The idea here is that this could be a collection of articulate subtle rages, or joys, or whatever. I know - i really am lame. so lame. so lame.

Without further ado - To the Internet:

If a website falls in cyberspace will it be Curt who notices?

If a domain goes down will GoDaddy rescue it?

Who is he who installs joomla in the sky?

Who is he who assigns FTP protocols to the delinquent few?

I’d like my domain to point to the world, and yet find myself caught in a web

My domain name is parked, and my zoneedit is dropping

I have laid my passwords to the alter of Isaac and my FTP settings to the Curt

Wont web traffic rain down on me?

Ode to Chad

Chad, our supplier has problems with the truth sometimes. This first blog entry, on my brand spanking new blog is dedicated to him. Not sure what will come of this blog, it'll probably go the way of all blogs. But for now, let there be clutter in cyberspace.

Chad, Chad, Chad

Why are you so bad?

You fill our hopes with Samsung dreams

But leave us with very little means

It's not that you purposefully lie

But your empty promises make me want to cry

We cannot go on in this dizzying maze

But without a clear resolve I'm left in a Daze

To wonder why it is you have wasted your breath

And failed to deliver, despite swearing on your death

Chad, Chad, Chad

I can'€™t help but feel so sad

For it'€™s you who play us for fools

But it'€™s us who come out looking like tools

Chad, Chad, Chad

Why oh why are you so bad?