10.21.2004

Red Sox and the Curse of Donnie Ballgame

Tonight, sitting in the first base dugout is a man who while one of the greatest hitters of his generation, never got shot to play in a World Series.

He is now a batting coach with the only major league team he has ever played for, learning the trade of managing by watching the inner workings of the club as it is managed by a man who's low keyed approach was once vilified, praised and now questioned.

Under this manager he has a hope to go as a coach where he has never been as a player to a World Series. 4 days and 27 outs ago, this trip was all but assured. Now, it lies wasted along with 2 blown leads, the pitching staff and the bats of his chargers that after one magnificent victory had gone cold under his watch.

Bitterest of all will be by who's hands came this cruel blow, the Red Sox. Foil for so many years. Saddled with their own curse which saw they rise of this club to greatness as theirs feel. Who arose from a humiliation in game three to do what had never been done before, first to come back from 3 games down and then win game seven.

As he leaves the dugout this night knowning their will be no more baseball this year, he will at one point looks in the direction of the current Yankee captain. The first man since he to be given the honor. Will the irony come to him. Maybe this is not one man's curse. That this gifted player who has shown bright on the October stage he had been denied has yet to win another World Championship since he took the captain C? Could it be that it is the bestowing of the title of Yankee Captain that smites the bombers this bitter October night?

10.17.2004

Sympathy for Job's servants

This week I started on a bible study with my Minster Steve called Gospel Transformations. Part of this is me trying to start healing the image that I have of God.

See, I'm a recovering fundamentalist. While I came to fundamentalism in my mid 20's, it was more out of the double wrong reasons of
1. Wanting to avoid Hell
2. Get my Dad off my back about getting baptized.

To be honest, I was a really bad fundamentalist. I still talked with my old friends and didn't try to get them to come to church. I not only respected other people's faiths, sexual orientation and political views but I wasn't interested in changing them. I still watched and read what my Dad called 'junk' and became even more neurotic and guilt ridden because I felt I wasn't doing it (life, faith, love whatever) right. See there was an idea that my Dad had that one could "back side" shorthand for losing one's faith. See Dad had a falling out with the church... Well let me back up a bit...

We as a family had gotten hooked up with the Crossroad's movement in Gainesville Fla right when things were starting to take off in the mid 70's. The Crossroad singers were cutting records (one was my music teacher in school) I had a prayer partner and Dad was all the time at the church. But when he got a new job with a Tower in NC, he was told to quit or risk all of our souls since there wasn't another Church like Crossroads and without the church, we were sunk. We left. For 20 years he stayed away from the church as so did we as a family. Only his surgery for his corrodic artery the day after Christmas had him ask me if I knew of a church we could go. We went, he recommitted his life and we kept going but he also expressed guilt over both staying away and how he didn't provide the upbringing in the church for my sister and myself. On one level he believed he was OK but I could always tell that he wondered if he was still in God's good side.

Trying to be on God's good side leads into the fact that I felt that I was a pretty bad Christian when I look back on it all. I hurt two people who loved me. I didn't mean to but I still did. I hurt and disappointed people who cared about me at church. I had panic attacks and no amount of prayer or assurance that God was going to see me thru it all made me feel any better about the fact I felt like I was having a heart attack. I felt like I had no faith.

So that's the point of this study. To look at things less with the I in them and more from God's POV.

Yet that too bugs me for in the first lesson, I read quotes from the one book that I just don't like in the Bible. Job. It's a struggle for me to hold on one side that God is all knowing, loving, caring, just and good while at the same time see how he takes everything from Job, waits to see what he does then 'restores' him when he doesn't curse God.

Now I get that every person place or thing in my life, good and bad God has there for a reason. What bugs me about Job is that God takes people away from him like his kids yet its all good in the end when God brings them back.. Right now when I look at John, I just don't get that right now. While I would see John with God, I would still struggle.

Speaking of with God. I had a dream that members of Islam, Judaism, and Christianity were sitting in a circle. All wondering why the other faiths were there. God then appears in the middle and starts, "We have some explaining for you" I hope that is what Heaven will be like. Where we all come back as one after years apart.

10.16.2004

The week from Heck

If I thought last week was bad, this week was oh so much better. Work computer blows up, so I had the joy of having to do try and balance getting a new rig up and running while trying to get my stuff off the old rig and run my load tests. This comes on top of three other projects in the hopper that I had pushed from last week. If I thought last week left me fried, this one has left me wondering if my brain will make it to Nov.

10.04.2004

We bought a shed and other weekend notes

- John's had this nasty chest congestion sounding cough all weekend. Looks like a trip to see Doc Sarah.

- Saturday while Jean was at work and her parents (down for the weekend and staying with Patty and Jay) were at a flea market, John and I did our tasks. 1. on the list was storytime. John wanted to play with the librarian's puppets and bounce around the room so we headed to the family reading room. There we had some brat 5 year old tell me that computers weren't for babies while she protected her beanbag from my boy even touching it. John then yacked on one of the chairs by the computer (maybe the brat has a barf detector?). This was not going well so we headed to stop 2, State Democratic Headquarters. I wanted to replace my Kerry / Edwards yard sign since my first one got popped in just 36 hours. John was the hit of the day. While trying to hunt down a Fingerhut sign, I got talking with a few of the women running the phone bank. One was fearful of what Issue One could do to her domestic partner benefits while another started to get weepy at the idea of another 4 years under Bush. John, ever the flirt, climbed in one ladies lap, grabbed a pencil and holding it in her left hand looked like he was ticking off people he had called. He even had the bank's cell phone at one point. Too bad we didn't have a camera. After being told where to find the Fingerhut signs by one kid, another came up telling the phone bank that the goal was 15 live contacts per hour and that we have 31 days till the polls. I remembered just then why I opted to get out of the campaigning game...grunt work like cold calling. I can work a both with the best of them but I hated canvasing. Stop 3 was to Heartland's sales center to get the family a shed to keep our yard stuff. John had fell asleep but woke up in time for us to pick out a 10X12 (biggest we could have in Gahanna) Delux Estate with 6 foot side walls. I feel so suburban now I can't stand it. When Jean got home, we headed back to Heartland to check if the 6 ft wall would work for us and then lunch at Red Robin. Ran into on the way Iron Mitchel from the CompuServe days. Come to find out that he was in the layoff class of 2002 where I was in the class of 01. We talk about who was with him at Bank One and what we've each been up to. I hope we can hook up to watch a game before the seaon is out.

- Sunday. After church ran the Allen girls over to sports ohio for their basketball pratice. Place kinda gives me the creeps. I rather have John playing pickup ball and having fun than 'working' at a place like sports ohio. Terry and I hit the GMGC for a quick nine. I haven't even been to the range but I hit some nice shots and was throwing darts with my wedge play from 100 yards in. Couldn't hit a put to save my life but I still had fun. On 3, Terry and I paired up with Niki who is the only woman I've ever seen who plays left handed. We got talking and she said that this was her first year playing. She could hit the ball well for someone who had been playing less than a year.

Well off to bed.

Anne Lamont on Faith

"Religion is for people who are afraid of going to Hell. Faith is for people who have been there.."