Category Archives: Life

Writer’s block

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The first few days of retirement have been a writer’s wasteland. Then I found a saved draft of Steve Shoemaker’s verse. It was as though it was waiting for just this time. Maybe tomorrow I’ll feel like throwing something away.

Write something, anything

(Was it Malcolm Muggeridge who said if
you can’t write something good, write something
bad that you can throw away.)
…
How do I know what I think till I see what I say?
…
Can ideas be feelings or colors or moods,
or must letters and spaces reveal the mind?
…
Type on an iPhone, computer or pad:
words, sentence, phrases–the good and the bad.
…
Drivel, insight, cliche, Truth–
symbol, allegory, tall-tale, lie;
future, memory, made-of-whole-cloth,
fiction, non-fiction, poetry.
…
Muses, Graces all have wings–they flit and fly away.

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL

Verse – Four Questions about Heaven

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Do choirs of angels
need to rehearse?

The choirs of angels
sing only of good will
and peace, or the five
praise Psalms. (Hallelujah!)
For angels, rehearsals
and performances are
all indistinguishable.

How many voices sing
in David’s huge mass choir?

God only knows…
The seven penitential Psalms
are David’s entire repertoire.
Most of humanity
joins him and sings on bended knee.

Why don’t any of the choirs
sing the word “Selah?”

David says the word meant
instrumental interlude:
listen for the harps and strings,
drums and flutes, the organ, horn!

Is Heaven’s music heard in Hell?

I certainly hope so…

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, November 11, 2014

Paul Molitor: a memory

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Paul Molitor

Paul Molitor

Paul Molitor [ML Baseball Hall of Fame] was hired yesterday as the new Manager of the Minnesota Twins.

In 1994 Mr. Molitor stood ahead of me in line at a McDonalds at the Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport. It was Sunday around noon. I had rushed there from morning worship at Westminster Presbyterian Church in downtown Minneapolis with no time to remove the clerical collar I’d worn in worship.

“Good Morning, Father,” he said, assuming, I suppose, I was a Roman Catholic priest, or perhaps, just being respectful. “Good Morning, Mr. Molitor, what a pleasant surprise.”

We got our BigMacs or some other unhealthy fast food and sat down together, as I recall it, at Paul Molitor’s invitation.

What I remember is his respectful nature and his humility. I congratulated him for his amazing performance in the 1993 World Series was the best performance I’d ever seen by a ball player. He was named MVP in the series in which he led the Toronto Blue Jays to win the series. He batted 500, reached base 57.9 % of his at bats, Had two doubles, two triples, two home runs, eight Runs Batted In, and a 1.000 Slugging Average.  Nobody does that. No one before. No one since.

He responded something like. “I was lucky. Thank you, Father.” He’s number one in my book. He’s make a great manager.

 

 

Catcallers and young bucks

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Verse – Animals

She felt like prey when men
she did not know
would call to her as she
would walk to work.
With head held high she would
not even show
she heard, but soon would hear
another jerk

whistling or clucking–one
would even bark…
Her dress was modest, no
short skirt, tight pants,
décolletage. Guys tried
to make their mark
still, would persist, ignore
her resistance.

She had kept rabbits as
a girl and knew
what happened when you put
a female inside
the cage of a young buck.
The four-month doe
was circled, bitten, kissed,
then he would ride.

Rabbits were bred to breed–
can human males
let women choose when to
be animals?

– Steve Shoemaker, November 3, 2014

prochoice

Election Day

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Today we go to the polls.

Yesterday a Minnesota voter from Minnesota House of Representatives District 7B noticed something very strange. She’s a Democrat. She also believes in fairness and clean play in political campaigns and was, therefore, distressed and confused by seeing a picture of Kerry Gauthier posted as the photograph of Travis Silvers (R) on an online voter ballot. Click HERE for the mistaken identity.

Travis Silvers is a Republican. He’s young.silverstravis

Kerry Gauthier is a Democrat. He’s the older, one-term State Representative from District 7B who left the legislatures following a widely publicized encounter with a 17 year-old at a highway rest stop. The publicity was ugly.

220px-Kerry_Gauthier

So…how does the photo of Kerry Gauthier appear on the MN-voter.org website as Travis Silvers?

Did someone hack the MN-Voter.org website in order to deceive or confuse visitors to the site? Or maybe some smart-alec submitted the photo as a way of having fun?  Or… dirty tricks?

Views tom the Edge reported the error to mn-voter.org yesterday, but we may never get a response.

Today we go to the polls. Finally, the alarmist campaign emails and phone calls will stop. But obfuscation and shenanigans will not. We will continue to substitute personality and personal stories for policy and substance. Dirty politics and slimy innuendoes will continue to be the order of the day.

Whatever the result of this election, it’s a sad day for the American people. Do we deserve better? Only time will tell.

Woke up this morning with my mind

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Rainbow over the IL prairie.

Rainbow over the IL prairie.

A song was singing in my head again this morning.

I don’t invite the songs. They come like old friends arriving at the door without explanation.

This morning the old friend was a Civil Rights Movement song, but I wasn’t marching.

“Woke up this morning with my mind stayed on freedom.”

The marching song my generation sang with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. has a different feel this morning. It feels personal. Soothing. Joyful.  Like relief. Not so much aspirational as descriptive of the less ambitious, less burdened, less anxious state that sometimes comes with age. I still pray for the greater freedom, but my step feels lighter this morning. No marching boots. No climbing boots. Just a pair of slippers to go with the freedom of retirement where aspiration for mountain-climbing surrenders to appreciation of the rainbow on the sun-lit plain.

Woke up this morning with my mind
Stayed on freedom
Woke up this morning with my mind
Stayed on freedom
Woke up this morning with my mind
Stayed on freedom
Hallelu, Hallelu, Hallelujah.

I’m walking and talking with my mind
stayed on freedom
I’m walking and talking with my mind
stayed on freedom
I’m walking and talking with my mind
stayed on freedom
Hallelu, Hallelu, Hallelujah.

Ain’t nothing wrong with my mind
Stayed on freedom
Oh, there ain’t nothing wrong with keeping my mind
Stayed on freedom
There ain’t nothing wrong with keeping your mind
Stayed on freedom
Hallelu, Hallelu, Hallelujah.

I’m singing and praying with my mind
Stayed on freedom
Yeah, I’m singing and praying with my mind
Stayed on freedom
Hallelu, Hallelu, Hallelujah.

 

The Meaning of Fulfillment

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“At 66, I find myself feeling fulfilled. I didn’t expect this, and don’t know quite what to make of it.”

The words belong to Emily Fox Gordon in the October 25 New York Times. Click HERE to ponder “The Meaning of Fulfillment” for your life and the lives of others.

The Good Earworm

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This head scratching verse from Steve Shoemaker arrived this morning in response to yesterday’s post about the song in my head:

thegoodearworm

thelord’smyshep-herdi’llnotwant
hema-akesmedowntolie
inpa-asturesgreenhele-e-dethme
thequi-i-etwatersby

“What’s an earworm?” I wrote back. He phoned a few minutes later. “Don’t you know what an earworm is? Nadja didn’t know either. Look it up in an Urban Dictionary. It’s a song that gets stuck in your head.” “I didn’t know you were so street-smart,” said I. We had a good laugh. I looked it up.

Earworm: “A song that sticks in your mind, and will not leave no matter how much you try. The best way to get rid of an earworm is to replace it with another. Be prepared to become a jukebox.” (from Urbandictionary.com)

The earworm Steve seems to be hearing is the Crimond musical setting for Psalm 23. Dipping into the jukebox, here’s another lovely setting for the psalm, the replacement ear worm:

 

 

 

 

DWI Straddling the Center Line

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Extra DWI Patrols this Weekend. Drive Sober. The message began to appear yesterday, Halloween, above the Interstate Highways in Minnesota.

It reminds me of a funny story.

Years ago, as my friend Ron remembers it, he and his parents were driving home from a relaxed dinner at the Nagy’s, the newly arrived Hungarian refugee family. Mr. Nagy was a gourmet chef accustomed to offering guests the best libations along with a delicious professionally prepared home-cooked meal.

Ron’s father, John, was not much of a drinker, maybe a beer once in a while, but nothing more. John got a little happy at the Nagy’s.  Driving home with young Ron in the back seat and his wife Helen in the passenger’s seat, John was straddling the center line on a two-lane, two-way street just a few blocks from home when Helen criticized his driving. Helen was a force to be reckoned with. “John! You’re drunk. You’re over the line. You’re wandering over into the wrong lane. You’re going to get us killed!”

“Helen,” said John, “it’s obvious you don’t know the law. There’s a law here in Pennsylvania. After 10:00 p.m. you can straddle the white line.”

Telling the story to my friend Steve and me last year, Ron could hardly get through the story. We’ve been friends since Kindergarten in Broomall, Pennsylvania. Today Ron is in ICU in a Pennsylvania hospital following emergency surgery straddling the center line.

Prayers surround you, Ron. I remember your story like it was yesterday.

Stillness on All Hallows’ Eve

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Kay in the Boundary Water Canoe Wilderness Area

Kay in the Boundary Water Canoe Wilderness Area

Woke up this morning with a song singing in my head. It happens more often as I move toward retirement. Sometimes it’s a hymn. During the World Series it was “America the Beautiful”. The music comes uninvited. Sometimes it seems to come from nowhere.

This morning, October 31 – All Hallows’ Eve, Halloween – the tune (without lyrics) was “Still, Still, Still,” the Austrian Christmas carol! It’s also our 16th Wedding Anniversary when “Still, Still, Still” (“Calm, Calm, Calm”) must have known what I feel when I think of Kay.

Here’s “Still, Still, Still” played by child prodigy Akim Camara on his violin. Look for the joy on his face.