The Cleanse

First week recap - Amidst a great deal of complaining - the whole family succeeded (survived) the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh days.  Meleea has produced a couple fantastic soups for dinner.  The one I helped with was a travesty.  I was the only one who ate it and I only did it to prove how committed I am.  I made a healthy but clearly not delicious or satisfying green shake with kale for breakfast.  Headaches reared up in the afternoon the first couple days and I can feel myself building for a mucus explosion.  I'm finally starting to feel like I'm in a groove.  The rest of the family is done but I'm doing liquid for breakfast and dinner with a solid meal for lunch.
I lost about five pounds and peed about once every 10 minutes (ok - not quite that much).
All of us could tell some improvement.

The rest of the family eased off after the first week.  I kept going.

I've lost about 10 pounds.  No headaches.  Great, deep sleep waking up without my tongue coated in goo.  Very increased energy level.  Reduced heart rate.

I went for a bike ride today.  Not sure if it's a result of weight lifting or the cleanse or both but I'm much faster for much longer.

I'm also more patient, more kind and less snappy.  Ask Meleea.

I keep thinking about the time Jesus said that whoever seeks to save his life will loose it, but he who gives it up willingly for his sake will find it.  Part of this effort for me is acknowledging and honoring the wonder of a fearfully made body.  It's capable of health, healing, strength, endurance, mood regulation, and a host of other almost supernatural accomplishments.  I believe in this creation and I'm interested to see how it performs when I treat it well instead of abusing it.

I finished the cleanse on Tuesday last week but I've continued with minor deviations (read - Philly Cheesesteak Sandwich on Friday night and taco dinner for Cinco De Mayo)  Still no dairy or wheat based stuff.

I think I'm going to just keep going.  It's not that hard and I feel great.  I'm hoping my allergies are significantly reduced.

I'll let you know.

Being on Mission is Not Work

Being on mission is not like work.  There are a few words that evoke a particular internal response in me.  I’m wrestling with my response because I don’t like how it feels.  “Intentional” and “purposeful” are two of those words; right along with “mission”.  The idea of being on mission is attractive to me.  I like the sense of doing something – facing a challenge, overcoming it and getting the task accomplished.  I think that’s great when I’m building, cleaning, fixing or solving something tangible.  But it doesn’t work well in relationships.

More Dramatic

The sign at our new house being removed

The Miller family has left the compound.  We have been waiting three long, eventful and uh, “character building” years for this event.  It’s a long story with unexpected twists and fascinating characters.  It is not nearly over or nearly understood but the setting has changed dramatically.  Together we are thankful beyond explanation both to God for his provision and our friends and family for their support and very practical help.

Why I Read

I do not read only to learn.  I do not read to gather facts and information – to hold them and at earliest opportunity, regurgitate.  I do not read or study to capture the world in my mind and define it.  It would be a perverse limitation and I am infinitely limited for the task.

Burn Barrel

His rescuer dragged 

blackened remnants

of last ditch effort 

to the barrel

and stood

with a charred stick

gripped absently.

She pushed down

and down again

into the heat

staring blank

and dry eyed

waiting

for the fire

to rebuild.

Cold Feet

feet on floor

Ah yes, I think I woke up.  At the very least, I can tell that the bottoms of my feet are colder than they should be if they are still ensconced under the covers.  Probably means they are resting on the concrete floor by my bed and I haven’t found my fluffy slippers yet.  I’m not sure this really qualifies as woke up, but it is a great comparison.  I spend so much time upright and moving without being attentive.  I notice this lack of awareness when I’m gently jolted into interest.  I’m embarrassed that I spend so much time like a zombie.  Just moving forward, concerned only with what I will consume next, unaware that what I consume does not nourish.  Why live as a zombie if I’m not dead?

Not So Little Details

I am so thankful every once in a while.

It should be more often, but when I am, I do not worry about that.

Because I am busy being thankful.

I am lost in the ideas before

And after the thankful comes.

Details are generous interrupters,

Reminders and awakers of my imagination.

I trip over their slow toes

As they dance in measured steps

In time with a loud heartbeat.

The smell of an old car that has served well and been appreciated.

Kisses softly on my wife’s throat while she waits.

Giggling children who are old too fast reminding.

The neighborhood hawk watching still on the wire for breakfast.

Last few beans bumping through the grinder by my hand.

That Brandon and Lulu at Golden Tusk know my 35a with six stars.

Heat finally under the dash and up my pant legs on a cold morning.

Freshly cleaned spectacles, warm and clear on my crooked nose.

That’s eight.

Good Things for a Bad Person?

It is a scary place, this spinning speck of dirt caught between the tide of heaven and hell.  When my imagination brings some meaning to the information my brain is collecting, I am so relieved to know I am saved from the terror.  It’s scary to know I am so close and it is so easy, so regular to end up drifting in ignorance, rebellion and abject stupidity into the abyss. 

I am at odds with my base desires when I soften to the strong, quiet affections of Jesus.  But, oh, it is a worthy effort to let go and rest in them.

7 Great Sayings?

Consider well...

Just joking.  What I really think is that these are seven common sayings that could use a bit more consideration. 

It can be observed that, sometimes, these statements are not true.  In the great and wonderful created world we live in, someone set up some rules.  They are always true.  According to this logic, if something is true in part, it will be true as a whole.  If it is false in part, it is probably false as a whole.

Most of these statements are not rules, they are assumptions made regularly with less consideration than warranted.  Rather than ranting on my soapbox and incurring wrath for my overly dramatic treatments, I have a question to follow each.  Just consider them a bit.  Maybe they aren’t that obvious. 

Words R Drugs

Bendy Straw

In the midst of scintillating conversation with Mark and Brant at Compass Coffee this morning, the artistry demonstrated by Bryan as he poured life and caffeine into an Orange Ginger Americano captivated our active minds and shut our mouths.  Watching his delivery of said coffee craftsmanship into the not yet twitchy hands of a definitely not hipstery hippie type of patron.  Mark paused mid sentence and breathed with a subconscious sideways nod, “that guy’s a drug dealer.”

I responded as I watched, “Too bad he went into business.” 

Non-Profit?

My daughter asked me yesterday what to tell people when they ask, “what does your dad do?”  It’s not the first time she’s asked that.  It was an easy question for most of her life.  He’s a contractor… slot filled, box checked, identity neatly secured.  If I trained her right, and I did, her answer might even produce a lead for a job. 

For the last few years, no one really knows what I do.  Including me.  I have been busy enough.  I think I’ve avoided apathy entirely and hope I’ve dodged lazy and good-for-nothing.  It’s just that my answer to, “what do you want to be when you grow up,” has been inconveniently interrupted by the growing. 

Shoe Armor

 It’s all about the shoes.  At least for me, this time, the shoes were the critical factor. 

I am a runner.  I am not a fair weather runner.  I am not a competitive runner.  I run to be outside, to pray, to live well, to think clearly and to know that I can run.  I catch myself, sometimes, watching my feet change places rhythmically - hypnotic forward momentum.  It’s amazing to watch my body adapt to longer faster distances.  I love country roads and the frogs croaking, crickets chirping while the trees turn dark against the wide color changing sky.  It makes me chuckle and holler with unbridled, happy energy. 

A while ago, I got a new pair of wrong shoes.

Score Matters?

Monday Columbian sports page headline reads, “Score Is All That Matters.”  I call BS.  Since I have a BS degree, I can do this.  In the online version a less dramatic title headlined the article.  I like the print version better; it’s controversial, not just informative.  I think it comes from the journalistic confluence of art and fact.  The sports editor also wrote a commentative article entitled “Chance to Win Not Same As Ability To.”  I agree with these titles… in context.  But that’s important.  Truth spoken and agreed to out of context does more damage to faith and hope than any circumstance. 

Beginning Earl

A couple 40-something guys...

Earl

Yesterday, I began a partnership with a 38-year-old truck.  My daughter says he is an Earl.  It’s nearly as old as me.  My friend Brant discovered him after someone else found him languishing namelessly in a field, starved of fuel and rusting in the rain.  After working hard to be a benefit for his owner, who recently passed away, Earl found himself on the sidelines with muddy, flat feet and no where to go… Poor Earl.

Tastes Great, Less Filling

I used to work too much.  I still do every chance I get but I try to spread the chances out a bit more.  It’s an opportunity I’m taking advantage of since my 1.7 decade contracting business augured into the ground like a giant run-a-way drill bit drilling holes for pole building posts.  Why work hard when you can live off the benefits of investing your life in the system of entrepreneurial business ownership?  I’m not sure a question mark is appropriate at the end of a rhetorical, sarcastic comment. 

Head Too Small?

God never does the same thing over and over.  He tolerates us doing it, but I can’t find where he does it.  Maybe in some really macro galaxy way, but that doesn’t count.  He invents really weird things to.  And people.  I know some weird people.  It’s quite likely that someone else somewhere is saying that right now and in their head is a picture of me.  That’s ok.  I’m making a point and if that is happening, it helps me.  Here is my point:

We can’t figure anything out apart from God. 

A Moment Finally Came

A moment finally came, ending the anticipation and cleaving my old life away in a violent chop.  For months, dread grew within me, eating at my soul and generating an insatiable hunger.  The odor of this coming moment had stunk up the air around me as I struggled against the inevitable.  I kept busy producing checkmarks for the mundane.  I expended myself with heroic efforts to ward it off.  Sometimes it enveloped me at my desk or in my truck.  Even outside, slinging words through the phone in the clear fall air, it cascaded over me like a deluge of wet, sticky sludge and pooled in a chunky, rank pile of demise causing goo.  It immobilized me.