Obama's Inauguration and Martin Luther King Jr., by Anthony Williams

For the first time in its brief history, my little corner of the blogosphere is yielded to another writer: my good friend and hero, Anthony Williams. Anthony was actually a student in my 6th grade Sunday school class at Highland Church of Christ, back in the day. Now, he is the manager of retail operations for Abilene Christian University, and an Abilene city councilman.

Anthony is one of my heroes because, like all great heroes, he faced long odds and still managed to come out on top. Anthony will tell you that in his neighborhood, growing up, there were plenty of chances to allow the downward drag of a disadvantaged minority community to have its way. But for some reason--I'm convinced it has to do with pride in his heritage, coupled with the determination of his mother to keep her son on the straight and narrow--he made different choices than some of his friends. Anthony worked hard to get where he is, and that's just one of the reasons he enjoys the respect of such a wide range of the Abilene community. As a lifelong Democrat, I josh Anthony quite a bit about his move to the GOP, a few years ago. But I never question his dedication to his family, his community, his faith, and his duty as a public servant.

From time to time, Anthony asks me to look over the posts he prepares for the opinion column of the Abilene Reporter-News and other public outlets. Once or twice, I've helped him with a speech he needed to make. I count these opportunities as pleasures, because Anthony is my friend, and I believe in him and what he is trying to accomplish.

Anthony's following reflections on the upcoming inauguration of the Obama presidency strike me as particularly timely. I offer them now for your consideration...

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Every year during the celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday, we take time to reflect on his dream of equality for all citizens of this country. Additionally, many of us take an assessment of the progress made thus far and the challenges that still exist. For members of the African American community, this time of year is always filled with emotions. Some of those are positive feelings like gratitude, as we reflect on the increased opportunities that will be available to our children and grandchildren as a result of the sacrifice and perseverance of those who went before us. Some of the feelings, however, are sadness and regret, as we reflect on our forebears, to whom we owe so much, who never had a chance to see the dawning of a new day, who never enjoyed the gratification of seeing that for which they wished, dreamed, and labored, come to fruition.

Having said that, I want to remind readers of all ethnicities that the principles Dr. King espoused were intended to benefit everyone, not only the African American community. His overriding purpose benefits all of mankind.

In a few days, Barack Obama will be sworn into office as President of the United States, becoming the nation's first person of color to hold its highest office. It is difficult for me to put into words how this truly historic event has rippled through our society. Its ramifications have affected not only the African American community, but all those who, in decades past, considered themselves disenfranchised, left stranded by the receding tides of opportunity and equality. Mr. Obama's refrain during his acceptance speech--"Yes, we can"--has electrified whole segments of American society who, in times as recent as my own youth, scarcely dared to believe at all in their own ability and potential.

For my family, election night was an extremely emotional
evening. The emotions had very little to do with partisanship; in
fact, within our family there are both liberals and conservatives. As a matter of fact, I find myself opposed to some of Mr. Obama’s stated policy goals. But the emotions in my household were about issues larger than policy; they were stimulated by thinking about the hope that was never realized by some of our loved ones, specifically people like my great-grandfather, John Cravens, who was the unchallenged patriarch of our family. This was a man who faced numerous obstacles just to vote--everything from poll taxes to outright intimidation--but who always voted. He passed on to his family the importance of voting and the need to be engaged with the democratic process. I don’t think I would have ever had the will to run for the city council without the inspiration of his courageous example.

I honestly don't believe that the election of Barack Obama, in itself,
makes America a better country. However, it does present a
tangible example of the fulfillment of Dr. King’s dream: the hope that all Americans could have an opportunity to be all that God created them to be, that our appraisal by society would not be dependent on our gender, culture, or color, but rather on our character and our determination to succeed.

The racial challenges of our day are not limited to our country; the globe is populated with similar ones, from the fight for equality in South Africa to the more recent struggles of minorities in France. What makes America great is that as history has shown, we lead and the world follows. For all its many flaws, this nation has shown itself, in the final analysis, to be ruled by compassion and the unquenchable thirst for justice.

During this time of New Year’s resolutions and personal evaluations, I think it would be wise, more than ever, to reflect on Dr. King’s dream and identify ways we can continue to approach making it a reality. Barack Obama’s election, as historic as it is, doesn’t signify that everything is fine and we have reached utopia--far from it. It is worth recognizing, however, that we are certainly no longer living in the state that caused Dr. King and other great Americans to stand up against institutionalized oppression and hatred. The reality is that we are somewhere in between the two, and our contribution to our society's improvement--or lack thereof--will determine which direction we will go.

My preacher buddy, Mike Cope, asked me for a couple of brief comments on Crosby, Stills, Nash (and Young). Big mistake.

Here's what I said, with only a few edits...




Well...

I'm all over the place on CSN/CSNY. I like it all, the collaborative stuff and the solo stuff, although I like Nash least (odd, considering he wrote "Teach Your Children," "Our House," and several others of their bigger hits).

Young was always kind of the wild card. He brought some great stuff to the group, but he kept a lot of his best stuff for himself.

Yes, Crosby was a major addict, especially in the late 70s-80s. In his defense, he never got over the death of his girlfriend in the late 60s. But he just about killed himself on coke before he finally got sober... and started using again... and got sober... and started using again... I think he's been pretty clean since his liver transplant, except for a little weed. He's scary smart, though, and wrote the most sophisticated music, harmonically, of any of the four.




Stills has always been a bit of a problem for me. I loved him/hated him. I probably admired him most of the four during the 70s, but I'll never forget staying up late one Friday night to watch him with Manassas on ABC's "In Concert" series, and he was coked out of his mind. Couldn't even find the shoulder strap on his guitar. Very disillusioning. The last few years, I've begun thinking he can't write a melody. Most of his songs just kind of go up and down a two or three note scale. Think about it: "For What It's Worth" (when he was with Buffalo Springfield) literally has a three-note range. "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" may have actually been the peak of his songwriting career, and it works only because of the harmony (which, I admit, is a little like saying that Mount Everest only works because it's high). He never wrote anything on the lyrical order of Nash's "Our House" or the unique creativity of Young's "Heart of Gold." Having said all that, I'm itching to do the definitive biography of Stills. He's the only one of the four who ever lived in Texas.



Young: what can you say? The guy is a machine. Probably has written more songs in his lifetime than any four other people you can think of; has released a mere fraction of his actual creative output (until the Archives Project goes public). Doesn't care what anybody thinks, most of the time, including his record company. Especially his record company.




Nash: hands down, the nicest guy of the four; they would've split up even more than they did if it weren't for him. Too bad he's the one I relate to the least, musically. But if you're ever in a mood to indulge your doubts, listen to his "Winchester Cathedral" (no, not the one by the New Vaudeville Band). It draws an elegant tension between wanting/wishing to believe and being unable to because of all the crap in the world.

Probably more than you wanted to know...




You should check out Mike's blog: PreacherMike.com.

TRAVEL REVIEW: Sainte-Chappelle--Jewel Hidden in the Heart of Paris

The Sainte-Chappelle ("Holy Chapel") was built by the devout Louis IX (later canonized as Saint Louis) to house his collection of holy relics, including a shard of the True Cross. Consecrated in 1248, the gothic chapel stands in the Île de la Cité; originally it occupied the courtyard of the Royal Palace. Now, this relatively small chapel is nearly hidden by the surrounding structures of the Palais de Justice. Sainte-Chappelle houses stunningly beautiful stained glass. Experiencing this building seemed to me like opening a shoe box hidden in the back of a closet--and finding an emerald inside.


Sainte-Chappelle has two levels: the lower level, which served as the parish church for the inhabitants of the palace, and the upper level, which contained the reliquaries and works of art intended to grace the worship of royalty and other dignitaries. But even the "common" lower level is decorated like a casket for precious stones: The pillars and vaulted ceiling are covered with fleurs-de-lis in gilded paint, set against rich, dark blues and russets. The intricate webwork of the gothic construction invites long moments of contemplative admiration.

But the upper level, with its breathtaking stained glass and soaring architecture, is where true inspiration awaits. The impression is of being surrounded by pure light and color--almost as if the delicate supporting stonework might disappear at any moment. Almost two-thirds of the glass is original. During the depredations of the French Revolution, Sainte-Chappelle was used as administrative offices, and huge filing cabinets covered most of the windows, saving them from the fate of the reliquaries, which were melted down after the holy relics were dispersed.

The chapel stands today as a prime example of French High Gothic architecture. It can be reached by Metro (disembark at the Cité station), bus, or taxi. Sainte-Chappelle has been a national historic site since 1862.

Not a Book Review: TEXAS BLUES, by Alan Govenar

Full Disclosure Statement: I edited this book and coordinated its publication by my employer, Texas A&M University Press. I have about as much objectivity about it as a proud uncle has at the birth of a nephew or niece.

Now that we've got that out of the way, let me tell you some of the reasons you should run, not walk, to your nearest bookstore and buy TEXAS BLUES. First of all, it is a truly gorgeous package. Printed on high-quality, glossy paper and chock full of amazing and rare photographs of Texas blues artists from the 1920s to the present, this is a book that will improve the resale value of your house just by sitting on your coffee table. Not only that, but for a book this size (600+ pages) with this many color and black-and-white photographs (400+), the price ($40.00 suggested retail) is very reasonable.

Alan Govenar, noted folklorist, author, and documentary filmmaker, has captured, in the artists' own words, the story of blues in the Lone Star State, from its beginnings as the music of slaves and sharecroppers, to its migration across lines of race and culture, to become one of the most influential genres in the popular music of the world. TEXAS BLUES is principally composed of oral interviews conducted by Govenar and others, and includes the first-hand accounts of artists like Gatemouth Brown, Clifton Chenier, Alex Moore, Mance Lipscomb, Lightnin' Hopkins, B.B. King, Illinois Jacquet, Sippie Wallace, Osceola Mays, Sonny Boy Terry, Delbert McClinton, Stevie Ray Vaughan, and dozens more.

Most of the photographs are from Govenar's own collection and have never been seen before. The pictures and the text, taken together, make up a truly masterful panorama of the blues in Texas and its continuing importance around the world.

TEXAS BLUES: THE RISE OF A CONTEMPORARY SOUND is available now. If you're into blues, rock 'n' roll, rhythm and blues, or you just want a beautiful book that will impress your friends, go get a copy today!

Travel Review: La Pievuccia--A Gem in the Tuscan Countryside

Imagine waking to the soft tolling of a church bell, the tuneful prattle of blackbirds, and the fluted chuckling of turtle doves. Imagine stepping out on your shaded front porch and gazing across a vineyard and up olive-clad slopes to a hilltop surmounted by a medieval castle. Imagine dining on specially prepared local recipes made with fresh ingredients and accompanied by glasses of award-winning sangiovese and trebbiano blends: grown, barreled, and bottled on the premises. Imagine sitting on the patio and sipping a heady, after-dinner vinsanto as the day eases gracefully into the cool of evening.

These were just a few of the experiences I enjoyed with my family last summer at La Pievuccia, an agriturismo (“farmhouse resort”) located in the heart of Tuscany’s Val de Chiana. Ricardo Papini, the third-generation proprietor, and Ulrika, his wife and able business partner, made us feel like la famiglia during our stay at this peaceful resort.

La Pievuccia is a certified organic agricultural operation: they guarantee no additives, preservatives, pesticides, or other icky substitutes for reality. In addition to growing its own grapes, La Pievuccia also cultivates and presses its own award-winning extra-virgin olive oil and produces four different types of honey from the hives scattered about the twenty-acre property. Ricardo and his staff provide vineyard and winemaking tours and lectures, cooking classes, and sometimes, rides into the nearest town. About two miles away, Castiglion Fiorentino is a charming medieval hilltop town (with Etruscan origins), conveniently located on the Rome-to-Florence rail line (trains depart from the station for Rome and Florence about every two hours). From Castiglion Fiorentino, you can almost see the hill of Cortona, about five miles away. In fact, the charms of places like Arezzo, Assisi, Montepulciano, Siena, and other unforgettable sites are easily within reach, either by bus or by train.

If you’re contemplating a trip to Italy, or even if you just want to take a five-minute vacation from the privacy of your own computer screen, visit the website: http://www.lapievuccia.it/. You can also drop Ricardo and Ulrika an email at info@lapievuccia.it. If you do, please tell them I said, “buon giorno.”

Book Review: PRACTICING THE PRESENCE OF PEOPLE, by Mike Mason

Practicing the Presence of People: How We Learn to Love
Mike Mason (WaterBrook, 1999)

I recently read this interesting little book because a guy asked me to. I’m glad he did.

Mike Mason evidences familiarity not only with the devotional classics (the similarity of his title to Brother Lawrence’s The Practice of the Presence of God is no coincidence, as Mason makes clear) but also with popular culture at its best—and worst. In this discerning, wise book, he chronicles his own journey from the tyranny of self-imposed spiritual isolation to the joy of authentic presence with the people he meets in everyday life. Along the way, he suggests some interesting and challenging notions that could revolutionize the way we think of the church and, indeed, the Christian faith.

Mason thinks that by learning to love people, we are learning to love God. To me, that sounds a lot like 1 John 4:20: “…anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.” Reminds me of a quote I once heard: “I love humanity—it’s people I can’t stand.”

But Mason will have none of that. Even the wicked are not exempt from his loving gaze, though he recognizes that “being present” with someone who is, say, a racist, will look quite different from “being present” with a child, a family member, or a close spiritual friend.

Practicing the Presence of People is divided into short chapters (over 50 of them) that lend themselves, by the author’s design, to quick reading, then prolonged contemplation. Not a bad way to spend a rainy afternoon. In fact, the only thing better, Mason would probably advise, is going somewhere to be around people… so you can practice.

Book Review: MARK TWAIN: A LIFE, by Ron Powers

In the interest of full disclosure, I need to say at the outset that I'm a lifelong admirer of the subject of this lively, witty biography. Born and raised in Missouri, Clemens' home state, I, like many country boys of my generation, dreamed of floating down the Mississippi on a raft. I even tried to build one; it sank, which was likely for the best. But I digress.

Ron Powers evidences great sympathy for his subject without coddling or sugar-coating the crusty curmudgeon with the wild white mane. His prose is appropriately tongue-in-cheek at times--as Twain would have wished, I think--and his research is scrupulously thorough without adopting the plodding pace that plagues so many scholarly biographies. He allows the reader to marvel at the Sage of Hannibal as he glitters in all his brilliance... and as he curdles in his own self-centered blindness.

Best of all, Powers illuminates to great advantage Mark Twain's pointed social satire and political commentary, uncovering what was, for me at least, the important and previously unknown record of Twain's scathing critiques of U.S. expansionism and colonialist exploitation in places like the Philippines during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Steaming upriver against the popular currents of the day, Twain anticipates by decades--and, in some ways, lays the groundwork for--the rhetoric of dissent that would become prominent in the 1960s.

For Twain junkies like me, or for anyone interested in the rise of the uniquely American literary voice before and during the Gilded Age, MARK TWAIN: A LIFE is a better find than the loot stashed in Injun Joe's cave.

Watch This Space...

Well, it has finally happened: I'm really going to try to join the blogosphere. I'll be posting book reviews, travel reports, and other miscellany that strikes my fancy. I might even put up some useful financial tips, vacation ideas, parenting thoughts, what have you. And, of course, the occasional creative piece that doesn't seem to fit anywhere else. If you've got a taste for the unusual, the random--the slightly tilted view of life, faith, and the pursuit of genuine joy... bookmark this page. It should be an interesting journey for all of us.

Funeral Director's Life

Not long ago on NPR, I heard a piece about a funeral director who’s a poet and essayist. He says poets and morticians are both engaged in essentially the same work: asking questions about the unknowable. He says both groups prefer dark clothing, complain about the public misunderstanding of their work, and rue the long hours and low pay. He read some of his work. It seemed very good to me, filled with astute observations about the ephemeral nature of human life; about how we’re all connected by the one thing we understand the least.

I thought about other funeral directors I’ve known. And I began to realize that all of them I could recall were people brimming, in some fashion or other, with life. There was Andy Womack, who ran a mortuary in my hometown in Missouri. He was always laughing and telling jokes. He was a deacon in the church. His son had a kidney disease, I remember; it made the poor kid smell bad, sometimes. We made fun of him at church camp until our counselor made us stop.

Then there’s Jack North—or “Cactus Jack,” as he’s known when he puts on his cowboy gear for civic clubs and school kids and narrates old photographs of the town, taken near the turn of the twentieth century. When he was young, before he took over the funeral home from his father, he used to play tenor sax in local dance bands.
This violates the popular stereotypes, I realize. Think of old Westerns. The town undertaker is usually portrayed as a dour, cadaverous figure in black who seems just the slightest bit pleased when there’s a hanging or a shootout. Trouble is, I can’t recall meeting any real-life undertakers who actually fit this image.

Maybe there is something about being with families through the final rituals for a loved one that causes undertakers to prize life a little more than the rest of us. Maybe the mortician’s art—administering the final ablutions to the dead, affording them the final dignities our society requires—imparts some discipline, some essential way of seeing that the rest of us adopt only after a more conscious process.

One thing I know: undertakers—at least, the good ones, I think—are not callous toward death. When my mother died, the man from the local funeral home (I can’t remember his name) wept when he came to our house to pick up her body. Like many in the community, he had witnessed her life first-hand. He now witnessed her death in the same way, and the sadness of such a loss made the same connections in him it made in others. I was grateful for his tears; they made a little more sense of mine, somehow.

Is there something about the undertaker’s profession that forces or encourages these folks to engage so directly with life? As I pondered this, I got to thinking about two words, similar in sound but, as far as I can tell, completely unrelated in any etymological sense. The two words are “humor” and “humus.” The first connotes amusement and fun; the second has to do with earth and soil. Is that merely an accident of language, or is there some essential connection? There seems to be—at least, as these words impinge upon the undertakers I have known.

The same connection is made in the venerable old graduation hymn, “Gaudeamus Igutur.” The main gist of the hymn, very loosely translated, would be, “Let us now rejoice in our youth, for one day we shall be dust.” Rejoicing and death—dancing and dust. Two essential elements of the human condition—as far as I can tell, the lower animals don’t think much about either one. But undertakers think about them every day, I’d imagine. They hear the sad, funny, bittersweet reminiscences of the mourning families, and they officiate as the mortal husk of the departed is reunited with the earth. Funeral directors must glide along the tightrope strung between the opposite poles of mortality. I guess that means they have to develop a good sense of balance.

In many works of Renaissance art you can observe a feature called a memento mori: literally, a reminder of death. In portraits commissioned by the wealthy, for example, the artist often places a skull somewhere off to the side. Every time an Italian noble or a well-heeled merchant of Amsterdam would look at his likeness hanging above the mantle, he would also be able to receive a prompt from the conclusion of the script, the final scene that awaits us all. The juxtaposition of the two elements—the honor accorded to wealth and station, and the utter leveling brought by death—must have surely provoked at least a few ironic smiles. Speaking of the end of the script reminds me that I once heard this line in a play: “Funny thing, death…” It also calls to mind the final words supposedly spoken by a renowned Shakespearian actor: “Dying is easy… comedy is hard.”

Maybe we should all get to know more funeral directors. Maybe by doing that, we could get in on the joke. Maybe we’d remember that to be human is not only to err… it is to laugh.

New Life, New Job

Why do I keep doing this? I seriously doubt if anyone will read this, but...

To go along with my new life (see previous entry on this blog), I now have a new job: Managing Editor of Texas A&M University Press. I start August 15. I can't decide if I'm scared, eager, sad, or happy. So, I'm sticking with some combination of all the above. It's a much larger press with a very active publishing program, so I'll be on a steep learning curve for awhile. I'm already listed on the web site, so I guess it's official.

I've even rented an apartment to live in until the wedding. I haven't lived in an apartment since 1979. I don't think much has changed, though. And now I can afford cable.

My deepest regret is that I'll be doing the long-distance parenting thing; my kids will stay here (one just graduated from college, one enters college as a freshman this fall, and one is in 7th grade). But they're being very supportive, for which I'm grateful. We'll figure it out. And I'll only be four hours away.

My New Life

I've finally figured out why a writer needs a blog: to avoid writing when you can't think of what comes next. I'm about 11,500 words away from the completion of my next novel (a modern re-telling of the story of Job, for both of you that are interested), and I'm stuck. I'll get un-stuck; I always have. But right now, since I'm stuck, I'm going to tell you all about how I'm getting married in October.

Two years and four months after my divorce became final, and three years after my separation, I'm marrying Karla Eidson (nee LeCroy), the most wonderful woman I've ever met. That's a purely subjective judgment, of course, but I'm sticking with it. We've been dating for several months, and it's been the most amazing time of my life, except for the birth of my children. (By the way, my kids are crazy about Karla, too) She is beautiful, talented, intelligent... and she likes me! A killer combo.

Healing from divorce is a tricky, start-and-stop kind of thing. I've been to places within myself that I never knew existed. But all through the process, I've asked God, again and again, to guide me. Mostly, I asked God to not let me do anything stupid. And then, lo and behold, Karla shows up in my life! I will never live long enough to be adequately grateful for that particular miracle, that answered prayer.

Looks like we'll be living in Bryan, Texas, in the great house Karla managed to find and rent. There will be lots of changes and adjustments, some of which will undoubtedly be difficult. But Karla's worth it. If you're lucky, she'll let me post her picture on here sometime...

Too many events...

Hello, everybody (translation: the two of you that actually know this blog exists). Quite a lot has happened since my last blog, just after my angiogram last October. With an opening like that, you know more is coming, right?

In January, my son was in a GMC Yukon with six other kids, coming back from WinterFest, a big regional gathering of Church of Christ kids in Dallas. They were about thirty miles from home, singing and yelling and making fun of each other when, for reasons as yet undetermined, the Yukon swerved violently left, then right to the shoulder of Interstate 20, then began rolling.

Six of the kids, including my son, survived. The seventh, Brody Bourland, didn't.

Ausin was airlifted to Cook's Childrens' Medical Center in Fort Worth with a closed-head injury, broken ribs and collarbone, bruised lungs, and minor lacerations. He was unconscious and entubated, to protect his airway (he was vomiting violently at the scene of the accident, a consequence of the closed-head injury). His buddy, Chris Cope, sustained a fractured vertebra, a concussion, cracked ribs, bruised lungs, and a broken thumb. One of the girls, Amara Childers, had a ruptured spleen and a shattered leg. Jon-Westin Bennett acquired two broken legs, one a compound fracture. Two other kids were treated and released the same day. The driver, my friend Julie Folwell, sustained neck and spine fractures and a dislocated elbow. She's recovering.

For nearly two hours, I didn't know if Austin was dead or alive.

You can read the blog of my friend, Mike Cope, for more details of the wreck and its aftermath, including the accounts of prayers, thousands of them, offered up all over the country for the deliverance of my son and his friends. It's a good thing; for a while, I was literally too much in shock and fear to pray.

I always wondered how I'd react to receiving news like this; now I know. I went numb, then I began to beg, quite inarticulately, for my son's life. I think I was mostly begging God, but I would've begged anybody else I thought could have a bearing on the outcome.

Long story short: after a week in the hospital and another week recovering at home, Austin went back to school. At this writing, he shows no after-effects, either physical or emotional. How can I adequately express my gratitude? I can't.

While all this was happening, my father was dying in the hospital in southeast Missouri. Precisely two days after Austin came home from the hospital, I got a call from my brother, telling me I'd better come. I left the next day (Tuesday), and on Wednesday morning, January 26, 2005, my brother, my sister, two nephews, and I sang, prayed, and Bible-read my dad into the next world. He was almost 85, and this case of pneumonia was the first serious illness he'd ever had in his life.

Mortal fear, life, and death coming in such close proximity can make you think, you know? Have I sorted this all out? No. I'm not sure life is meant to be sorted out as much as it is to be lived and experienced. My son was spared; my dad wasn't. Would I have made that choice? Probably. Knowing my dad, he would've, too. But why is my son still walking around, and the Bourlands' boy isn't? Not a clue. That's a choice nobody got to make.

If I could think of some profound closing remark, it would go here.

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Originally uploaded by rightr.

Here's the photo referred to below...

My Angiogram

Okay, so for my 49th birthday, I decided to give myself the gift of a treadmill stress test. I'd just successfully concluded my annual physical (what my MD fondly refers to as a "poke and grope"), and everything looked great. I casually asked, "Shouldn't I take a treadmill test?" My doc says, "Why would you want to do that?" I reply, "Oh... just seems like a good idea at my age," or words to that effect. He shrugs and says, "Sure." So, I scheduled the test.

Now, mind you, I expected to do well on the treadmill. I've been running a couple of miles a day, four or five times a week, for most of the past five years or so. But lo and behold, my doctor saw something on the results he wanted to "study more closely."

Study more closely! I thought. "Am I going to die? Am I a walking heart attack? WHAT'S GOING ON HERE????!!!! (Those of you who know me won't be surprised that I defaulted to Anxiety Mode. It's very familiar territory, complete with family history and everything)

I go to the cardiologist to whom my MD refers me. Nice fellow, personable. He puts me on blood pressure medication. BLOOD PRESSURE MEDICATION???!!! (Anxiety Mode again. Tell you what, let's refer to it hereinafter as "AM." Saves time) He recommended something called a nuclear stress test (or, in the case of our President, "nucular.") They shoot you up with a radioactive dye and put you back on the treadmill, then take pictures of what your heart does with your newly-radioactive blood. "We can possibly use this to eliminate the possibility of coronary artery disease," the cardio tells me. "Less invasive than an angiogram, etc., etc." "Sure," I say, in between the Lamaze breaths I'm taking to counteract AM. "Sounds like a plan."

So, I flunked the nuclear stress test, too. "He wants to do an angiogram," the nice, efficient nurse tells me on the phone, when she calls with the news. "If he fixes anything--" (by now I'm sucking wind like a woman dilated to a 9) "--you might spend the night in the hospital. Otherwise, you'll be done and home in about four or five hours."

Friends and neighbors, this farm boy has never been IN THE HOSPITAL as anything but a visitor since he was two years old. And now, they're talking about poking a camera up my femoral artery (you know, the one that runs past your groin?) and taking snapshots of my coronary arteries. And to top it off, they can't get me in for THREE WEEKS. At this point, I'm popping Xanax like M & Ms (just kidding; but I'd have taken some if I could've gotten hold of it), while trying to cling to my customarily suave and calm demeanor. AM is so counterproductive to my customarily suave and calm demeanor. Bad for my reputation, don't you know. And I believe I clearly communicated all this to the nice nurse on Monday morning, when I respectfully requested a quicker date for my (breathe, Thom; in and out, in and out...) angiogram. Which, lo and behold, they granted me--even without the overt threat of a lawsuit.

Which brings us up to Thursday, October 21. I show up, bright and early, and they hand me the latest in hospital haute couture, complete with the convenient vent in the back so they can access your, um, hinder parts with a minimum of resistance. The IV, the blood pressure readings (not too far out of the normal range, thankyouverymuch), and especially the consoling conversation from my friend and co-worker, Karen, were truly highlights of the waiting period. This is the day after the BoSox did it to the Yankees, after being down 3-0, so I'm maybe thinking the Second Coming is imminent, anyway, and what the heck will all this matter in that case? My cardiologist, AKA, The Photographer, shows up, and we have a little pleasant banter as he assures me he's read the user manual for the procedure very carefully, stayed up late the night before so he could watch the video, etc. etc. Not for nothing is the first syllable of this guy's specialty "card."

They wheeled me into the cath lab, which is maintained at approximately the temperature of a meat locker. Which, in a sense, I guess it is. A very nice orderly shaves my groin, and let me tell you folks, I'd trust that guy with anything I've got. In fact, I did, since I had no choice in the matter. And then, they started the drugs in my IV.

Whatever happened next I've had to reconstruct from second-hand accounts, since, though conscious, I was in no condition to keep a journal. But those are some good drugs, friends. Reeeeeaaaaaallly good. They could've probably put a Roto-Rooter in my femoral artery, and I'd have smiled the whole time.

So, it turns out my coronary arteries were fine and dandy. I've got a "muscle bridge," which means that one of my arteries dips into the heart muscle for a brief stretch. Thus, every time my heart contracts, the artery gets squeezed and immediately released. Which may account for why I flunked the stress tests. Let's see, maybe I can show you some pictures... See the little narrow spot in the picture at bottom left? Now, compare that to the one at bottom right. Taken a quarter of a second later, and no narrow spot! Cool, huh? The cardiologist says I've been living with this thing for 49 years, and I could live with it for another 49. Sounds good to me.

Since then, no AM; my customarily suave and calm demeanor is totally intact.

Right now, my biggest concern is whether I'll have to go through all this again at my next stress test. Stay tuned...

Kids and Community

Last night, our covenant group (what some people would call a small group or a Bible study group, though we don't usually study the Bible, per se) met at Mike Cope's house. We had all the kids there, which we try to do about every three months or so. We each got to talk about our children: what's going on in their lives, what their challenges are, what's ahead for them. And then we went around the circle, and one of the parents of each family prayed for somebody else's children.

It was a great time. I was the only single parent there, so that simplified the division of labor in my praying time.

I was so proud of all our children. They love God, they get along with their siblings (mostly)--they're just pretty great people, take it all around. They will lead such interesing lives, I'm sure.

Sometimes, what we accomplish seems so small, compared to the importance of giving our children a decent chance at life. In the eternal scheme of things, I'm sure things like careers, publications, and vacations won't count nearly as much as how well we did at hugging our kids, showing up at their games and recitals, reading to them, praying with them, and telling them, over and over again, that we love them.

A good reminder.

My Next Post

I've struggled with this whole thing. After all, I'm a published author. I'm one of the privileged few who get to sell my words to the public. I have ample opportunities to display my ignorance to my readers. Why should I blog? Is it some narcissistic need to gush unedited, random thoughts (like these), some secret exhibitionist wish to be on display for the world to see? I can see why people like Mike Cope blog; they have things to say. Not necessarily things they want to go to the trouble to organize into a book, but good things--stuff people can benefit from. For free.

Maybe that's it; maybe I'm just too mercenary about my writing. Maybe I don't deserve to be in the free and noble company of bloggers.

I'll have to think about this...

My first entry

Who knew? I never meant to have a blog. I know people who are bloggers, and I never thought I'd join their ranks. But... here I am. We'll see what happens...