dual personalities

September 22, 2023

Friday inspo

by chuckofish

Thy name is excellent,
      thy glory high,
      thy compassions unfailing,
      thy condescension wonderful,
      thy mercy tender.
I bless thee for the discoveries, invitations,
    promises of the gospel
  for in them is pardon for rebels,
    liberty for captives,
    health for the sick,
    salvation for the lost.
I come to thee in thy beloved name of Jesus;
  re-impress thy image upon my soul;
Raise me above the smiles and frowns of the world,
  regarding it as a light thing to be judged by men;
May thy approbation be my only aim,
  thy Word my one rule.
Make me to abhor that which grieves thy
    Holy Spirit,
  to suspect consolations of a worldly nature,
  to shun a careless way of life,
  to reprove evil,
  to instruct with meekness those who oppose me,
  to be gentle and patient towards all men,
  to be not only a professor but an example
    of the gospel,
  displaying in every relation, office, and condition
    its excellency, loveliness and advantages.
How little have I illustrated my principles
  and improved my privileges!
How seldom I served my generation!
How often have I injured and not recommended
  my Redeemer!
How few are those blessed through me!
In many things I have offended,
    in all come short of thy glory;
Pardon my iniquity, for it is great.

–The Valley of Vision

Now that’s a prayer!

1 Comment
September 21, 2023

“Charles, if the goal was to offer a more interesting anecdote, we’re headed in the wrong direction.”*

by chuckofish

Yesterday I went to my friend’s house to watch I Am So Not Inviting You to My Bat Mitzvah (2023) on her big screen tv.

It stars Adam Sandler, his wife, and two daughters. It is Mean Girls for Jewish girls. I enjoyed it and understood most of the jokes. But it is a lot of seventh grade girls being girls. I lived through those years myself and through my daughters’ early adolescences as well. It was not easy. Now from the perspective of old ladyhood, it is still amusing, but I am glad I am through with all that drama.

I have also been watching season three of Only Murders In the Building with Steve, Marty and Selena.

It started off very slowly, but it is picking up steam and I am enjoying it. I always watch each episode twice so I won’t miss anything, but there are people out there who clearly are really obsessed.

Meanwhile daughter #1 flew to Maryland to spend a few days with daughter #2 and her delightful little family.

Let the good times roll!

*Oliver (Martin Short) on OMITB.

3 Comments
September 20, 2023

Living the sermon

by chuckofish

The other night I watched 42 (2013) starring Chadwick Boseman as Jackie Robinson, the first African-American to play Major League Baseball, and Harrison Ford as Branch Rickey. I had seen it before and liked it, but I was really struck by it this time around.

Obviously Jackie Robinson is the heroic figure at the center of the film. He blazed an amazing and courageous trail. But I have to say, I found the character of Branch Rickey, co-owner, president and general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers, to be equally fascinating. Why did he do what he did? Why did he take it upon himself to integrate the Dodgers and thereby professional baseball? At one point in the film Rickey explains that his inspiration for bringing Robinson on to the team was the ill-treatment he saw received by his black catcher Charles Thomas on the Ohio Wesleyan baseball team, which he coached in 1903 and 1904, and feeling that he hadn’t done enough to help him. Granted, but the movie also seems to suggest that a large part of what motivated him was his Christian faith.

When Rickey decides that Robinson is the man to do the job, one of his main reasons is “He’s a Methodist, I’m a Methodist… And God’s a Methodist; We can’t go wrong.” He is not kidding.

He also tells Robinson after one of many altercations, “I want a player who’s got the guts not to fight back. People aren’t gonna like this. They’re gonna do anything to get you to react. Echo a curse with a curse and, uh, they’ll hear only yours. Follow a blow with a blow and they’ll say, ‘The Negro lost his temper.’ That ‘The Negro does not belong.’ Your enemy will be out in force… and you cannot meet him on his own low ground. We win with hitting, running, fielding. Only that. We win if the world is convinced of two things: That you are a fine gentleman and a great baseball player. Like our Savior… you gotta have the guts… to turn the other cheek. Can you do it?”

I think Martin Luther King would have agreed.

And there is this exchange after the racist manager of the Phillies has bated Robinson mercilessly:

  • Robinson: Do you know what it’s like, having someone do this to you?
  • Rickey: No. No. You do. You’re the one living the sermon. In the wilderness. Forty days. All of it. Only you.
  • Robinson: And not a damn thing I can do about it.
  • Rickey: Of course there is! You can stand up and hit! You can get on base and you can score! You can win this game for us! We need you! Everyone needs you.

Anyway, I salute Branch Rickey: preach!

Bonus: This movie also stars Lucas Black as Robinson’s teammate Pee Wee Reese. “Maybe tomorrow, we’ll all wear 42, so nobody could tell us apart.”

Amen.

1 Comment
September 19, 2023

We ain’t perfect but we try

by chuckofish

I finished the Hillsdale College online course on Genesis and I’m happy to say I passed all the quizzes, the final and the course. It was a worthwhile endeavor and I will probably take another course. And they’re free.

This is an excellent article on a disturbing subject. “In 1939 T. S. Eliot gave a series of lectures at the University of Cambridge in which he described a fork in the road. Western Civilization might continue along the Christian path, he predicted, or it might adopt “modern paganism.” Eliot, a Christian convert, hoped for the former, but he feared that we were already hell-bent on the latter.” The pagans are winning.

And here are two articles about a favorite subject of mine: Puritans–Jonathan Edwards and his long workday and Puritan women debunking Puritan stereotypes.

I try not to get into arguments with people, but I remember one time I did. It was back when daughter #2 was a student at Wash U. and I had lunch with her and her boyfriend, who made the mistake of making a really uninformed remark about Puritans. He was your typical know-it-all, arrogant Wash U. student and I just couldn’t let him get away with his stupid comment. A lecture followed. I’m sure daughter #2 was mortified. Well, let’s just say I was pleased when they broke up at the end of senior year. Thank goodness DN has had the good sense never to knock the Puritans in my presence.

Like I said, I try to get along with people.

We find out when you die the keys to heaven can’t be bought
We still don’t know what love is but we sure know what it’s not
Sometimes you got to

Get along, on down the road
We’ve got a long long way to go
Scared to live, scared to die
We ain’t perfect but we try

—Shane McAnally, Ross Copperman, Josh Osborne

(The artwork at the top is by my talented six-year old granddaughter Lottie. It is her interpretation of the song “Coat of Many Colors” by Dolly Parton. The mean girl on the left is making fun of little Dolly’s dress.)

5 Comments
September 18, 2023

Just as I am

by chuckofish

The Greentree Festival was this weekend in our hometown, so, of course, we went to the parade. Per usual, there were bagpipers, army trucks, the KHS band, Shriners, floats, old cars, and more:

The twins had a great time–they couldn’t believe people were throwing candy at them…

…and Mr. Smith had fun being out and about too!

After church on Sunday we went to watch the wee bud’s soccer game. We have now officially entered the grandparents going to their grandchildrens’ sporting events phase of our lives–I am not complaining.

It was a beautiful day to sit outside and we had a lot fun. Once when the ball went out of bounds right in front of us, Lottie picked it up and threw it back in and all the boys yelled, “Lottieeeee, what are you doing?” It was pretty funny. She just laughed and gave them a fiddle-de-dee look.

The boy’s team won the game and they are 2 and 0 now. They have a couple of boys who can actually dribble and they score all the goals. The rest run up and down the field and try not to fall down.

So it’s Monday again and September is half over. May the God of every grace be with you today.

4 Comments
September 15, 2023

A simple walk in the park

by chuckofish

Friday again–where did the week go? I did the usual: reading, grocery shopping, lunch with a friend, preparing for Bible Study, going to Bible Study…and the unusual–having Mr. Smith as a house guest while daughter #1 was in Indiana working in the field.

Mr. Smith was pretty stressed because he was left again with us. I tried my best to reassure him. I read him a poem.

Dogs will also lick your face if you let them.

Their bodies will shiver with happiness.

A simple walk in the park is just about

the height of contentment for them, followed

by a bowl of food, a bowl of water,

a place to curl up and sleep. Someone

to scratch them where they can’t reach

and smooth their foreheads and talk to them.

Dogs also have a natural dislike of mailmen

and other bringers of bad news and will

bite them on your behalf. Dogs can smell

fear and also love with perfect accuracy.

There is no use pretending with them.

Nor do they pretend. If a dog is happy

or sad or nervous or bored or ashamed

or sunk in contemplation, everybody knows it.

They make no secret of themselves.

You can even tell what they’re dreaming about

by the way their legs jerk and try to run

on the slippery ground of sleep.

Nor are they given to pretentious self-importance.

They don’t try to impress you with how serious

or sensitive they are. They just feel everything

full blast. Everything is off the charts

with them. More than once I’ve seen a dog

waiting for its owner outside a café

practically implode with worry. “Oh, God,

what if she doesn’t come back this time?

What will I do? Who will take care of me?

I loved her so much and now she’s gone

and I’m tied to a post surrounded by people

who don’t look or smell or sound like her at all.”

And when she does come, what a flurry

of commotion, what a chorus of yelping

and cooing and leaps straight up into the air!

It’s almost unbearable, this sudden

fullness after such total loss, to see

the world made whole again by a hand

on the shoulder and a voice like no other.

(John Brehm, “If Feeling Isn’t In It”)

Meanwhile the babes in Maryland are redefining precious.

C’est la vie. Have a good weekend.

4 Comments
September 14, 2023

Incorruptible beauty

by chuckofish

Today we remember Charles Dana Gibson (1867-1944) on his birthday. An influential American illustrator, he created the “Gibson Girl”–an iconic representation of the beautiful and independent American woman at the turn of the 20th century.

I think it’s safe to say that our grandmother, Mira Sargent, styled herself that way.

Sadly, I did not inherit her bountiful hair gene.

Do not let your adornment be merely outward—arranging the hair, wearing gold, or putting on fine apparel— rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God.

(1 Peter 3:3-4)

I’m still working on that gentle and quiet spirit.

2 Comments
September 13, 2023

What are you reading?

by chuckofish

As usual I am reading a lot of different things. I have a new book We Believe, which includes all the reformed creeds, catechisms, and confessions of faith.

Woohoo–it’s all here–even the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Anglican Church which they now view as a quaint, antique document to ignore.

I am also doing the reading for my Bible Study group. The homework takes up a lot of time!

Also, Craig Johnson’s latest Longmire book was released last week, so I have been reading The Longmire Defense. After last year’s not-so-great entry in the Walt Longmire oeuvre, Johnson has thankfully gone back to his tried-and-true formula and this one is a winner (so far anyway).

Now that I have gotten through my deluge of doctor appointments which comes every six months, it’s time to start working on the next edition of the Kirkwood Historical Review.

And did I mention that we’re dog-sittin’ with Mr. Smith while daughter #1 travels for work? Well, yes we are.

Good dog!

2 Comments
September 12, 2023

Things of minor consequence

by chuckofish

There is a lot going on in the yard these days…sometimes right on your front doorstep. And there are pumpkins at Trader Joe’s.

In other news, baby Ida is on the verge of crawling. She is highly motivated.

Her style is mostly reminiscent of this:

You go, girl!

This is interesting. “”There is no half-mile anywhere on Earth which means more to more people — not to millions, but to billions — than the half-mile that is the City of David.”

And happy birthday to Maurice Chevalier (1888-1972) who, when I was growing up, was considered the quintessential Frenchman. Unfortunately, I don’t think they make Frenchmen like him anymore.

We also remember John Qualen (1899-1987) who died on this day. He was a character actor who made over 100 films, many of them as a member of John Ford’s famous “stock company.” You remember him, playing Scandinavian immigrants and the like in such movies as The Searchers (1956) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962), or as the Norwegian resistance fighter in Casablanca (1940). He’s probably best known for playing Muley in The Grapes of Wrath (1940).

He made a lot of good movies. The mark of a really excellent movie, don’t you think, is when the minor characters are allowed to shine and you remember not just John Wayne or Henry Fonda, but John Qualen and Russell Simpson and Ward Bond and Jane Darwell.

So pay attention to the little guy. And look around your yard. C’est magnifique. Have a good Tuesday.

3 Comments
September 11, 2023

“But meantime let me whoop it up”*

by chuckofish

Today is daughter #1’s birthday. She was born during a humdinger of a thunderstorm and a low pressure system that caused the water of every pregnant woman in St. Louis County to break. Seriously, they were lined up in the hallway at St. Luke’s. She was two weeks early, but that wasn’t a big deal since back then Moms stayed at the hospital for a week anyway–at least Dr. Gulick’s patients did. I was never in the hallway either and I had a private room, so no complaints from this peanut gallery.

This year we celebrated her birthday on Sunday in our usual style…

…with tacos and Tippin’s pie.

Because daughter #1, the OM and I went to our favorite winery on Saturday to celebrate her birthday and listen to the musical stylings of Bryan Toben…

…we missed the wee laddie’s first soccer game (there are 9 more), but the boy, who is also one of the coaches, took lots of good pictures.

I looked for, but could not find, any pictures of the boy at the same age playing soccer–but he looked just like this.

Sunrise, sunset.

In other news, the twins started Sunday School with the big kids (1st grade!) so we are all going to Sunday School at 10:00 am before the 11:00 am service. This is quite a departure from the way we were used to doing it in the Episcopal Church where Sunday School was just a short business during the sermon and communion. Besides all the kids’ classes, there are six adult classes to choose from–the boy and I attended the class on “Modern Ethical Topics”. I was impressed.

So onward and upward. This will be a busy week. May the God of love and peace be with you.

*Robert W. Service, “Birthday“

4 Comments