Orginal Works (Medium: Other)

Artwork (Medium: Google Keep)

My Election Advice

If you find yourself facing a tough choice, fill in this name:

Dear Future Biographer (I)

Just wanna super apologize for the amount of [sic]s you're going to have to use when quoting things I've written.

But, in my defense*, spelling is kind of an artificial skill anyway, right?

==

*Just took four tries to spell "defense" — pro tip: there is no "c".

Happy Accident

I'm not sure how Google ending up making this, but I like this odd little gif thing:

Papa,

Thank you for:

• Wilco.
• Alec Baldwin.
• William H. Macy.
• and everyone else behind The Cooler.
• And for This Film Is Not Yet Rated and other truth-tellers.
• Anthropologie.

Things I Learned From a Day at the Zoo (with Two Kids)

• My wife and motherhood are going to mesh well together. Like, insanely well.
• A double-wide stroller (combined with gravity and a hill) is potentially a deadly weapon. Wield it carefully.
• I have some kind of paternal instinct kicking in hardcore. "Feeling like a dad" is something I say when I feel great about something.

From Phillip Yancy's Prayer:

I write about prayer as a pilgrim, not an expert.

From the author description for Randy Alcorn's Heaven:

Dr. Randy Alcorn is a leading authority on Heaven.

The difference between a pilgrim and an expert (or authority), is that, though both spend a great deal of time and energy seeking knowledge, the expert stops at some point and says, "I have conquered this subject. I know all this is to know."

The pilgrim is ever restless. But in that restlessness, she continues to uncover truth — long after the authority has declared the case closed.

Grateful

Thank you for being taller than me.
Thank you for bending over to hold me.
Thank you for holding me.

Thank you for the thoughtfulness of David Fincher.
Thank you for the irrepressible buoyancy of Guillermo del Toro.
Thank you for the vulnerability of Joss Whedon.
Thank you for Win Wender's clear eyesight.
Thank you for what Malick does to my vision.

Open me eyes. Help me see.

Grateful Tuesdays 3.5.14

Things I'm grateful for: The mysterious, good energy on set yesterday. The fact that I was on a set yesterday. That I still have a job at that one place. For the rain. For the comfort I find there. For how often this computer works. For the size of my house. For a place called "my house." For taking me up on the whole "acculturating my exodus from adolescence" thing. Darn you. Amen.

Grateful Tuesdays

Thank you.

Thank you for this woman. For this home, this life. You have wrapped your arms around me. You have taken care of me. And times where my head is pulled out of the dark clouds around it, I see what you have done. And I feel it. I feel very taken care.

You are my shepherd. Goodness and love will chase me. Goodness and love will chase me.

Goodness and love will follow me. All the days of my life.

I was taken care of when I looked at the little pirate lord on his island. And I am being taken care of now.

Grateful Tuesdays

For my Trimet pass.
For Mary Poppins.
For my book.
For a Shakespearian passion project.
Her hair. And what she's like with a little wine in her. My playful girl.
For the satisfaction of flipping switches.
That the bus waited.
For the trust put in me.
For danger. Danger is so deeply important.
And for that reason: That Papa played shuffleboard last night.
For reconnecting with my old friend. We scratch the topsoil of our friendship and found it still fertile.

Grateful Tuesdays

Shepherd,

Thank you.

Thank you that I looked up in time to see the river.

Thank you for Lev Grossman and his friends (and enemies).

Thank you for the ring on my hand.

Thank you for the walk, all the walks, that things are tight and for the short wait for the bus.

Thank you for the leaves. For green.

Thank you for the free ticket.

Thank you for the book.

Thank you for the biting, chafing, searing beauty of faith. Thank you for the man who pointed it out to me.

Thank you for everything that man has taught me. For how overwhelmingly good things have been. And that everything will be okay. And that even if it isn't, it's okay.

Thank you for the prison break you are launching in my heart. It has been so slow, but why is it happening at all?

Thank you for my friend. That she makes me better. And feeds my heart. And holds my hand. I am lost in her, and she is lost in me.

Thank you for the people (person?) reading this.

You prepare a table before me. In the presence of my enemies.

Installment Number Thirty Eight...

"The scariest moment is always just before you start."
—Stephen King

Notes From a Country Called Fear

In Fear Country, you:

• don't decide.
• Don't choose at all. In any form.
• Don't choose a belief system. Don't choose a God.
• Don't offer thanks. If you thank somebody for something that's a form of choosing: You are embracing that one thing over another thing.
• Don't move forward. To choose one path is to deny all other paths. And who knows if those other paths were the ones you were really supposed to choose?
• Don't stop looking over your shoulder. The blow might fall any minute. Best to always keep one eye open.
• Of course, the idea of living a choice-less life is a false one: Every moment is a fork in the road (try not to think about that). This is where your god will come in, whichever, whoever it may be. Tarot cards, fortune cookies, or Jehovah-Jireh, they all serve the same purpose in Fear Country: Someone to whom you may reliably pass the buck.

2013

Build a Wall

I'm sadden by the insurmountable wall we've fixed in the conversation about abortion. Those on the right are not allowed to say this issue is complex because it involves the bodies and futures of real women in complex and difficult situations.

And those on the left are not allowed to give thought to what the smaller one in question might become if given enough air, water, and mac and cheese.

Frank Schaeffer sixth chapter of Sex, Mom, and God has some excellent thoughts on this phenomenon. (Including the rebuke to conservative Christians: "It takes two to start an all-consuming culture war.")

Let's class up the discussion, friends. Please.

Mister Bear

From my Tumblr.

Over a Black Guitar

"I don’t know exactly when I decided that this would be my life’s dedication; I don’t ever remember it having to be a decision. I knew from Johnny Cash—and Bob Dylan very quickly afterwards, with a thunderous clarity—that I had to live whatever life allowed me to dress like that—to wear pointy boots and glare out over a black guitar."

[From Image Journal's Conversation with Joe Henry.]

The Party

First, the original. A solid pop song about confidence, a commodity among youth made valuable because of it's scarcity.

 


 Now the poorly lip-read send up.

 


 Now the original again, so you remember the tune.

 


 Now Weird Al's critique of the espionage agencies.