Jesus and The Belly Dancer

    Last night was a first for me.   I saw my first Celtic pub band, a belly dancer, (didn’t actually see her belly )  a River dance maiden and  Lego Man, all at one place.  The highlight of my night was when  Wylde Nept    took the stage, they looked like this: 

     They even  had cocoa nuts.

     As we were sitting there about 2 hours past my bed time, a moderately drunk young woman comes over  to our table and asks if we were college professors.  (Iowa City is a college town, and I guess in her mind, we had to  be teachers if we were at this place  this time of the night.  

    I’ve talked about this before, but  some of my favorite people to hang out with are your  non churchy types- bikers, people covered with tattoos, you get the idea.

       I think it has something to do with the type of people  I work with.  I’ve discovered,  beneath their (sometimes)   tough exterior most construction workers have a soft heart.    I LOVE to get to know and discover the person behind the mask. 

       Speaking of masks,  last night happened to be an early Halloween party, which explained some of the get ups  we saw, but not all of them.

    Melissa (the friend who invited us out on the town)  mentioned we might  see some belly dancing to the Irish pub music.

      Some of you are probably thinking to yourself, now how does that work???  Well, it works better than you might think.

   Here’s your chance to try a new feature on my wordpress blog…you get to vote  :-) 

    If you do vote, feel free to leave a comment and tell me why you voted the way you did.

I Am Ostfriesland

    I never  thought much about my  Low German roots until a few years ago when a friend of mine (who happens to be from Germany) explained to me the distinction between High  and Low German ( Plattdüütsch)  

      High German is the language of today, spoken by pretty much anyone who says they are German.    Low German   (depending on who you talk to)  would be considered  slang,  spoken by the  uncultured, back woods poor peasant types).  My Grandpa (Opa) came from Low German stock, where as  Grandma (Oma) came from the city, was  more refined and spoke both. 

     There should be no shame in having  Low German roots but just between me and you, ever since hearing the distinction, I’ve  felt just a wee bit second rate….until this week.

      I’d  heard growing up  that my ancestors came from the Northern part of Germany called “Ostfriesland” (pronouned  Aush-Freeze-land)   ( or the Freeland).   This week I’ve done some reading…

      It seems that way back in the time of the Roman empire,  the people of Northern Germany lived in freedom and did not want to submit themselves to the bully called Rome. The area they lived in was in fact called ”The Free lands”     Rome decided to conquer these farmers,  instead, they (the Romans)  got their butts kicked in the  Battle of the Teutoburg Forest  (A.D.9)   The peasants knew there would be hell to pay  and there was.  It resulted in 7 years of bloody conflict, but in the end, Rome never was able to completely subdue them. 

     I told my wife this morning, the Ostfrieslanders  were too busy fighting off Roman soldiers to care how many spoons you needed to formally set the table.       And yet, as I’ve read more about my ancestors this week,  I also learned they were not the brute savages you might think.  Taticus (Roman historian) mentions they were fiercely monogamous.

     I say all of this to tell you, I embrace  the fact that there is “Freelander” blood coursing through my veins.  It gives me a rich heritage I didn’t realize I had.

    If you want to know more…check out this link:

   Ancient German people

 

  So what do you think? 

Thoughts, comments, questions?

Switchback- Live

      Saturday night we headed South to hear Switchback 

   Embedded below are two clips from U-tube (Kudo’s  to Kristina the Home Engineer for helping me out. 

      These clips don’t do justice to  just how good these guys are live.

     They were awesome. 

      I’m seriously thinking about booking them for something in the future.  Let me know if you’d like to see them. 

 

 

 

     So  what did you do this   weekend?

Generous To A Fault…Is It Possible?

       I need some Input.  Is it possible to be too generous?  Where is the happy medium?

     

      I have no trouble charging what I need to charge when it comes to my construction business.   If I’m asked to bid on a job, I work up a fair price, if I get the job I get it, if someone wants to do it for less- let them.  Simple, right?   Why is it, then that I can’t apply that same straight forward non emotional decision making process to our other business ventures?

     We have a small Bed and Breakfast business that we run out of our home now that our children have grown.   We do it as much for a tax write off, and a chance to do a little hospitality  as for generating income.  I’ve written before about opening our home to musicians who happen to be traveling through the Midwest.  When I heard one musician was looking for a gig, we wrote them  and told them while we couldn’t host another concert so soon after our last one, they were more than welcome to crash @ our place for a day or two…I would never have thought about making that offer and then say, Oh, by the way, it will cost you just $80.00 per night…you know what I mean.  Based upon some other B and B’s in our area, we could be charging another $15 to $20.00 per night…but then again, there are other ones that are not charging as much as we are…so that’s why we’ve set our rates @ what they are.

     We also have a small apple orchard (this years crop is about 30 bushels) which eventually should produce between 150- 400 bushels a year.    I see it as a hobby, I love to prune, spray, and  pick, it doesn’t feel like work for me, more of a way to unwind.  I put an add in the local paper this week- $1.00 a pound which is cheap compared to what they are charging in the grocery store for some varieties, and yet, I struggle with charging much more until we have the volume to actually have something to offer to the public. 

         In doing some historical research this past year about Lyman Dillon, it was said, he was “generous to a fault”.  He never got rich, because he was always helping out other people.  When I read about him, I thought to myself..he sounded  a lot like me… (I can tell you right now, at the rate I’m going, I too will “never be rich.”  I tend to give it away almost as fast as I can accumulate it…any suggestions?

Chicken Little Christianity

      We visited a turkey farm in 2007.    I can still remember the farmer telling us as we approached the buildings to “ Be quiet ” -  not do anything to startle the birds or they might panic.  Do you know what happens when turkey’s (or chickens) get frightened?   They   run to the other end of the building, pile on top of each other and  smother.

    There is something I bump into from time to time among people who should know better I  call “Chicken Little Christianity” 

      Basically,  it works like this.   A piece of fear based nonsense gets passed around by  word of mouth, e-mail, etc. and it causes a stir in the Chicken house, I mean church.   Like this one about the FCC supposedly trying to outlaw Christian radio.       If you’re a regular reader , you know I rarely “rant”  but I’m feeling one coming on.      

   Amber posted something today on Oprah.   (I loved her thoughts by the way, she was right on)   At the end of it she observed some people have  gone so far as to say “Oprah is the Anti-Christ. ”  I thought to myself, ”Here we go again -”Chicken Little theology,”

     WHY do some Christians have to embarrass the rest of us by their stupidity.????”

     This Summer I got an e-mail  suggesting that maybe Barack Obama was the Anti-Christ.    I thought to myself,  “Come on people, get your head out of the you know where.”

     Back in the mid 90′s I remember a   pastor talking about computer chips supposedly  being implanted in the  hands of people in some Central American country in order to buy and sell, and maybe, just maybe, this was how a portion of the book of Revelations was going to be fulfilled.  

        I’ve been a Christian since 1980.  I’ve been exposed to some of the same nonsense  that you have.   Two of you (Amber,  Sanity Found ) have  talked about it on your blogs  at different times, and I cringed for both of you.

       I’m as familiar with  “Pretrib eschatology” as any Christian.

translation: “Pretrib eschatology“  One school of thought among Christians on how the end of the world will play out according to the Bible. 

      What you rarely hear about (I’m talking to any one still reading this blog piece and gives a hoot)  is that there are at least  2 other schools of thought  that  traditionally have  had as much credence in Church history as the one getting all the press today (and in my humble opinion feed these Chicken Little fears).

     Bottom line-historically, to be a Christian is to suffer, so what’s all the excitement about?

      Maybe- just maybe, it indicates you have way too many eggs in your basket this side of eternity. 

      I’m going to tell you right up front-  If this post ruffles your feathers and you want to make a nasty comment to me on the blog- don’t bother…I’ll just delete it.  If on the other hand you can express yourself graciously, then I  will.   

Thoughts/ questions/ comments?

You asked “How Do You keep Your Relationship Fresh?” and other random questions

       I asked a couple of you that know me pretty well if you would be willing to come up with a few questions I could answer for a blog post.  Here’s what you  came up with:

What is your greatest accomplishment? 

   That is a good question.   My greatest accomplishment  is being able to look into the eyes of the woman I  married  almost 30 yrs ago  and still see a woman who is in love with me.

How do you keep your marriage fresh and still remain authentic to who you are?  

    

      A few things  come to mind.  Both of us are very intentional about personal growth…. whether that means   going to a counselor for  help or being willing to be pushed out of our comfort zones. Those type of things add  freshness to your relationships. 

     Forgiveness…definitely.  Both of us are very intentional about trying not to go to bed with unresolved conflict in our relationships.  Unresolved conflict will ferment  and sour your  relationship, every time.

     Time together, for us probably the most important time together is in the morning.  I bring  coffee to the bedroom before we get up for the day.

      Just speaking for ourselves, I’ve observed there is an “ebb and flow”  in our relationship in terms of emotional closeness .  Dr Dobson talks about how our emotions tend to be responders.  (ie.  do the deed and our feelings will follow)….if your relationship is starting to feel “flat”, maybe it’s because you haven’t been investing time dating, doing little acts of kindness, thoughtfulness….I know that’s true in our lives.

   

What is the most romantic thing you’ve ever done for your wife?

      That’s a hard one.  I tend to be a romantic in a dozen little ways…I will often call home when I’m driving to work (I would have just walked out the door), or @ break time, lunch time…just to say “Hi” and tell her some silly thing I might be thinking about).  I have put together more than one “surprise” party.   I’m  verbal.  I think most wives long to hear what their husbands are thinking, how his day was, be asked how her day was,  and yea, I have been known to wash the dishes on occasion.

  What is your biggest regret? 

Great question…funny you should ask it because I just had this conversation  the other night. 

     I do not have any regrets @ this point in my life period…none…nada…sure I would do things differently if I had a chance to go back  when our kids were little (and as a younger husband)..but @ the time I was doing what I thought I should be doing..and did things the best I could.

 Looking back through your life, what one moment do you see as a “fork in the road – pivotal” moment? 

  The night I picked  up the phone, pushing past raw fear to  do this : read this post

What exactly do you do for a living?

       I own a construction business with 2 employee’s currently besides myself.  I love my job, every week is different.  Today for example I rented a cement saw and cut an egress window into a basement.  Last week we finished siding an older home.  We also pour concrete, frame houses, and things like that.

Describe….how  you proposed

     We’d been dating for 5 months.   One evening we were out taking a walk around my parents farm, hadn’t talked about marriage before that night, although I had been giving it some serious thought.   I’d been  having  a very strong “nesting urge” (ie.  desire to settle down and start a family vs. run around every weekend partying, so in the midst of our walk, I said I needed to talk to her about something…I looked at her and simply said, “Would you marry me?” ..there was the longest pause …and then she said, “You bet.”  At that point my knees got weak and I had to sit on the ground…the rest is history

   5 foods you hate:  corn,  peas, asparagus, white milk, carrots

 

 5 foods you love :

  KFC extra crispy, a good rare steak, fresh green beans with new potatoes and bacon, (sorry Winston), and  coffee (coffee is a food group right?)

    If you’d like me to come up with a set of questions you could use to create a blog post, let me know…I would love to.

Johnny’s Flower

  

        ”Each mind has its own method….do you think the porter and the cook has no anecdotes, no experiences, no wonders for you? …especially  (those)  whose minds have not been subdued by the drill of school education.”                                                          Ralph Waldo Emerson

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                 Quick story.  ***

 Little Johnny heads off  to Kindergarden.   Teacher tells the kids, “Today we are going  to  learn how to draw a flower.”

     Little Johnny loves to draw so he gets busy , though the teacher is still talking.    Here is Johnny’s flower:

     Teacher comes by his desk a few minutes later and says, “That is a nice flower Johnny, but you weren’t listening,  let me show you how I want  you to do it:”

 

       Johnny is embarrassed.   His flower looks nothing like this.  The other kids laugh at him and his flower, that’s what you get for not listening to the teacher.  Johnny learns a valuable  lesson that day.  If you don’t do it right you may get laughed at, and that isn’t any fun.

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We jumped into homeschooling when our children  were 12, 11, 6 and 4.  (1992)   We were told it might take a few years of ”detoxification “  before our older ones natural curiosity and creativity would come back.   I remember thinking to myself, what are they talking about -”detoxing”?  

      Detoxing from what? 

       What ever it was , it didn’t  sound good.  :-)

      This essay is not about home schooling by the way…it’s about “detoxing“ 

         Our choice to educate our children (for a season) at home was a radical departure from how I was raised and I discovered something serendipitously in the process.   It was like opening Pandora’s box (but  in a good way.)  Once you  make the choice to do  X when society tends to push Y,   you start looking  at other things  with an open mind too.

         Why can’t I hire a woman on   my small town construction crew???? 

          Church- don’t get me started

          Leisure - there really is more to life than just money.

        There is a freedom and creative energy  that I can trace directly back to 1992.  

          You can read more about it  here .

        I’m guessing most of us like to think of ourselves as independent types.    The truth is, while we may have rebelled against the authorities of our youth,…we are pretty slow to wander  too far the beaten trail of our peers.  Then as we get older, other voices    temper our choices. ”What would the neighbors think?”, “What would my friends think”, “What would my co-workers think?”…..and your flower looks a lot like everybody elses  flower.   

     God made you unique, He loves diversity.  One of the biggest ways to bring a smile on his face (my humble opinion) is for YOU to be you  and do it with gusto.

       *** (Can’t remember where I first heard this story.)

How To: Handle Constructive Feedback

     “Mom!  What do you think of my picture?”  My friend leaned over, took a long look @ her daughter’s picture and said, ” Well, Honey, it’s not your best work, but I think it’s very nice.” 

      Without batting an eye, the little girl tilted her head, looked up at her mom and said, “You know what, Mom?  I think so too, but I do like it.”

     To that, my friend smiled and said, “Yes honey, I like it, too.  I really do.”

      That little conversation had a big effect on me.  I was a young mom then and thoroughly intrigued by the way my friend matter-of-factly told the truth to her child.

      I could’t help but think of a young man I knew during my college years.  He was a charming, gifted individual.  If anyone had the goods to accomplish great things, he did.  Yet never had I met such a self conscious, insecure person.  We became fast friends, and so I finally asked him:  “How is it you can be so gifted and talented yet so unsure of yourself?”

     His answer shocked me.

      ” I came from a great family….My mom loved me and I knew it.  But according to her, I could do no wrong.  She praised every single thing I did.  And if I messed up, she helped me find some way to explain why it really wasn’t my fault.  I went through my school years thinking I was always right.

      As you can imagine, I was not at all prepared for what was waiting for me in the real world.  Out there, people don’t sing your praises every single moment.  Your professors couldn’t care less if you have five good excuses for not doing what they asked.  I’ve encountered more conflict and more disappointment than I know what to do with.  It’s as though I’ve lost my footing.  I don’t even know who I am anymore.”

     ….In a generation of finger- pointers and fault finders, we desperately need a generation of teachable kids.

      My sons are now adults, and our middle son recently said to me, ” By teaching me that correction is a positive thing, you have helped me become a better friend, employee, student.  When those in authority over me correct me, it doesn’t occur to me to take it personally because I know who I am.”

     We do our kids a great disservice when we constantly coddle them.  On the other hand, we give our sons and daughters a valuable gift when we lovingly equip them to handle correction and redirection.   Those kids will be tomorrow’s leaders.”

      From October 2008 Focus On The Family magazine

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     I (DM) read this article this morning and it spoke to my heart.  I occasionally battle conflicting thoughts regarding what I write.  Is it any good,  does it suck, or is it  some where in between?   If it is somewhere “in between”  what would you suggest to take it to the next level?  

     When I lived in New Jersey I  was part of a discipleship group where we would  have an activity called “Strengths and weaknesses” , where  one person got the chance to have honest, loving feedback into their lives.  I loved it, couldn’t wait to have my turn.

            So my dear reader, how about you?  Can people who care about you give you your medicine straight or do they have to handle you  with kid gloves? 

  Recently another blogger asked me to be his accountability partner.   I thought to myself, “I don’t know about this.  I’ve done that sort of thing before and the person ended up turning on me.”   It wasn’t too many days later when I had to ask my new accountability friend about something he’d written- he responded beautifully.  It takes humility to listen to feedback, but the rewards are great.  If I am convinced you have  my best interest in mind, your  feedback in my life is a gift.