All in One Day

I don't write poetry, so excuse this. Random things that are striking me after a four year absence from the USA, as we begin to travel and share our mission again.

Rise before dawn
dress in high heels.
Glide through the night
light creeps into the sky.
Frozen creeks
carpets of green sprouts
gold-red prairie grasses
spread in tweed browns.
black turned earth
muddy black cows
chopped yellow stalks
ice jams on rivers

i-70, KS 36, 99, 9, 15
200 miles tick past
Honk Kong Buffet
Dairy Queen and Truck stops

excited to share
leather cowl 3rd Row
old man w/ fuzzy neck
who lived in Berlin in the war
grateful to receive MY emails?!

white flakes on the wind
unseen owls whoo-whoo
birds of prey swoop the road
gulleys of unmelted snow
farmer on a phone in a tractor
grand spreads
brokedown barns
abandoned homes
stoic stone courthouses
stone arch bridge in a random field

Instant gratification

Am I blogging only for the sense of gratification I get from a few comments? I've wanted to tell stories and write since I was in grade school...around the time I quit growing (taller) now that I come to think of it. Anyway, I like the sense of getting something out immediately, but I've been in the industry long enough to know that there is a certain lack of authentication without an editor involved.

I've read the articles debating self publishing and the need for a neutral party to read (edit) your writing. Better yet I've read some of those books by people who decided to just go for it and print after frustrating bouts with the publishing industry. I seem to have stalled out in that painful area and I can totally appreciate giving up and paying to put it in print. Don't get me wrong occasionally these books turn out okay, but more often than not they are noticeably behind their formally published counterparts in quality.

So after a sheaf of rejections in my own drawer, I do enjoy the instantness of a blog. But now I'm beginning to experience instant rejectification. Last week I submitted a short story to an anthology at about 11pm the day before the deadline. It was a story of around 4,000 words. I had the rejection by 3pm the next day. Hope doesn't even have much time to hatch in this environment. I suppose the bright spot is there was no exchange of postage and self addressed stamped envelopes.

So thank you for the moments of instant gratification in blog land and a thumb of my nose to the instant rejectification. If I give up trying, I'll never know if my writing can get authenticated and published some day.

I feel ignorant

I had a moment this week that I used the word ignorant in the literal sense of the word. I was on a tech support call if that helps any. I couldn't get the new website to load and I knew that I was simply ignorant of some step in the process. (I must be missing a similar step for the printer, but I digress).

We are about to start doing public speaking each week about our lives in Spain making videos. I realized after living in Madrid the last four years people expect me to be an authority on Spanish culture, but I feel ignorant. In four years, it seems I've barely scratched the surface and now I must speak for an entire country.

It's not that I didn't gain a lot of knowledge in Spain, I did. It's just that I really only know about my own experiences. I had one culture class from a real Spaniard but that was 3 days about five years ago. I knew and interacted with a few Spaniards but my daily life was with missionaries and other immigrants.

My only real Spanish friends were from church and there again most of the people sustaining the churches we attended were not from Spain. Romanians and South Americans seem to keep the church alive. I know compared to the random person on the street I do know a lot about Spain, but I don't feel an authority on a country so diverse. Each region has its quirks and laws and in some cases language.

Now don't get me wrong, it's a blast to get to talk about it, but I feel sheepish speaking for an entire people group with my limited experiences. Most people are only interested in about 15 minutes worth of conversation about my life in Spain, sometimes only five minutes. So traveling around and visiting to do our fund raising is a fun opportunity to blabber on and on about what I do THINK about Spain or tell my personal experiences. Hopefully a year from now I haven't left a lot of people thinking the wrong things about my other home.

Ready or not here I come.

As good as it gets

I had a conversation once with a friend from high school about how we thought we were fat in our 20s and now, uh, well, several years, okay decades later, we think how good we looked when we first got out of high school. (Please note: I'm not talking about fashion, just looks.)

Often in the mornings going through my morning ablutions and I'm feeling fussy or I'm complaining, I try to remember today is the youngest day of the rest of my life. Today is the least wrinkles, barring surgery, that I will have for the rest of my days here. So I need to appreciate what I've got today, rather than look back in 20 more years and think how good I had it and didn't know it.

I suppose it could be the skinniest day of the rest of my life but I don't know, people do take up fitness at various ages, so it's possible to have a thinner phase of life. So far my track record has been a slow escalation which all things continuing to be what they are means today is probably the skinniest day of my life as well.

I wish I could say I appreciate this fact and live in it's fullness each day. I don't. But I am learning to remind myself that today may be as good as it gets, so don't disavow that person in the mirror today. This may indeed be as good as it gets. But a little more make up might not hurt.

Hold onto your hat

I'm reinventing my blog with the idea of posting once a week for a year. A friend of mine did a piece of art a week last year and made it to the end of the year. So I was toying with the idea of posting some writing weekly. The thing is that I can't find a theme. It seems a little reckless and unrealistic to write a short story every week, well, not and expect it to be good.

I also saw the movie Julie and Julia where she blogs about going through a cookbook of recipes in a year. I was inspired again but still came up theme-less. I can't say I've resolved to do this for 2010 because at midnight last night I was still un-decided because of my lack of theme.

Perhaps I will randomly post myself into a theme. It's possible. Perhaps it will be a private journal that people will not read much.

I have had the conviction for the past few months knowing I was leaving my office schedule routine in Madrid for the more random public speaking, fund raising schedule in the United States that I wanted to write more in 2010. A lot of writers, and want-to-be writers say they want to write more "this year." I used to say more words on paper. I guess now it's just more words. I still wouldn't call it a resolution. An aspiration maybe.

Will I be among the many who disappoint themselves this year? Or will I stumble into something good? Maybe the simple act of doing will be discipline and reward enough. We shall see.

Upcoming ideas: crappy crafts, writing anst, story ideas.

To write or not to write that is the question

Just a thought. I see here I haven't posted all year. The blog was originally for keeping in touch with friends while we were in Spain. Some of the friends have moved away from KC, but we are all keeping up on facebook now rather than following one another's blogs. I fell off the blog train for sure.

I keep wondering and wanting to reignite my writing life. In order to move forward in the writing world, I really need to start blogging as a writer and connecting with other blogs. The thing is I don't really have time to keep up with email and Facebook as it is now. How will I add being an active part of the blog writing community to that and how would I draw people here who want to read something significant about writing? It's just a thought right now. I could start posting my worries about writing or possible rants against the process. Latest discouragements. Hmmm, sounds so alluring.

I could post short stories all year, like Forest (a friend who has posted a painting a week for a year). I don't know. I definitely want to respark my writing life when we got to the USA. Will I? Can I?

It's only in addition to scheduling fund raising service, writing new scripts for video production, doing a new website for the video/missions life. Is there room for more? It all sounds like work right now. I'm not so sure what to do.

Update

Wow, we had an insanely busy holiday season. I bet everyone can say that. It's nice to be settling down in our own environment again after all the travels. (9 states and 14 flights in a month for me!)

Little did I know that my last post - church angst- was only a small harbinger of things to come.

We arrived back in Spain to some strange emails, frenzied phone calls, and all out church split going on. Ick.

We've tried to stay neutral and I think without asking for dirt and details we have a good feel for each side. Two churches are coming out of the mess and the building will revert to the original pastor while the "new" pastor and his flock will leave. It's all messy.

Even weirder and messier for us is the fact that the missionaries (too many in one church in the first place) all piled up on one side of the issue and while we have no ill will to that side and can see that perhaps what happened was innocently done -- this side is not the side we like the style of church.

We tried to tiptoe off to the "other" church Sunday and a coworker dropping some pretty wide and pointed hints today that vaguely implied we were ill informed or somehow flawed in our choices. Maybe I should have the guts to just say everything but we really are rooting for both churches to succeed. There's a certain implication that you can't be friends with all and I don't see why not. We'll see how we weather this very weird and uninvited storm.

Church angst

I realized today I've never lived through a church leadership change. I suppose sort of the one at OPAG but the Pastor who took over had already been on staff for 15 years and had been team leading, so it wasn't some sort of shake up. Behind the scenes I'm sure there were issues but my church didn't mutate out from under me.

A few weeks ago, our Spanish pastor stepped down and let someone he was grooming to take over in another year or so go ahead and take the helm now. I think there was some conflict in style and speed of change. I'm anxious now.

The new pastor is very personable and nice as a person, it's not that. He seems to want to operate in a more old school church style, taking you back to the 1980s maybe. Musically when he sings, it's usually something from that era. His style is more emotional and you didn't really get it if you didn't come forward. (implied not stated). He also veers off of his main point pretty much every week for about 15 minutes or more.

There's nothing I can do about this. I'm not in leadership, no one wants my opinion. It's something I have to adjust too. I guess one thing that has occurred is I've learned that I like an scholarly approach to scripture and learning, not an emotional one. So I will have to learn more about myself through this process and accept that without realizing it, I had a church style.

Customer service? I don't think so.

Tonight we drove through near rush hour traffic in a city of 5 million, Madrid. We navigated tricky one way streets, wrong turns, and tiny street signs. We arrived at the Plaza de Something Republica. Parked two floors underground in a garage. We walked two blocks dragging a suitcase to a business address.

About six weeks ago, I dropped off two pieces of equipment at this business to be fixed. The equipment - two different decks for work - is large enough that we need the suitcase to move it back to the car.

The business had moved. In the myriad of emails that flew between my Spanish speaking co-worker and the six or seven phone calls, no one thought to mention that they were moving AWAY! Come on!

Can I just say this is what socialism gets you? Customer service is not important. It isn't important that the clients be able to return to pick up their expensive equipment or that a satisfied customer be able to return and give them future business. I suppose the good news is that the doorman seemed to know where they were at and their phone number is still the same. But WHEN WERE YOU GOING TO LET ME KNOW?

So we get to drive into the city again in the very near future and pick up one piece that is repaired and another that -- oh joy -- will have to be hand carried to the United States. Probably by us. Did I mention that this is someone else's responsibility, but they can't seem to get around to it? Yeah, it's good to be responsible; my fault, I offered to help!

Stories from Communism

We went to Romania for a Christian Visual Media conference along with about 90 people from around Europe. I knew that there was persecution under communism but we saw some videos and heard some first hand stories that were amazing.

Several of the media people shared documentaries about persecution under communism that were really severe. They took believers and intellectuals and tortured them in an experiment to turn them into the perfect communists. It was psychological as well as physical. Part way through the experiment they told people if they would administer the torture to fellow prisoners they would be released, so some turned on the others in desperation.

While the videos were shocking, touring a local Timisoara Revolution museum we discovered some information that I found a total surprise. They feel like they have had a 20 year revolution that is still continuing because in 1989 they over thru Chachesku, the brutal communist dictator, but they were not able to get rid of all his croneys and they are still in power in various parties today. In the chaos at the time, the Chacheskus were killed with a perfunctory trial. No one argues they weren't guilty but they weren't allowed to live and point out their cohorts. The corruption continues deeply and the people are hoping that the attempt to join the EU helps. They have more physical freedom but still feel they are taken advantage of by the government authorities. (In a way, aren't we all?)

The most interesting testimony I heard was from a woman who is now a Christian. She was not a believer before the revolution and had no idea of God. She said it was depressing because in the communist system your life was spelled out for you. Where you lived or were born dictated what school you went to. Your marks dictated whether you would go to a trade or to a university. Your job was given to you and that was it until you died. They weren't allowed to travel; they could have no aspirations of a different job or a business of their own. Food was rationed tightly and there was no variation. You had children and they did the same thing.

After the revolution, her husband met a missionary and was saved. For one year she resisted as her children accepted the Lord and her husband kept trying to convince her. She finally said in her heart not outloud, God if you are real and want me to believe all this send someone to me. That night two missionaries who did not know them stopped by because someone from another country had asked them to drop off a package. It was dark and the streets weren't marked and it was a miracle that the men had found their home. The one man spoke French which she knew from school and spoke to her. She just started crying because she knew God had sent this man and that God was real.

Today she and her husband are running a 24 hour television station reaching Romania and southeastern Europe for Christ and (!) using our videos!