Father's Day 1972 Revisited, Part 4: A Brief Encounter With a Jesus Freak

This Sunday evening church excursion was not turning out anything like I'd planned. Instead of ushers telling me, as I'd hoped they would, that I couldn't come into the church dressed as I was, I was welcomed by a hundred or more Jesus people, most of whom probably assumed I was one of them. I was chagrined I'd let myself get snookered into being part of this gathering of Jesus freaks. And now, to top it off, here was an old high school acquaintance calling me "brother." When I informed him I was no "brother" and that I'd just given someone a ride there and was not at all interested in religion, he looked genuinely surprised, but then, getting his evangelical footing gushed, "Hey man, you should really check it out--God loves you, Jesus proved it by dying on the cross for you. You know, the Bible says..." I cut this off immediately with, "Don't tell me the Bible says this or that or some other thing. That Bible of yours is full of contradictions and fairy tales--no one believes that stuff anymore." But before I could quote some Bertrand Russell for his enlightenment, he held out his big Thompson Chain Reference Bible toward me and said, "Well, show me one and we can talk about it." This so startled me I forgot my Bertrand Russell and just stammered, "Well, I know they're in there, it's well documented. I couldn't tell you just where they are right this minute, but I know they're there." At that moment I was blushing inside with intellectual embarrassment. I had prided myself on being an intellectual, someone who dispassionately looks at all the available facts, considers them very carefully, applies logic and reason and then follows the truth wherever it might happen to lead. In that instant it became blindingly obvious to me I had never even come close to doing this regarding religion, the Bible or the claims about Jesus. Oh sure, I'd gotten drunk with a buddy one time and we'd read Revelation and laughed it to scorn. That of course wouldn't really count as having read the Bible. I was intellectually busted and I knew it. Of course I was not about to concede that to this Jesus freak.

Next he tried another angle, asking me, "Well, who do you think Jesus was then? The Bible says..." "Yeah, yeah, I know what the Bible says about Jesus--I was went to Sunday school all the time when I was little, right here in this church in fact. You can't really expect me to believe any of that walking on water stuff or the virgin birth or the resurrection and all the rest of it. Besides, no one is really sure if Jesus even existed." For some reason, my declaration of unbelief didn't seem to faze him in any way for he simply replied, "Jesus was either a Liar if he said things about himself he knew weren't true, a lunatic if he believed all he said about himself and it was not true, or--or he was exactly who he claimed to be if everything he said about himself was true. He must be one of those and, as for me, I know he's my Lord and savior, praise God!" My only retort at this point was to try and brush it off by saying, "Well, his followers probably just made all that stuff up after he died." About this time Cher came up and wanted to introduce me to someone--which was a sort of salvation to me at that moment. As we began to walk away my friend called after me, "I'll be prayin' for you brother." "Ugh," I said under my breath and thought, "Yeah, you just do that. Whatever floats you religious boat buddy." Still, as satisfied and self assured in my unbelief as I was, it seemed a worrisome chink had been found in my atheistic armor. I'd have to see to that. Already I was determining in my mind to find at least a few of the many contradictions I'd referred to so that, the next time some Jesus freak button-holed me I'd be ready with better come-backs. I especially didn't like having to concede that I hadn't read the book I was rejecting. That just didn't look intellectual and would need to be addressed. OK, I'd have to read the Bible--at least once, at least the New Testament gospels with all their unbelievable fairy-tale miracles. It would be worth it in order to bolster my anti-Christian arguments. I could handle it, no sweat.

Thus was I drawn yet another little step into Gods loving and so well-disguised trap.

Father's Day 1972 Revisited, Part 3: Not Saved by the Ushers

The mysterious young Jesus Person neighbor girl asked me--me--an atheist/agnostic/, seeker, rebel, hippy guy--for a ride to church. Going to church held absolutely no appeal to me, but spending time, even half and hour, with this girl did. Perhaps I could find a way to give her a ride but avoid sitting through a church service. A plan began to form in my mind and was, from my point of view, brilliant. I would wear my favorite very well-worn hippy bell-bottom jeans, the ones all faded and frayed and with the knees torn out. A white T-shirt would be good and, in spite of the sultriness of the evening, I'd wear that old army shirt emblazoned with Magic-Marker peace symbols--the one I'd sewn a large American flag,upside-down, on the back of. And, just in case all that was not enough to get me denied entrance, I went barefoot. Yes--that would do the trick! I had it all played out in advance in my mind: Of course, the ushers would deny me entrance, she would go to the service; I would take a walk and smoke a cigarette or two, Afterwards, we'd go for a coke and conversation and I would explain to her why I could not possibly be a Christian what with all the derss codes and regulations etc. At least that's the way I'd envisioned the evening unfolding. I was in for a rude awakening. As we pulled into the parking lot of All Saints Episcopal Church, I noticed something unusual--there were more than a hundred, perhaps two hundred, young people, most of whom looked like hippies, milling about on the expansive lawn of the churchyard. Something was seriously amiss, especially my plan for getting barred at the door of the church. Just then, as I turned my dad's station wagon into the parking space, Cher excitedly pointed toward the lawn and exclaimed, "There 's pastor Lonnie, he's really cool." "You mean that guy with the beard, in the muslin shirt?" I asked. "Yes, wait 'till you hear him--he's really anointed" she said in a low whispery voice which seemed one of admiration. I could see that my carefully thought-out plan was shot. I hadn't come up with an alternative as we got out of the car and headed for the lawn--she eagerly, me very reluctantly. Before I knew it we were seated on the lawn, everyone singing "cum-by-ya" and a guy to my left slings his arm over my shoulder in brotherly fashion. The muscles in my shoulders and back tightened, but I sought to look cool and unimpressed. "Oh no" I thought, "The Jesus people again--I can't seem to get away from them." As I contemplated this unexpected turn of events, Lonnie began to preach a gospel message with passion and plenty of happy hippy feeling. As I listened to the young preacher tell me how Jesus had died on the cross for me and was seeking me out like a lost sheep and all I needed to do was to open my heart to him and I'd be born again and have a whole new start in life because God loved me more that I could ever imagine, and loved me even no matter how many sins I'd committed and if I were to come to Jesus He would put a whole new plan for my life into effect if only I'd open my heart and invite Him to come in and be my Lord and Savior. I was unmoved and appeared, like I had for years carefully practiced appearing, aloof, skeptical and unmoved. I felt very out of place, here with all these Jesus People singing love songs to some Jesus I know had died two thousand years ago. The whole thing I considered to be completely absurd. I couldn't wait to get out of there. It wasn't to be. Someone who knew me from Poly High came up to me, threw his arms around me and exclaimed, "Denny, praise God!--it is so good to see you here brother!" That last statement irritated me greatly and I challenged him by informing him, "Hey, I just gave someone a ride here, I'm no part of this, I just happen to be here and don't know what in the hell all you people are so excited about."

Father's Day 1972 Revisited, Part 2: Clouds, Horses and a Plan

The mysterious beautiful guitar-strumming girl spoke to me. She told me her name was Cher--short for Sharon. She said she lived in the little house behind us with her mother and older sister. She talked of God. Her sister had recently become a Christian and now she too had come to Jesus and been born again as well. Of course I'd heard of and seen Jesus People before--had even argued with some of them in my senior year at continuation school. I softened my usual off-the-shelf anti-religion, anti-God handy arguments in an effort not to offend her and instead introduced her to my deeper, thoughtful, philosophical-seeker side. I listened to her tell of God's love and his sending Jesus and I in turn told her how, when I was in a cynical frame of mind, I didn't believe there was a God, but that sometimes, in a better mood and looking at the beauty of nature--especially a blue and cloudy sky--I felt like some sort of a Creator just might exist after all. I suppose I was desperate to find some common ground with her, no matter how small, so that this Jesus girl would not write me off and want nothing more to do with me.

The something we did have in common was horses. Her mother had a big Tennessee Walker and her sister had a Quarter Horse. They were all experienced riders. I was a novice, having just bought my first horse, a Palomino mare I'd named Joplin. Before long Cher and I had arranged to go on a ride together. This was the first time I'd ridden bareback--or barefoot. This was new to me--more like hippy horseback riding than cowboy style riding. As we leisurely walked our horses through a field of soft sandy soil, my horse paused and began pawing the dusty loam with her left front hoof. Before Cher could finish saying, "Hey, don't let her lay down" Joplin had rolled over on her side, I'd slid off her back and fond myself holding the reigns of a horse who was joyfully rolling back and forth in the soft soil, snorting with delight and creating a shallow bowl-like impression in the soft ground. While I was still trying to figure out what had just happened, Joplin decided that, since her itch was now sufficiently scratched, and she'd gotten enough tan powdery dust worked into her coat, she would get back on all fours and let us continue our afternoon ride. I picked up the crumpled bareback blanket from the ground and, with a leg-up assist from Cher, managed to get back atop Joplin's back. I was somewhat chagrinned and humbled; I know Cher got a good laugh over my little equine behavior surprise, as I suspect Joplin did as well.

On our horseback ride I learned that Cher's sister was a singer in a new Christian church-based group named Koinonia who had just released an album. I could tell she was proud of her sister, but I sensed a little sibling rivalry there as well, especially since both of them played guitar and sang. Even as I was becoming increasingly attracted to her, I learned that Cher had a serious relationship with a young man who considered them as good as engaged. Of course this new information only made the Unobtainable all the more deeply desirable to me.

I'd only known her a few weeks and, living only a few houses apart, we had not exchanged phone numbers. I would often walk past her house hoping she'd be sitting out on the lawn playing her guitar and indeed I often did find her there, under the same little tree where we'd first exchanged words and first made eye contact. These walks allowed me to stroll over as if I'd just happened to pass by on my way somewhere. The first time I got up the nerve to ask, in a very offhand way so as to protect my ego, "Do you want to go get a Coke or something later this evening?" Her reply was, "OK, but do you think you could give me a ride to church too? There's a service tonight at seven." "Sure, why not? Where is it?" I asked. "It's in Riverside--at All Saints Episcopal." "OK, I know where it's at, I'll pick you up about six-thirty." I didn't show it, but I was a bit flummoxed. My folks had been members of that church in the 50's and we'd gone there most every Sunday back then--before my dad left mom for a younger woman in 1965. I knew it as a formal, rather stuffy, upper-crust sort of place. I'd sit there on the hard old wood pew, in my starched white long-sleeved shirt and clip-on bow tie and look at the big brown wood beam work up by the ceiling as a voice far up front intoned something like, "We most humbly thank and praise Thee, Almighty and Gracious Gawd, for Thy exceedingly great and precious gifts which Thou, in Thine great mercy and compassion, hast so lovingly bestowed upon us..." I just could not imagine this Jesus Person girl, with her bell-bottom jeans going to that church. On the other hand, it didn't really matter much why she went there--the important thing was that I'd be with her for a precious half-hour as we drove there. That's what really mattered. I really didn't want to go to a church service there though. I came up with a plan...

Father's Day 1972 Revisited, Part 1: The Beginning; a Summer, a Sunrise, a Seduction Begun

My very first memory is of being lost and alone in a thunderstorm at the age of four, but I will not start there. I will begin at age twenty-one, in 1971. I'd just been released from Banning Road Camp after serving 66 days of a 90-day sentence for violating the terms of my probation. The specific term I'd violated stipulated that I not be arrested while on probation. The court took note that I had gotten myself arrested in Seal Beach for possession of marijuana. This was not my first scrape with the law and my father was concerned about the trajectory my life had been taking of late.

That is why, upon my release from the Road Camp at Banning, I was met by my dad and my brother, Skip. From Banning the three of us drove to the nearby San Jacinto Mountains for a few days of camping. At the conclusion of our Father-sons camp-out, the plan was that I go live with my dad, his new wife and her three kids on their little half-acre horse ranch situated in Mira Loma, only about 7 miles from Riverside where I'd been raised.

I had not been on good terms with my dad for the previous ten years, and for the past few had been living on my own in several different So-Cal locations, most recently Seal Beach. So this new situation felt a bit strange, but at this stage in my life a change of this sort was a real ( but unrealized by me) godsend.

Enter the beautiful neighbor girl. I first saw her on a misty morning in May as she walked past our house on her way to school. I was intrigued and enchanted from the first. Her long, straight chestnut-brown hair and slim figure were the easily identifiable outer allurements which got my initial attention, but of course there was, in addition, that deep and difficult-to-pinpoint intangible something--was it something in her bearing?--which captivated me. In the next week or two I made a point of being where I could watch for her in the morning and evening hours when I knew she would be walking to or from school.

Although I'd seen her walk down our street, I had never seen which house she had come from. A week or so later, on a warm Saturday afternoon as I walked down the street I saw her sitting on her front lawn, playing a guitar (these were semi-rural properties with deep yards and no curbs or sidewalks). As painfully shy as I was, my feet seemed to instantly overrule me and walked right up to where she was sitting. I sat down and listened as she finished strumming and then somehow I found a voice and introduced myself. Unwittingly I had just set a tentative foot into one of God's cleaver and loving traps. To be continued...

Calvary Chapel(s) Then and Now

Lonnie Frisbee was preaching at Calvary Chapel Riverside when I first began going there in the summer of 1971. In the days ahead, I will be blogging about my experience there in the early 70s and also about Calvary Chapel Chino in the late 70s and early 80s. I am interested in contacting a few people from those days so, if you happen to know anyone who was involved in either church back then please send them to this site or have them contact Allen "Denny" Randall at First Presbyterian Church of San Diego.

Here in the Lap of Luxury

As I pulled my socks on this morning it hit me once again--I live like a king and am surrounded by luxuries galore! Here I sit, my feet luxuriating in clean soft white cotton socks casually tossing words out into a peaceful little cyber-pond like some monarch reclining on pillows and absentmindedly casting cherry pits into a lake. I have it all! A mere few steps from where I sit, a pair of servants patiently await my wishes. One with a bucket of clean, fresh cold water, and a companion who stands at the ready with steaming hot water for my every need. On the other side of this very wall is a room which half the world would likely walk a hundred miles to find, for it is filled with the finest food from around the world: grains of all kinds, exotic fruits, nuts and spices. Fresh crisp vegetables of all sorts, different kinds of oils, sauces and dressings, each with a different and delightful flavor. Oh my--I see the time has arrived for me to take my royal carriage to town and attend to some court affairs. This will therefore have to be continued another time, for I have but begun to innumerate the many luxuries which fill our dear castle here. Until then, adieu...

This Day

Thank you Lord for granting me yet another day of life. Let me have and express gratitude for everyone and everything I experience today. Save me from the hurry and distractions which would blind me to who and what you would want me to see today. Father, may I be a blessing in some way to each person I encounter, even those I pass on my way from here to there. In the midst of the city help me to be mindful of your creation all around--the sun, sky, trees, birds and every living thing. Please help me to order my thoughts such that my mind will not be filled with clutter and clamor, but instead will follow the threads of thought which lead to true wisdom and understanding. Let my words today be measured, thoughtful and loving so that I may encourage those who are weary and discouraged. May I use the gift of this day to draw closer to you and to bring you glory. May it be so.

Comment Goose Eggs and a Mother Hen Blogger

You'd think I was watching for eggs to hatch. In the hours and days after I've laid a--I mean written a post, I'm checking, checking, checking to see if anyone has read or had any response to it. Perhaps I need to get up, rustle my feath--I mean edit it a bit to coax it to life. Now whole days have gone by and the goose egg sits there with not even the slightest little crack appearing. Oh you poor little post, no one has anything to say about you. You have apparently delighted no one nor roused any-one's ire. I suppose it is the same principle in action as the watched pot. The funny thing is, people have given me feedback in person to some of my posts, indicating which ones they've read or enjoyed. This is gratifying but still... I just can't stop fretting over those goose eggs. Perhaps I should simply chalk all this fretting up to New Blogger Syndrome. I need more patience and to be content to let some of these little posts fend for themselves and garner comments--or not--as they deserve and as time goes by. What do you think? Want to hatch an--I mean, leave a comment?

Memorial Day Confession

I am a reformed/repentant pacifist. During the Viet-Nam war I was a passionate and proud follower of Gandhian pacifism. I not only dodged the draft, but made a personal cause-celeb of fighting the draft in a dramatic and public fashion. My hometown (Riverside) paper featured an article about my plans to refuse induction into the armed services. A Los Angeles based draft attorney and I had dreams of taking an appeal of my case as far up the judicial chain as possible, perhaps to the supreme court. He was a real ACLU-style attorney, motivated more by ideology than money (For his services I payed him one Fender Jazz Bass guitar).

From 1968 to 1970 I worked at organizing anti-war activities at my high school, attended meetings of the Students for a Democratic Society, joined the Peace and Freedom Party and marched in massive anti-war demonstrations. I can still hear the chants of "Ho, Ho, Ho-Che-Min--the Viet Cong are going to win!" David Harris came to our city and his speech convinced me to return my draft card to the draft board and to refuse induction if drafted. I was duly drafted and, after moving to the revolution's mecca, Berkley, I refused induction at the Oakland Induction Center. After doing so I was shunted to a little side room where a kindly FBI agent, in his 60s with graying grandfatherly hair and very calm demeanor, asked me, "Son, do you realize the seriousness of what you're doing, and the 5-year prison term you will serve if you are convicted?" I told him I did and politely declined his invitation to change my mind. The indictment and trial I so eagerly looked forward to never did materialize. It seems the courts were so clogged with similar cases they were only taking a few high-profile ones in order to make an example of them. I felt cheated, ignored and disrespected. That calm conversation with the nice FBI man was the last dealing I was ever to have with the U.S. government regarding my draft case.

As a pacifist I of course had a great and profound love for all humanity (in the abstract) but also great (righteous) hatred of whole swaths of it in reality: the evil U.S. government--and all who loved or supported it; the military; capitalism; the police, the wealthy; all Republicans, right-wingers and Christians, along with most main-line Democrats. These all were summed up as The Establishment. For those who have not indulged in this sort of spiritually delicious hatred, it's pleasure is difficult to describe. Its main intoxicant for us revolutionaries was the way it made one feel so pure and morally superior to one's enemies. And not them only, but also all the common folks who could not see with our enlightened clarity the evil of the whole American enterprise.

The reformation of my thinking as it regards pacifism has taken some time and has a number of causes--which I will leave for some future post. Here I will only note that I can now, thirty-nine years later, observe Memorial Day with deep appreciation and gratitude for all the warriors who fell in battle. Whose lives were given for a country which treated me so gently when I was railing against it. It was difficult for me to let go of my pacifist/Gandhian identity--for it was a very important aspect of how I understood myself and how I wanted others to see me. It was also a sacrifice to say goodbye to my cherished hatreds and ideological righteousness. They were heady but adolescent pleasures, and so had to be left behind. This Memorial day I am at peace with my anti-war past. Although I judge my actions from back then quite differently now, I am neither proud nor ashamed of them. They have been given a decent and properly respectful burial under a shady tree which watches over a little green field in my soul. That revolutionary young man may not have died in battle, but he did die. He had to lose his life--in order to find it.

Vanity Press, Blogging & Poetry

I hate to admit it, but I suppose blogging is the ultimate vanity press. Nonetheless, some legitimate authors, such as my friend John Shore, are prolific bloggers. I myself am anything but legitimate as an author, having authored nothing, save this little blog--which about 6 people have set eyes upon. This is where the vanity aspect comes in.

I began blogging simply because it was so simple to set up. I had been sent to a blog [cindyred60.blogspot.com/] by its author and, wanting to leave a comment (Note to my readers: You need to leave a comment on blogs you read--don't just be a troll!) Anyway, I'd read her blog and wanted to leave a comment. To do so, I had to register. In the process of registering, I was invited to "build a Blog." So I selected one of the templates offered and began. I filled in some heading and, before I knew it, Bodda-bing, bodda-boom, blogspot informed me, "your blog is now published." At that point, I saw I needed to add a post, which I did--post haste! (See my first post, DON'T Do Random Acts of Kindness). That was what got the whole blogalicious thing started.

Once I saw my, wow--actual bi-line in print, online, I was, of course, instantly hooked and thinking I was, kind-of-like, well, "published." Of course I was no such thing. Being published means that some legitimate real publisher believes he can sell what you've written to enough people to make you and the publishing company a decent profit. Obviously, blogging is a million miles from being "a published author." Yet--yet--it has the illusion of being "published." That's why, after my email marketing campaign (sending an announcement to my family and Friends in my contacts list) I was anxious to see if anyone had left a comment or had became a "follower." How thrilled I was when I got the first comment on my very first post! Wow--success--someone, it didn't matter who, actually read something I wrote and left a comment!

Much to my (spiritual) chagrin, I still have a very active ego that needs/seeks stroking--in the form of affirmation of my creative effort(s). That, I suppose, is at the heart of all vanity publishing and, now that I think of it, a good deal of legitimate publishing. as well. Vanity publishing is a sad enterprise if ever there was one. My dad used a vanity publisher to print a book about his career as a Physician's Assistant. He actually had an interesting story and, with a ghost writer, may have eventually interested a real publisher. As it was, he wrote a book and paid a vanity publisher to print x number of copies. I'm glad he did. It motivated him, and let him share important aspects of his life with family and friends.

It is late Saturday evening. I have much more to say and can/will say it better in a day or two.... stayed tuned for our We'll Publish Your Poem Contest!

The Miracle of 1950

You haven't heard of it? Well, I suppose I really can't blame you for not knowing about the miracle of 1950. How could you have known? You would have had to have been in Minneapolis Minnesota that year, in a particular delivery room, on the 23rd of May, to have seen it with your own eyes. I happened to have been there, but my recollection of that day seems for some reason quite fuzzy. My mom has a much more vivid memory of the event. Most parents, even non-religious, will attest to experiencing some sense of the miraculous at the birth of their children. It's as if for one moment the cursed veil of having-gotten-used-to-everyday-life-and-taking-it-all-for-granted falls away and we see with Eden wide eyes the marvel of a being coming into being. We see one small suddenly Someone appearing as if by divine decree and taking our breath away by the mere fact of his or her existence. A bloody, slippery, bawling, wrinkly miracle. That was me. That's the miracle of 1950 I ponder, at least for a while, every year as the month of May approaches.

You too, dear reader, are an improbable miracle. For God brought you and me into being with an eternal purpose aglow in his Fatherly heart. As George MacDonald puts it, that purpose can be summed up in a name--your name. But it is not that name you were given at birth, but your true name. The name alluded to in Revelation: "And I will give to each one a white stone, and on the stone will be engraved a new name that no one understands except the one who receives it." [ Rev. 2:17] MacDonald comments: "The true name is one which expresses the character, the nature, the being, the meaning of the person who bears it. It is the man's own symbol,--his soul's picture, in a word,--the sign which belongs to him and to no one else. Who can give a man this, his own name? God alone. For no one but God sees what the man is, or even, seeing what he is, could express in a name-word the sum and harmony of what he sees. To whom is this name given? To him that overcomes. When is it given? When he has overcome. Does God then not know what a man is going to become? As surely as he sees the oak which he put there lying in the heart of the acorn. Why then does he wait till the man has become by overcoming ere he settles what his name shall be? He does not wait; he knows his name from the first. ...It is only when the man has become his name that God gives him the stone with the name upon it, for then first can he understand what his name signifies. It is the blossom, the perfection, the completion, that determines the name; and God foresees that from the first, because he made it so; but the tree of the soul, before its blossom comes, cannot understand what blossom it is to bear... Such a name cannot be given until the man is the name." --George MacDonald, Unspoken Sermons,

Lord, help me to more fully reflect that name I will one day receive from you. Help me to overcome all the influences which would have me own some other, perhaps more accepted or respectable name. Thank you for granting to me the miracle of existence, of being, of life. May I be filled daily with gratitude and wonder as I grow into my new name during this, my 59th year. Amen

Being (Upsidedown) and Nothingness (from B of A)

Yes, I am a real estate genius. I can make this claim because of the amazing and exquisite precision with which I can sense market conditions. Back in 2005 everyone else was guessing, wrongly, that the market would be going up forever, or, if not forever then at least for the rest of all our lifetimes. They figured that in a very few years they'd be taking 100k in equity out every other week for things like adding an atrium to the 2,000 sq.ft. spare bathroom which was way overdue for its third makeover. Wrong. I had them all beat by a suburban mile! And its all because my super market-sensitive gut gurgled up to my brain the message, "buy!" at the exact moment the market topped out. That happened on Midnight of the day we inked the escrow papers. In fact, if you were to look at a graph of real estate values in San Diego for the past ten years, you'd see an asterisk atop the almost-off-the-chart peak in 2005. The corresponding asterisk at the bottom of the page informs, "Randalls buy."

So here we are four years later and our little (576 sq. ft.) condo has lost so much value I'm thinking of offering it to the guy who collects cans in our alley. Several good trips to the recycler and he'd have enough for the down payment. Heck, I'd even help him. Perhaps he'd be interested in becoming a "flipper." In fact, he could buy it at its current market value--the equivalent of about 95,000 aluminium cans--and then sell it back to us, say for 105,000 aluminum cans, and turn a tidy little profit. We then would have neatly readjusted our mortgage to reflect reality. Hey--looks like I'm a re-fi genius too!

More updates in the months ahead as we seek to charm the "people" at B of A into the idea of a short sale. Currently their lips are sealed because we've somehow offended them by not missing any payments.

Coming soon, The Miracle of 1950!

59 years ago It happened-stop- More to follow this weekend-stop- I'll keep you posted-stop-You heard the man, STOP already!

Meet My Beloved GKC

G.K. Chesterton—Manalive!

"If there were no God, there would be no atheists."
“You cannot grow a beard in a moment of passion."
“The decay of society is praised by artists as the decay of a corpse is praised by worms."

Quotes like these gave me an intellectual itch to read more from the wit who penned them. Let me tell you the story of how I so happily came to scratch that itch and, in the process, added another character to the pantheon of dead folks I’ve come to think of as friends and acquaintances.

Brian, the owner of Adams Avenue Books, seemed as excited as a kid hearing the ice cream truck when I told him I had yet to read any G.K. Chesterton and asked, “could you recommend which book I should try first?” As he took me upstairs he began to go on and on about what a wonderful and witty writer Chesterton was and even telling me stories from Chesterton’s life as if he were some beloved but eccentric relative. Beaming at me like a grandma offering her grandson freshly baked cookies, Brian held up two rather thick books and suggested, “Give Heretics a try—it’s a real hoot!” Now I’m beginning to wonder if the book business has perhaps pushed Brian over the edge and whether I really want to tackle Chesterton after all. Yet my curiosity got the better of me and I left the bookshop with both Heresy and Orthodoxy—along with some of Chesterton’s Father Brown stories. As I crossed the store’s threshold and emerged onto a sun-splashed Adams Avenue, I felt as if I had, in some fashion, just made Brian’s day. I also had a vague suspicion that I’d just taken my first steps into some quirky Chestertonian brotherhood. I had.

Chesterton has changed the way I look at life, God and myself. He’s taught—no, he’s re-taught me—to view life and creation with proper childlike wonder. He did this by introducing me to the wonderful Mr. Innocent Smith. You can meet him too. He resides between the covers of the delightful little novel, Manalive. In Heresy and Orthodoxy Chesterton showed me the connection theology has to philosophy and, indeed everything in life. This too has changed the way I see the world. Regarding the way I look at myself, Chesterton has taught me to take myself—and life--less seriously. He has also taught me to take them both more seriously. If you think what I’ve just said is some sort of strange paradox which doesn’t seem to make much sense, you’d be half right. It is a strange paradox; and paradox was Chesterton’s favorite tool for opening his reader’s mind to those truths which timid conventional thinking has kept them from seeing. As Chesterton himself said so well, “He is a very shallow critic who cannot see an eternal rebel in the heart of a conservative."

Speaking of eternal rebels, perhaps it was my ever-active inner rebel who inspired me to begin the Chesterton Cigar Club a few years back. This was right when the anti-smoking puritans were hiking tobacco taxes and driving smokers from the very last nooks and crannies of the workplace. I only mention the the illustrious CCC with the happy intention of spreading its fame and perhaps, like a good fisher-of-men, enticing some fellow smoker to join us for our monthly meetings.