Happy Thanksgiving

A lot of people don't get nostalgic about Thanksgiving like I do. That is because it is so often looked right over. Cornered by Football season and a commercialized Christmas it doesn't stand much of a chance. Selfishly, that really doesn't bother me much, because I like to have the cozy uncommercialized feel that Christmas gets tainted with. The traditions are vague enough and few enough not to be thrown in your face. With Christmas, holy smokes, you can use anything. You've got songs, Santa, sleighs, snowflakes, wreaths, trees, lights, movies, stars, candles, red, green, angels, ornaments, plays, parties, books, trips, and traditions that can be scooped of and killed by the media. With Thanksgiving all they really have is a turkey to run across the television or newspaper. It's just a meal shared together where you are thankful. What a blessing that is. So to my small minority of faithful readers, I'm thankful for you. Have a Happy Thanksgiving.

Author

We completely shrug off and/or underestimate the enormous amount of power that comes with the authorship of something. An author's creation is his own to alter and control. An author is hardly bound by trivia like definitions or 'inconsistencies.' The author can rattle reality until all the leaves fall off. You can find no flaw in the story, because of that apastrophic punctuate that specks the word, author's.

It's his.

His.

Who wrote our story? Who is writing it as we speak? It was and is Almighty God. How can we hurl our man-strewn definitions at him like they are highly evolved. We don't understand we are offering them brazenly at the very one who invented anything conceptual. We'll say things like "My dear God, this grace you offer is hardly just to our actions, and yet you are a 'just' God, or so you say." I wish I could scoff and keep my conscience clear at such statements as that. God defines what it is to be just and we can't possibly bind him with all the Webster's in the world.

Nothing about God is argueable. You can dig up no dirt on Him. You can bring nothing alarming from His closet. You'll find that his slate is spotless, and his hands only dirtied by the ragamuffin children He holds so tightly in them.

But people are becoming arrogant. The age we live in now is cuddled in a great, big man-made quilt of technology. So much of what we see now is metal, plastic, and electrical. While formally, someone could bid you, "Look around you and see the beauty of God's creation," when we obey that command now we see skyscrapers, neon lights, computers, funiture, and other accessories that are far from than organic. Maybe that is what causes even we Christians to stop and say, "Oh yes Father, I forgot, YOU are the author of all this."

So a word to myself and all other readers to the divine story he now pens: Don't question or try to disprove the author, and marvel at his professional prose. Here's praying this has left you with a greater drive to submit to your Creator and the story and purpose He has all drafted out for your own personal...Classical Ride.

You Can't Take it With You (Part I)

The winner of 1938's Best Picture Award was Frank Capra's You Can't Take it With You. It starred Jimmy Stewart, Jean Arthur, Lionel Barrymore, and Edward Arnold. It revolves around the Sycamore family who, by some, are thought to be insane or abnormal, but by their plethora of friends and neighbors, only abnormal in recognition to their uncommon kindness and care for others. The theme of the Sycamore's happy home defies the envisionment of a twisted American Dream. While the outside world is wasting their entire life for hopes of financial success they are inside, not lazing, but working at what it is they love. For instance Grandfather collects stamps, his son-in-law and their former ice man make fireworks, the new clerk they adopted into their family makes toys and the like, a daughter dances, the mother writes plays, a son-in-law prints things, and the list goes on. Any guest is recieved with the utmost of hospitality.

This weekend found that utopian film coming to life before my eyes. At the last minute I decided to accompany my sister, her friend, and my mother on a trip that had little to do with me save my attempts to stay awake. The trip was actually for a small jewelry making experience for my traveling-mates and my invite only came with the fact they had eleven children. What would I find, but a brief stimulus of hyperactive children?...What indeed?

I'll tell you what with none too professional diction so as not to spoil the magic of it all. My arrival was greeted by two younger boys, an older boy and a mother. They explained to me with subtle introductions the structure of their piled up house, the chicken in one of the younger boys arm, and little else. As they gradually got more comfortable around me the explanations ranged from new games like a favorite of theirs, "Bases" and why 'kids' are goats and 'children' is the proper name for human young. I saw things like a four year old girl scaling a flagpole and swinging cheerfully on her rope that she got for her birthday. I played tag, and hide and seek, and Apples to Apples. I watched knife throwing videos. I learned how to make certain parts of jewelry in a room solely dedicated to that sort of thing (which is saying a lot with eleven children). I was educated on many a Christian band, namely: Audio Adrenaline, Newsboys, and D.C. Talk. I was offered three kinds of fruit and two kinds of juices. I was lent a 7 hour DVD on people who found Christ in strange ways. I was given the names and distinctions between many, many cats who all looked the same shade of gray to me. I was offered puns I could not solved. I was made to guess names and ages. I was given a ride in a tub down a creek. I was informed about "Papa's" and other siblings hike in the Appalachian mountains. I was made known to family reunions that rent out entire hotels for the some 200 close relatives. I was smiled at, accepted, and amongst a brilliant group of minds who knew what it was to be happy. When we left, the entire family that was there stood as we pulled out and waved. Every single one of them. All with a priceless smile on their faces.

Yes indeed. People like the Sycamores truly exist and they are my favorite sort.

Loyalty

Undeniably my favorite virtue to find in people. Fierce, unshakable, and unashamed loyalty. Merriam-Webster calls it "unswerving allegiance." There's a beautiful feeling in the knowledge one can be depended on. Here are a five qualities of loyalty.

1. Loyalty is not always mutual- Sometimes a truly loyal person has to put there own betrayal aside and stay true regardless of whether or not the other party took on the same position. It's best exemplified with Naval Captain Stephen Decatur's quote, "Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong" or Civil War General Carl Schurz's elaboration, "My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right" Look at it as a friend instead of a country here "...may she always be in the right, but our friend right or wrong." This does not mean you are accepting their behavior? Of course not! Which is why I like the add on of Schurz "...if right, to be kept right; if wrong, to be set right." Loyalty will be relentless in setting things right, no matter how much itself is wronged.

2. Loyalty is not ashamed- This is almost inserted as my soap box. It bugs me to no end to see those who will gladly act as your equal while you are alone, but when you both branch out among the powers that be, they will scarcely look in your direction or will sometimes even demean you. How unfortunate is the denial of a friend for fame, because one is more lasting than the other and I can assure you it isn't renown or fleeting popularity. Please all who read here, do not ever deny a friend, because they are priceless. Stay true and you will be rewarded.

3. Loyalty is selfless- It is on multiple occasions in the greatest show on earth, The Andy Griffith Show, that shrewd Sherriff Andy Taylor will rescue his Deputy Barney Fife from ever-impending embarassment. One of my favorite instances is where Andy and girlfriend Helen Crump find themselves trapped inside a cave. They eventually find there way out only to find that Barney has organized a search party. Instead of saying well he'll get over it eventually, they were both quick to change back into there dirtied clothes and hurry back into the cave to wait for his rescue. Also among his loyalties are turning down exclusive clubs that would not accept his socially un-savvy buddy and capturing a crook that Barney clumsily released in the first place and bestowing the credit to him instead of taking it for his own to save Barney's pride. This kind of loyalty is the most extreme. This is going the distance. This is being loyal far beyond just the person as the are, but to their feelings and each thing that affects them. It puts all personal gain aside for salvation of another in whatever way is at stake. (For more thoughts on T.V. shows, see http://theclassicmc.blogspot.com/2009/05/television-shows.html).

4. Loyalty is defensive- It isn't enough for a loyal person to stand my and cheer no matter how unshakeably they do so. Being a fan is only a sub-category of true loyalty. The real friend is in the battle hurdling antithesis at each degrading blow. Loyalty does not allow others to be hurt and will not be shy in making there opinion known on the matter. Consider the dog. Often a symbol for loyalty. Does a dog when his master is beset, merely stand by and bark? You and I both know that a faithful dog would gladly tear the assailants head off without any concern with personal safety.

5. Loyalty is constant- It does not take off days. It isn't only loyal when it is convenient for itself. When people argue against the contraversial theory of a innate Moral Law, there can be a dialogue that goes back and forth as follows: "How, sir, can you say there is no Moral Law when people do things, at times, that are good without any personal gain?" "Well to that I will say this, they do it at times to attract a mate who might be impressed with such virtuous chivalry and therefore there is personal gain." (This argument is discussed in further detail in C.S. Lewis's book Mere Christianity). You see loyalty cannot be like one who is trying to fish in a Gent or Damsel. It might be selfishly beneficial to fish in a mate for a time, but when a day comes where it pays to deny it is "so long Sally." No it must be present in the most unpleasant scenarios.

So there you have my favorite trait, I promise you Proverbs 19:22 speaks truth in saying, "Loyalty makes a person attractive." (NLT)

Anti-Climatic...Wise Man (Men) III

My life lacks climax in almost every highlight. Maybe not so much climax as distinction. Situations just enter onto my stage production without cue or fizzle off without closure. There is no mounting crescendo to introduce a pivotal point in my life. Not even an F and F-sharp combo that a cinematic shark is found worthy of. No tears are shed and no curtains are drawn as another era dies off from my story. Oh how this sort of gig cheapens the plot.

I can honestly say I hate how my biggest realizations come as little back thoughts with little room for monument. Rue the day I would ever achieve fame, for a biographer would have an unholy time recording landmark times in my life. The reason is there is no memory of them.

All of a sudden I'm reminded of one of my favorite movies, The Prestige. It tells the stories of two rivalling magicians and their obsessed quest to best the other. An important thing to know about their contest is their specialties. Where one is truly magnificent magician the other has a knack for showmanship that the first lacks. It strikes me as highly correlative to the human race and their own personal purposes. There are those who do as much good and are little recognized and those that have showmanship (which isn't necessarily bad, after all it does attract attention). The first of these two types might go about making there difference one person at a time while the other outlines Project Change-the-World with propaganda, advertisement, and all. Though I stick to this, that neither are wrong, I do believe greater reward comes with the first because of this scripture from Matthew 6:5,6 "When you pray, don’t be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth, that is all the reward they will ever get. But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father, who sees everything, will reward you." Because it is not publicised it becomes irrelevant and is lost.

But it truly bugs me. Not that it is not recognized, but that I have no past to brace myself on (though it also helps with I cannot excuse either). All I have is right now and that is fleeing fast. It seems like things are happening before I know it. My memoirs have followed the pattern of my very first landmark, birth, and stayed stupidly unsure of what just happened. It just...happened.*

It is possible you are thinking, "Why, this matters even less than the mediocre high points of your life that you so failed to remember." Well there, sir or madam, I would say you are wrong. Two different wise men have bequeathed to me this belief to percolate into my solvent-like brain. The first made it clear to me in a church sermon that "Your [my] story will make other people believe." The second was witness and testifier to the fact that our story is the greatest message we can give to people. He taught that my story was a gift to minister to others. These things I believe.

So without the parade or the bugle's sound I'm left lost in a shadowy past of trivia. What then will I do to bring distinction to things. In this case vague is ugly. I don't like it. I suppose it remains but to rally the scribes and hullabaloo in order to keep record so that I too may have a story to tell.

*Nothing omitted, ellipses are purely for emphasis.