I'm really enjoying my return to the family farm. There are lots of mud swallows this year, and lots of the mosquitoes they eat. They are fast birds, I still have a lot to learn about photographing them, but I have been happy with my initial results.




I couldn't decide which of these I liked better, the balanced picture or the hi-contrast. Which do you prefer?
Click them for full screen!

Stuff like this happens in college

Rain is not gravel plopping &
rolling
Not a child's bead
kit
somehow story-retold
spinning in the
air
isn't coins being sorted
uncleaned into
sacks by
loud machines, gray machines
like clouds.
Looking up, drops shine down
back the way they came
too small to see, the long long
fall
Size. Silent. Clouds.
You know
that noise on
boards.

A four-section poem of reflection after reading the 16th chapter of The 5000 Year Leap:

Empire of Liberty
Where purpose ripples through
the laws incorporate
and kindnesses individual Each
fit for their spheres.

The rampart nation
steeled to a code
Resolute.
Within the channels of law / vast tracts of freedom are preserved,
Wherein men may act as good as gods sharing what they safe-ly possess.

It is man that is broken; needing a fence of rules at every turn,
Separated in his thoughts away from all around,
A selfish ingrown will.
Mankind - willing to tread on the fingers of his brother,
each reaching for individual satisfaction.
Even the best visions of law only show the callow colors of our motivation.

I await the perfect leader
healing he will bring
we'll act in righteous pro-duc-tivity
in hope for life of perfected thought - I wait
here speaking from the shadows.

Some food thoughts

There is much for me to discover when pay close attention during my experiences. I have found it very hard to resist eating candy bars out of the vending machines at school. I try not to, since they cost 85 cents and are a part of an unbalanced diet. Buying cheap candy from stores is also ineffective, because it is then available all the time and I usually eat it up too quickly. Today I didn’t bring a lunch and subsequently spent 2.60 on vended items and 2.05 on frozen yogurt. $4.65 is a pretty bad score for what I got. The opposition to this is taking the time to make my own food. If I’m going to take the effort, I put in a little more and end up with toasted homemade bread, meat I prepared toasted cheeses, pickles, olives, and there are plenty of microwaves to warm up what I bring. And overall, its cheaper. To tip things even further, this last candy bar wasn’t even tasty, its strident sweetness and clumsy flavors made me glad to wash it off of my tongue with a bottle of drinking fountain water. So why do I like vending machines? It is the experience, which I need to find a remedy for. Vending machines only draw when I am hungry. They are both conveniently near, but not everywhere on campus, usually I have to go at least half a building or one and a half buildings to get to one. Then I need cash; not carrying any is a good way to make them inaccessible. Money as tokens (as opposed to plastic access cards) have weight, form, unique wear and markings for where and when they are made, so measuring out change is an information packed ritual. (I used to collect coins, and still look at them as items with a historical origin.) Then there is the participatory mechanics of putting the change into the machine, and pressing buttons. As a person who grew up in an age of personal electronics, pressing buttons means access, getting what I want, and having a voice. Button pressing is its own reward. Then the machine responds with a show, humming its motors, clattering the change in with the rest of its take, the spring shelving turns and down falls the brightly printed candy bar. I then get to push open the double flap and hold my prize. Having attained a Butterfingers, I can put it in my coat pocket and walk around until I find a good spot to sit and eat it.

Eating is the most disappointing part, it is not as enjoyable as getting. Afterwards I’m happy to be not-hungry, but other than satisfying a craving for sugar there is nothing else to experience, it all has passed. Perhaps what I need is to find better containers for my lunches. If they had a better experience than plastic tubs and aluminum foil, lunch could then rival the vending machines. Some container of porcelain, metal and enamel, something both functional and artistic, and complicated latches would be nice. Combination locks would be interesting. How about a temperature read out? Such a lunch box would be really striking. To be useful it would have to be a porcelain food dish that a metal lid latched around. The dish would be removable to be microwaved, and since custom made ceramics is beyond my knowledge, it should be a store bought dish. The metal lid could have a rubber gasket to transport wet things. The lid would have a band (links or a metal strip) that goes around the dish to clamp on tightly. The top and or bottom could be inlayed with wood.

Such a device would be limited next to the lightness of ubiquitous plastic, but if you can make such an item, do go for it.

Grady Houger

Allegiance

If my body is my own, I can do whatever I want to it. But if it is not my own, if there are liens against it, or allegiances that transcend individual autonomy, then I cannot rightfully pursue any course of behavior. Inappropriate actions against myself are then just as wrong as when done against another person, and exactly what is prohibited is a choice for those higher authorities to decide.

This gives grounds for regulation in matters of sexual conduct, suicide, physical upkeep, and use of time.

Thus categorically, a Christian is not authorized to follow any impulse that comes into their head. We are "free", unrestricted in body to think, speak and move as our mind wishes, and therein is a great dilemma, we are capable of doing far more than we ought. What we ought to do overlaps poorly with what we can do. Thus we must decide what we will do.

We should even think twice before saying "I". Not because we need a bizarre new symbol in its place (such as "this one"), but just to keep in mind the insistent philosophy of personal autonomy attached to saying "I will do this or that." We should not throw away the reality that we are each individual agents controlling the body we inhabit. The whole point to this is to remember our allegiance comes with both benefits and a duty to perform. we Christians are not our own. We where bought with a price. Its not the sort of price you can repay, then go do as you like, free from any oversight or restrictions. Its a price as in a positive value necessary to bring a sum out of the negative. It is like a essential component given where the lack meant utter destruction.

Therefore honor God with your body.