The Final Countdown

10 Days. Well, 9 days, because my last day will be "Zero Day".

The plan: I'm going to have a theme for each of my final ten days of work. For the sake of fun and boredom, I'll write a short blog post about each day.

Deal? Deal.

9 Days - Health Insurance Day

It's safe to say I know just about nothing about health insurance. Or should I say, I knew just about nothing about health insurance. That was before Health Insurance Day.

First, let me say that I have some problems with insurance. I just don't like the idea that I'm paying for protection against something that might never happen. It just bothers me.

However, I'm a good American citizen, and I understand that part of being a good American citizen is being insured. And I've had some cavities filled that I know I wouldn't have wanted to pay for in full, so, I get it. In just a little while, I'll need to purchase my own health insurance plan, and that means I need to be informed.

My first order of business was to email my friend Clay. Clay sells insurance, and I trust him. That seems like a good place to start. I tell Clay that I'm looking for two things - decent coverage and low cost. Clay puts together a little plan for me, and that's when I realize just how uneducated I am when it comes to health insurance. What's co-insurance? What's a deductible?

Next stop: Wikipedia.

Wikipedia is the ultimate source for basic information on just about anything, and it delivers the goods on health insurance. Before I know it, I've got some of the lingo down, and I know what I'm looking for. I check out some quotes online, make some comparisons, and compose another email to Clay with some questions about things like co-pay and premiums. And we're off.

I didn't buy an insurance plan yesterday, and I've still got some things to consider. But it was a good start.

Mission accomplished.

Halfway There

"For his dream of the future was real and never to be destroyed, and he had said, 'I will go,' and that made a real thing too. To determine to go and to say it was to be halfway there."

John Steinbeck - The Pearl

I recently made a big decision. It was one of those decisions on either side of which you define your life as "pre-" and "post-". And it was a long process -- an eight-months-long process, and probably longer if you think about everything that led me to this point.

An interesting thing happened about a week or two before I "sealed the deal". I started having these conversations with friends and acquaintances that went something like this: "Hey, have you made a decision yet?" "As soon as I can admit to myself that this is what I want, I'll make the decision." My mind was made up, but I was afraid to speak it.

I think that's how most of my decisions go. I know what I want long before I say it or commit to it. Because saying it gives it life. Once something is spoken, it is alive. It is real, and it has life. And you can't control it anymore. You can only respond to it.

Like Steinbeck says, our thoughts and dreams are real. But speaking them into the world is the hard part.

Because now I'm halfway there.

Set This Hope In Me

If you tear me a part, will you put me back together?

If I'm overcome with grief, sweat spilling down my brow, will you comfort me?

If my heart, tormented with the sorrow of not knowing, longs to be put together again, will you find all that's lost?

If I begin to believe I'm alone, unlovable, unwanted, will you whisper to me?

If destruction is the path set in front of me, will you walk it with me?

If I'm scared, and I can't say it, can't express it, can't understand it, will you set light in my eye?

If my back has broken from this burden of shame that I have strung around my neck, will you carry it?

Will you release me?

Will you heal me?

Will you set me free?

Come. For I know you have, and you are, and you will.

For I rise with you. And I will let you hold me up. This destruction...this destruction is beauty.

For today we rise.

benjamin

This Day in History

Hands down, the telephone has to be one of the most influential inventions of all time.

Think about it. One day, you're writing a letter that will take days to get to your friend. The next day you punch a few numbers into a receiver, and you can talk with someone miles away as if she's sitting right next to you.

All of a sudden, communication becomes easier. Business happens faster. Plans can be made only minutes in advance. Breaking up with boyfriends or girlfriends becomes less awkward.

Lately, you hear a lot about the "connected" or the "plugged in" world. In our society, if you don't have a cell phone you are in the minority. In fact, I haven't even used a land line in my home since living in the dorms in college. I email. I text. I call. I blog.

Anyone can get a hold of me at any minute. Not only can they get a hold of me, it's expected that I will be available at any minute. If someone doesn't answer the phone when you call, send a text. If the the text isn't answered, send an email.

I don't think things are too different today than they were at any other time in history. The telephone, just like the letter and the text and the carrier pigeon and the dashes and dots, means this: We need each other. We need to be connected to others. We want to be connected to others. We want to relate and interact with one another. We like the feeling of being loved when we hear the voice of a friend. When the phone rings, it means someone is thinking about you. Even if it is a telemarketer.

But still, there is something about presence that can't be replaced. Something is lost in translation over the telephone. It's not the same as having someone physically right there with you. There is no body language. There is no eye contact. Things become even fuzzier with text-messaging. You can't pick up on sarcasm or accents. A phone call, or email, or text, just isn't enough.

Which is why on this very day in 1876, when Alexander Graham Bell placed the world's first phone call to his assistant, Thomas Watson, he said this:

"Mr. Watson, come here! I want to see you!"

-Dave

For All

Is this the taste of humanity?

"All I can say now is that something small but unforgettable happened inside me as the result of that chance meeting--some small flickering out of the truth that, in the long run, there can be no real joy for anybody until there is joy finally for us all..."

Do we hold this inside? The longing for one another. The longing for myself.

To taste joy. To at last shrug off the weight of carrying a tired body in a tired world.

And to know that you are coming with me, you, and you, and me. A joy for all.

ben

Ashes to Ashes

Remember:

From dust you came,

Have you ever watched someone make pottery? Maybe create pottery is a better term. Then again, potters call it "throwing". And it is throwing, because it's very physical. It takes all of you to make a good pot.

A couple weeks ago I had the opportunity to watch someone throw pottery. Kyle took me to his studio at the University of Washington where he is a ceramics major. He got all dressed up in his coveralls and hauled a bucket full of used clay over to a table where he smacked it into a thin layer to let it dry.

Then Kyle took some other clay and did this thing called "wedging". Basically, you find some open space - for him, it was the ground - and you sort of knead the clay for a while. Vigorously. It's supposed to get any air bubbles out and ease the creating process later. So you get down on the ground, on your knees, and you work the clay. You throw it against the ground and you beat the air bubbles out of it.

After that, Kyle carefully made a ball and put it on the wheel. The wheel is difficult. You have to learn it, know it. It takes a combination of skill, gentleness, and strength. In his words, "You could take the biggest, baddest football player, and he'd be huffing and puffing by the end of it and not have anything to show for it." It takes your whole body - your back and your hips and your arms, legs, head, shoulders. You really have to get into the process.

Then he kicked on the wheel, and the ball started spinning. He added water to his hands and to the ball of clay, and he started into it. Just like that, there was a divot in the middle of the ball. Then, just like that, it had a shape. The clay looked like it was rising out of itself, or rising out of Kyle's hands. It's a delicate process as much as it is a brute process.

As Kyle explained to me what he was doing on the wheel, he spoke as if the clay were a living creature. He would say things like "It doesn't want to cooperate" or "You have to know what the clay wants" and later, "It's getting tired. Might be time to stop."

And I watched him nod his head, because throwing clay is rhythmic. You nod your head as the clay spins and you get a feel for where the lumps and imperfections are and you apply pressure the next time it comes around. You learn the clay, and you join it and guide it.

The story of God creating humans out of the clay of the earth hit me with more clarity than I've ever had before. God got involved. Because making humans is a very physical thing. He knelt down on the ground and plunged both of his arms deep into the earth. He dug out a heap of sledge, put it on the floor, and he began to create. He smacked out the air bubbles and kneaded us. He carefully rolled us up into a ball. He put us on the wheel. He used his skill and his strength and he joined us in rhythm. He joined us. He used his arms and his back and his legs and hips. It's a delicate process as much as it is a brute process. And he listened to us, to each unique piece of pottery. He spoke of us as if we were a living creature.

And then, in a way that not even the most expert potter could do, God breathed into us. After watching the effort that goes into throwing pottery, I wonder if the breath God breathed into us was a breath of exhaustion. I think it might have been. Like a breath of release after you've concentrated and worked really hard at something, after you've really put yourself into something. Like you've given that thing part of yourself.

When he was finished, Kyle took off his coveralls. His clothes were damp with the effort of creation. And God rested.

And to dust

You shall return

Kyle threw any extra scraps back into his bucket to dry. He scraped the muck off of the wheel, and he picked up little slivers of clay off of the floor. Every bit.

The bits and pieces of sludge aren't thrown away, though. They wait in that bucket until it's time to make something again. Then you take those pieces and you mash them together. You put them back on the table. You wedge them on the floor. You form them into a ball, and you put them on the wheel. And then, one day, you begin again to create another unique piece of art out of the scraps of life.

We're Back...For Now

Ryan is a good friend of ours. He recently spent a few months in Ecuador, and now he's vagabonding around Kansas and the rest of the country. He also goes by Ry-man.

More Than Words

Have you sat in front of people that just did not talk? Like you’re two feet away from there and they’re just staring off into the distance. They’re not in a hurry. They’re not going oddly slow. They’re just sitting there. Little whispers here and there. A grimace; a smile; a playful kick to the ankle.

Is it weird? It is meant to be? What if they’re just enjoying their time together? Maybe their connection is deeper than words. Maybe they’re just enjoying each other’s presence. Maybe that’s how relationship with God needs to be.

There is something to be said about an intimate experience with the Lord where nothing is said. Mother Theresa was asked what she says when she prays. She said, ‘nothing, I just listen to God.’ ‘What does God say,’ was the following question. ‘Nothing, He just listens to me.” Perhaps that is the way to relate to the creator of the universe. The One who is not in the earthquake, fire or wind, but rather in the still quiet whisper. To mature beyond the need for words and just to sit in each other’s presence. To allow the Presence and love of the Lord to wash over you like a babbling brook over a stone.

You know happens to that stone? Eventually it becomes smoother and smoother, and smaller and smaller, and then finally, after mountains of time the stone dissolves into nothing.

And the two become one.