Saturday, March 29, 2014

March 29, 2014 - A drive on the wild side

I had a great day with Aria today.  We got up early and left the house at 6:11.  We met some brothers from church, and drove to NJ to the Bishop's Storehouse.  This is a small warehouse that the church maintains.  It is filled with food for the needy.  Our task for today was to pick foodstuffs off the shelves and package and palletize them.  The pallets (based on the individual needs of specific families in our region) will be delivered to a central location in the Hudson Valley, and then the individual families who need the items will get them on Tuesday.  The 4 of us ended up filling 4 pallets about 6ft high with food - pears, flour, syrup, toothbrushes, hamburger, bread, cereal, milk, diapers.  Yeah.  All that good stuff.

We finished an hour early (it took us 3 hours instead of 4), and stopped by Wendy's for lunch on the way home.  Helping the poor makes me so thankful that I am in a position to give.  And aware, at the same time, that I may be on the receiving end someday, and grateful in advance for the those who will help me.  It's a really good feeling on many different levels.

We drove back to Beacon where one of the men lives, and then got back in my car.  We did a little shoe shopping, then saw the new Muppet movie. Just me and my teenage daughter.  She didn't want to see the latest YA fiction-based PG13 movie.  She wanted to see the Muppets Most Wanted.  Maybe part of that is knowing that I love the Muppets, maybe she just wants to see it, maybe she just wants to spend time with me.  I'm grateful for all of it, whatever mix there might be.  The movie was good - the cameo at the end was the best for me.  I won't spoil it for you, but I will say the cameos in this movie are the best of any Muppet movie I've seen (except for maybe that Gregory Hines bit in one of the early ones).  Not my favorite Muppet movie, but not my least favorite, either.

We left the Fishkill Regal 10, and there's a Famous Footwear there.  So we did some more shoe shopping.  She loves boots, and wanted to get another pair.  So we went back to the corner of the store with boots, and the clearance rack was there as well. She spends the family's money as carefully as if it were her own.  The first shoes she looked at were on the clearance rack.  We walked down the aisle, and spend maybe 10 minutes together.  Then I left her to look on her own and went to look at trail running shoes for me.  Really surprised to see Avia shoes so dirt cheap, and that they look like New Balance or ASICS or Nike.  She surprised me in my shoe shopping, coming over in a pair of sleek shiny black vinyl heels.  She showed me them first, then stepped out of them and into a pair of very classically style heels.  They have the solid sole that is popular now, but a medium-brown base, and black satiny upper with a black satin rose above the open toe.  Aria said she was going to start painting her toenails.

She told me the price for both pair ($20 for one, $30 for the other), and I told her it didn't matter which pair she chose for those prices.  She said she thought so, but she wanted my opinion.  I told her I would choose the satin-look ones, because they were more like 1940s movie star shoes; classy.  She said that's what she wanted to know, and those are the ones she chose.  I feel unbelievably privileged to be a part of her growth into a woman.  Not just to see it happen, as so many parents do, but to be a part of it.  And that she wants me to be a part of it.  Quite a blessing.

A few minutes later, we left the store with a pair of every-day black canvas shoes for everyday wear and the heels for Sundays, along with more of the no-show socks that are stunningly overpriced.  That's a good business to be in, may I say.  Those socks are $1 each, $2/pair.  For how little fabric they are, someone is making a stunning markup.

So we had completed our shoe shopping.  We had a little time left before we needed to be home, so I drove us to a deserted medical center parking lot and parked the car.  "Dad, what are you doing?" she asked.

"Would you like to drive?" I replied.
A smile conquered her disbelieving face.  "Are you serious?"
"Yes, I'm serious."
A pause.  "YES!"

So we switched seats.  I taught her how to adjust the drivers seat from a 6'4" man setup to a 5'4" woman setup.  I explained how to adjust the mirrors, what she should be able to see out the mirrors.  After a few minutes, she was settled in.  I had her use the blinkers, the windshield wipers, the high beams, turn the headlights on and off, rev the engine in park.  Then we proceeded to take it slow and easy: foot on the brake, push in the button on the gear selector, move it to Drive, remove foot from the brake.  No gas yet.  The car started to move.  She started to steer it, took us around an island at the end of the parking lot.  By the end, we had discussed right of way, some NY laws, she had parked head-in, had used reverse a few times, had sped up to 25mph and then come to a complete stop in a certain space.  I had her stop the car and get out to see how close she was to a curb or to a stop sign to get a good feel for the vehicle's size.

The lesson was maybe 30 minutes.  She did really excellently.  She was calm, followed directions, and paid attention to detail.  When I told her, "Getting behind the wheel is a life or death situation, every second, every time.  It's serious."  I think she believed me.  Your first time behind the wheel of a 2,000lb hunk of steel is humbling and thrilling at the same time.  I think she has a lot of respect for the car now.

We got home just after 6, a phenomenally fun and enjoyable day behind us.  Certainly a day for the record books in my life.

Thursday, March 27, 2014

March 27, 2014 - Why all the fuss?

This blog does not have many regular readers.  Most posts get 5-8 hits quickly after I post them.  Some, like my musings on Romans, get twice that much traffic.  But that's about it.  My intended audience is not wide, and the blog is not a commercial endeavor.  I don't intend to ever add advertising to it, or change its scope or content to get more readers.

So, asks one reader, why do I bother?  Who do I do it for?

A good question, and something I pondered as I started writing.  First and foremost, the blog is selfish.  I understand myself and my surroundings better if I write about them.  And I'm terrible at journal-writing in general.  I had a couple really good years when I was younger (under 25), but not much since then.  Having the blog public and knowing that it is one source of family news for my parents motivates me a bit more to write in it.

Secondly, the blog is for my family.  It serves a few purposes in this regard.  Because my family is several thousand miles away from the rest of our relatives (except my brother) and Facebook is not a good vehicle for prose, a blog makes good sense to provide some context and story to go along with the FB posts and pictures.  So that's the real-time angle.  It also provides a journal-like history of the world (I try to put in some topical references now and again to place thoughts in context) and my family's wanderings in it.  At some point, I'll export this blog into a desktop publishing program and print some copies of it and bind them.  And then it will be a book of my life - a stream of consciousness autobiography.  And though I'll never be famous, perhaps my kids or grandkids will find something useful in here.  I suppose I should add my handful of regular readers into this section as well.  Some of them stumbled upon the blog, some I told about it, and those who find something valuable in it come back for more.  I feel sorry for you, gentle readers, that you have nothing better to do with your time.  And I am thankful you come back to read more anyway.  For these dear people, the blog is an obvious way to be step out of my normal introversion and express myself in ways that I don't often to outside of my immediate family.  I am terribly unmotivated to seek friendships outside of my family.  Not because I don't like people, but because I have always had a VERY small number of VERY close friends.  And now I live with 5 of my best friends, which is about as wide of a circle of friends as I've ever had.  I suppose that as the kids grow up and move out that my adult friend circle will increase.  Time will tell.

Thirdly, the blog is for whomever may stumble upon it.  My life focus is broad - work, family, church, politics, music, camping, fitness - and my blog reflects the eclectic nature of my life.  I am hopeful that some things I write may be useful to someone else.  I don't know who those people might be (the internet is miraculous that way), but maybe I can be of service in just an ancillary way to someone I'll never meet.

A couple quick updates on various fronts - I was asked to take a quick trip for business reasons, and it's been a bit of an eye-opener.  Not surprising so much, but a very good opportunity to learn.  I've done a long run each week (9 miles or more) for the last 4 weeks.  I challenge myself each time, of course.  Today's run was 9 miles of road running, and I was happy to see a 9:24 average pace per mile when I was done.  Not as fast as I would have liked, but the knees felt okay, and I wasn't stumbling at the end.  Good stuff.  I'm up to 9 chin ups in an upper body session now, along with 30 pushups and some chest presses and some other stuff.  The upper body stuff is coming, and with luck I'll be able to complete the Tough Mudder, every obstacle.  That's my goal.  Frankly, I may skip the final electrical one this time.  I did it already, I have nothing to prove.  I finished Words of Radiance.  It is as awe-inspiring as I hoped it would be.  I am a little worried that Brandon Sanderson will go all Orson Scott Card in the series and spend a lot of book time on expository about the magic systems, etc.  I really don't care why there's Stormlight in one world and Allomancy on another and superhero powers on another.  And I'd prefer to keep them separate.  Card, at the end of the Ender series spends most of a book trying to explain his notion of god in that universe.  He does the same with the Oversoul in a different series.  Hoping I don't see that from this author.

And now I'm tired - time to read for a few minutes before I sleep off today's run.  I have an upper body workout to do before I hit the office at 8:30 tomorrow morning.

Monday, March 24, 2014

March 24, 2014 - A breather, of sorts

It's been a while, eh?

I found Libby and Jake climbing a tree one afternoon.
Life became exceedingly busy one Friday afternoon with something that happened at work, and it's been an incredibly busy month there.  On top of that, Aria was in her final month of The Little Mermaid (she was Ariel), and Katrina's mother came out to see the show.  But she took Katrina away on a long weekend excursion first thing when she showed up.  Very hectic.  That's nearly always the excuse.  Ah, well.

The past month I've been working on a joint "life story" project with my mothers and wife.  I keep sending the questions to my dad, but he doesn't write much.  He reads a lot, not much of a writer.  A couple months back, a woman at church presented a lesson on family history, and provided some sheets with questions on them. 52 questions, 1 question a week.  Easy, right?  At the end of it, you have the bones of a life story.

Christian says he feels like an experienced camper
now that he can set up his own tent in 5 minutes.
I have wanted my parents to write theirs (so far), and have been meaning to write mine (so far), and this looked like a really easy way to get it rolling.  Each Wednesday (I try, but I'm not very consistent on the day of the week) I send out a question to the email address group.  And I send out my written section as well.  Questions so far: tell me about your mother, your father, the house you grew up in, and your challenges growing up.  Seems easy, and then you start to write and realize you can only barely scratch the surface in a couple pages.  I've learned a lot so far, and I feel very good about what I've contributed as well.  Good stuff.

My last photo of a frozen creek this winter, I promise.
We've had snow on the ground since mid-January, including a couple massive snowfalls.  I was not able to get out and spend time in the woods since Feb 2.  We got some real warming a couple weeks ago, and the snow has been gradually melting.  We were finally able to use our driveway turnaround last Friday, and I went on a nice (and challenging) trail run on Saturday.  9.2 miles through the woods.  A little slower than I had wanted, but it was wonderful nonetheless.  My longest trail run ever, tromping through 3 inches of wet snow much of the time, 40 degrees, overcast, with a little rain and wind.  Lovely time.
Some nice light and shadow on the trail.

In the mean time, of course, Aria has had her show.  I heard her singing as she was doing laundry (yes, that's normal at our house), and heard her sing for possibly the first time ever.  I had heard her put notes out of her mouth, but this singing was from her soul.  It was real music.  She was stunning.  Her performances were fantastic as well.  An amazing cast that was directed well and liked each other.  Seriously impressive in all the best ways.




She was a massive celebrity after
the Sunday matinee.
Do you see that?  That's how she
sounded, too.  Amazing.
And, of course, Christian turned 12.  So he is now in my Sunday School class, and joins me for the beginning of Priesthood class.  We studied the Word of Wisdom last week, going over it line by line, making sure we knew everything it said.  It's a really fun first discussion to have on the nature of revelation and the frailty of humanity.  We're waiting until the grandparents get here to ordain him as a deacon and baptize Jacob.  It will be an excellent weekend.




What else?  I was asked to serve in a different calling.  I accepted, of course, and we'll see what it comes down to.  I'm curious to see how it pans out.

And I suppose that's all.  And that ought to be enough.  So now work returns to a human pace, our family life calms down for a while, and we can catch our collective breaths.