Pride
Is like a redeemed child inching toward the cookie jar;
The moment we start doing good,
We fixate on the reward we know must be coming.
Lord, help me see doing the right thing:
As obedience,
As life with you,
Which is always in the moment, never waiting on some greener pasture.
Give me acceptance
Obedience and reward
Both are now.
Saturday, December 15, 2012
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Mason-Dixon alive & well
Take a look at these maps. One's high-tech, one's low-tech--but they're pretty much the same picture.
Right?
The problem is, while one tells us where our political lines are drawn today with the impending election, the other shows us where they were drawn 160 years ago - before Lincoln won the Civil War.
The states in Red (in the map on the right) are States that seceded from the Union, where slavery was legal. The yellow areas in the same map were "open to slavery." The states in Red (in the map on the left) are States that will vote against another 4 years with the first African American president.
I might hesitate to say more. With such evidence, it's best to let people form their own conclusions.
However, a recent University of Washington study corroborates one of the obvious conclusions we might like to avoid. The study proves that, while there are substantially polarized individuals within each party, for whom race does not play a part in their selection of candidates, there is also a sizable subgroup - 10% of the total study participants - for whom race is a more determining factor than the issues. In other words, says the study, were Obama not black, he could very easily be 20% further ahead in the polls.
Don't take this as an accusation against certain states in the Union or conservatives as the "bad, prejudiced ones--that is not the point at all. This study took place in Seattle. And the substantial majority of participants were liberals.
The point is, there are unresolved issues in our country--in each one of us--going back over 150 years, and they still polarize us along almost the same lines. Fundamental biases and perspective differences have not changed. For anything to change, it would require a sustained effort on each our parts to have the challenging conversations--that bring us to face and expose the prejudice within ourselves--rather than the oversimplified, us-versus-them, tired dialogues that fire us up and sell ad spots on TV.
When Obama said in the debate the other night that Romney wanted to take us back to the foreign policies of the 80s, social policies of the 50s, and economic policies of the 20s, he left out one: the unresolved racial and political biases of the 1860s.
Only it's not Romney who's taking us there, it's we who are stuck there; Romney's just benefiting from it.
Sources:
http://storiesofusa.com/american-civil-war-timeline-battlefields-1854-1865/#confederate-states-of-america-1861
http://graphics.latimes.com/2012-election-electoral-map/
http://www.artsci.washington.edu/newsletter/Oct12/Greenwald.asp?src=eblastLD
Right?
The problem is, while one tells us where our political lines are drawn today with the impending election, the other shows us where they were drawn 160 years ago - before Lincoln won the Civil War.
The states in Red (in the map on the right) are States that seceded from the Union, where slavery was legal. The yellow areas in the same map were "open to slavery." The states in Red (in the map on the left) are States that will vote against another 4 years with the first African American president.
I might hesitate to say more. With such evidence, it's best to let people form their own conclusions.
However, a recent University of Washington study corroborates one of the obvious conclusions we might like to avoid. The study proves that, while there are substantially polarized individuals within each party, for whom race does not play a part in their selection of candidates, there is also a sizable subgroup - 10% of the total study participants - for whom race is a more determining factor than the issues. In other words, says the study, were Obama not black, he could very easily be 20% further ahead in the polls.
Don't take this as an accusation against certain states in the Union or conservatives as the "bad, prejudiced ones--that is not the point at all. This study took place in Seattle. And the substantial majority of participants were liberals.
The point is, there are unresolved issues in our country--in each one of us--going back over 150 years, and they still polarize us along almost the same lines. Fundamental biases and perspective differences have not changed. For anything to change, it would require a sustained effort on each our parts to have the challenging conversations--that bring us to face and expose the prejudice within ourselves--rather than the oversimplified, us-versus-them, tired dialogues that fire us up and sell ad spots on TV.
When Obama said in the debate the other night that Romney wanted to take us back to the foreign policies of the 80s, social policies of the 50s, and economic policies of the 20s, he left out one: the unresolved racial and political biases of the 1860s.
Only it's not Romney who's taking us there, it's we who are stuck there; Romney's just benefiting from it.
Sources:
http://storiesofusa.com/american-civil-war-timeline-battlefields-1854-1865/#confederate-states-of-america-1861
http://graphics.latimes.com/2012-election-electoral-map/
http://www.artsci.washington.edu/newsletter/Oct12/Greenwald.asp?src=eblastLD
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Wild pack of family dogs
Songs often sing through my head for years before I reach the level of insight to understand what my subconscious was trying to tell me through repeating those tunes.
Wild pack of family dogs by modest mouse.
This song is about abuse or addiction in a family, the havoc it wreaks and the responses family members adopt.
Interrupting the idyllic impressions we all like to believe about our youth, "one day" something wild and terrible comes running through the safety of our home.
Responses often include outward violence or denial, another form of violence. "Shot it up, they ran away ok."
Innocence is lost however and the family addiction takes part of us with it. "my own dog ran away with them." Too young to make sense of it, and likely in an environment hostile to outward acknowledgement of the problem, most of us "didn't say much of anything at all."
The denial does not make the problem stay away. In response to our denial, often the consequences grow, affecting some in the family more severely than others. "she was eaten up ok."
Hysteria and collapse. As if we couldn't have seen it coming. "cryin' blood dust." "quit his job... was fired."
What can we do in the face of generational terror that has consumed all we might have known of stability? "waitin for the pack to take me away." give in to the forces of violence and compulsion within us.
And fantasize about an afterlife. Complete with final relief and justice for the perpetrators.
"up toward the glowing sky. Now they will receive their rewards."
Wild pack of family dogs by modest mouse.
A wild pack of family dogs came runnin' through the yard one day
My father got his gun, shot it up, they ran away ok
A wild pack of family dogs came runnin' through the yard
And as my own dog ran away with them, I didn't say much of anything at all
A wild pack of family dogs came runnin' through the yard
As my little sister played, the dogs took her away
And I guess she was eaten up ok, yeah she was eaten up ok
My mother's cryin' blood dust now
My dad he quit his job today, well I guess he was fired but that's ok
And I'm sittin' outside my mudlake, waiting for the pack to take me away
And right after I die the dogs start floating up towards the glowing sky
Now they'll receive their rewards, now they will receive their rewards
This song is about abuse or addiction in a family, the havoc it wreaks and the responses family members adopt.
Interrupting the idyllic impressions we all like to believe about our youth, "one day" something wild and terrible comes running through the safety of our home.
Responses often include outward violence or denial, another form of violence. "Shot it up, they ran away ok."
Innocence is lost however and the family addiction takes part of us with it. "my own dog ran away with them." Too young to make sense of it, and likely in an environment hostile to outward acknowledgement of the problem, most of us "didn't say much of anything at all."
The denial does not make the problem stay away. In response to our denial, often the consequences grow, affecting some in the family more severely than others. "she was eaten up ok."
Hysteria and collapse. As if we couldn't have seen it coming. "cryin' blood dust." "quit his job... was fired."
What can we do in the face of generational terror that has consumed all we might have known of stability? "waitin for the pack to take me away." give in to the forces of violence and compulsion within us.
And fantasize about an afterlife. Complete with final relief and justice for the perpetrators.
"up toward the glowing sky. Now they will receive their rewards."
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