Refillable Bottles of Balsamic!
It’s Saturday and I have been shopping, running errands for work, light plumbing and geting the big dog to a grooming appointment… I’m tired. But I did want to write something fast for the “Things Disposable” theme…
My family is full of Balsamic Vinegar lovers! And in Bethesda you can use a refillable bottle at Bradley Food & Beverage (check out their stunning website, lol) instead of simply buying new bottles every time you need more vinegar! They also have refillable olive oil bottles! I refilled a bottle of Balsamic, today!
If you are near enough, check it out and save some bottles! If you live further away, check around and see if someone close to you offers the same! Think of it as an adventure!
Forever Homes for Pocket Knives
I don’t suppose it would be exactly correct to say that reusable is necessarily the opposite of disposable, but it’s surely a good alternative much of the time. And so many things in our lives can be nudged away from being disposed of, and moved back into good use, or reuse. One of the things I have found a good bit of pleasure with is rescuing and reusing old pocket knives on their way to the disposal pile.
I post pics on Facebook often of knives I’ve found, bought, cleaned and sharpened. What I don’t often talk about or show pictures of are the “forever homes” that I also sometimes find for the pocket knives. Many come into my hands rusted and dulled beyond safe use… but just a little oil, whetstone work and patience brings them back to a place of purpose and meaning. The Imperial Scout shown here is the knife I’m currently carrying for daily use.
I love the older, cheap American made knives, a few of my favorites being Camillus, Camco and Imperial. Though I find a reason to use my pocket knife’s sharpened blade every day, I love a secondary blade with the bottle opener/flat-head screwdriver combo! I use that one as often as I use the sharpened cutting blade.
Are you a pocket knife person? Would you be willing to give an old pocket knife a new life of usefulness and purpose? I have joked about making an online adoption site for rescued pocket knives, but I’m not sure I have that much time… in the meanwhile, just let me know and I’ll see if we can find a good match for you!
Bottom line, we junk and throw away too many great old pocket knives that can be made useful again, disposing of useful items! I wonder what else we dispose of before it’s time?
Coffee Cup Dare!
I dare you to start carrying a coffee cup everywhere you go, if you’re a coffee drinker! If you’re not a coffee drinker, then go take a nap like the rest of us can’t. And I guess this works as well for the tea drinkers (says I while sipping some herbal tea at my desk).
I was down at one of the four Starbucks in Bethesda yesterday looking for an elusive Yukon coffee cup (the one with a bear on it), but instead found a newly released Guatemala cup! Woot! I visited Guatemala in 2003… stayed a few days in Old Anitgua. It’s a lovely country and totally delightful people!
I’m not sure if we can really ever quantify the waste produced by disposable coffee cups in our country. So carry a cup… to work, to school, to your mosque or your church, and even to the coffee shop!
Here’s the deal about carrying your own coffee cup:
1) You won’t eliminate all the disposable cup waste in the world, but you’ll eliminate some of yours,
2) You won’t save a ton of money, even though most coffee shops give a $.10 discount when you bring your own, and
3) It’s a really nice way to help your community and environment.
Oh, and now Starbucks wants to make this all even easier and cheaper with reusable $1 cups that are rolling out TODAY! How can you beat that?
The Need for Speed
As I begin thinking about things in my life that are disposable, two values really jump out at me: 1) speed and 2) convenience. We often opt for disposable things because they offer a level of speed that is not otherwise available with things reused. Easy example: our food choices.
I have been sitting at La Madeleine this morning having breakfast. Though the napkins are one-time use things, the plate, flatware and water glass are shared items. They have been used and will be used again. It’s a slower way to eat, especially in contrast to fast food items designed to be be consumed and leave behind a waste trail of bagging, wrapping, condiment tubes, cups and straws.
It’s easy to recognize the enormous waste produced by fast food. It takes a little more effort to recognize the toll on our lives by a food system driven by speed. I believe that our appreciation of food suffers, and therefore our appreciation of what food does for us suffers, and therefore we suffer. All to be a little faster, cheaper or have a bit more convenience.
My mother’s parents grew food. They weren’t the typical American farmers out in Middle America, but they lived in a suburban city near Dallas and farmed a modest little couple of acres in town where housing development couldn’t happen, and a good chunk of their back yard. My grandparents also kept bees. He was a carpenter by trade, she a seamstress, so I think the idea of patient craftsmanship was easily extended to food. I remember both my grandparents working hard, but I don’t remember them being frantic. Ever.
Disposable things are feeding the beast of haste in our lives. Disposable things are making it too easy to rush through important times and segments of the day. If we begin the day devaluing the very food we eat and rushing through the first nourishment we will provide ourselves, how do we later slow down and become appreciative?
Speed is deceptive. Speed can be alluring and exciting. Speed can give the impression of importance and power. But speed will also do what speed always does: it leaves things behind. Perhaps our rejecting the disposable food experience is a good step toward affirming that there are not “disposable times” in our day. Each moment is valuable. Each moment is a gift.
And here’s a few things I found online, food for thought:
slowdownnow.org
How To Slow Down
“Slow Down” by Keb’ Mo’
10 Ways to Slow Down the Speed of Your Day
“Things Disposable” in 2013
So in this, the beginning of 2013 (Happy New year!) I feel the desire to dig a little deeper into an area that I have only brushed up against in the past bunch of years, and that is the effort to remove “disposable” things from my life.
If you know me, then you know I usually carry my own coffee mug, because I hate the waste of disposable coffee cups. But if you know me then you also know I am surrounded by those disposable 44oz soda cups from 7-11, because I’m an addict.
This month I’m going to think about what is disposable and what I need & want to do about “disposable” things in my life. I think there is some truth in the old saying, “Waste not, want not.” But there’s also the effort and cost involved in not going disposable with many of our daily things.
Today is just the jump off, so I’ll simply say that the new header image for the blog includes a disposable cup from our family’s favorite tea shop, and it’s the last one I’ll accept in 2013. Either I take a reusable cup to the shop, or buy a cup to reuse, or it’s no tea for me that day.
Cheers, Todd
Jan. 1, 2012
election day limerick (nov. 6 2012… tongue in cheek)
My little election day limerick…
“election day is finally here
time for you to vote!
your side will surely win it all
or at least you hope
but either way you did your part
you braved the crowds, you stood in line
to guarantee for four more years
your right to cheer or right to whine
or letting loose that thousandth tear
so just be safe, and pack a bag
I hear Canada’s nice this time of year”
new notebook (a poem for november 3, 2012)
Just some quick backstory… my dog ate my notebook. Yes, he ate the notebook in which I write my poems! But undaunted, I strode manfully to the mall and bought a new notebook. That notebook is the subject of a little poem I write tonight.
smell of the paper
feel of the grain
this notebook needs to be lettered
like the ground needs the rain
it holds my pen
steals my breath
i must dig into this paper
plumb it’s width, breadth and depth
something will be found
treasures yet unknown
despite all other gain
i shall have arrived home
sacred unease (a poem for nov. 1 2012)
still grey skies
mock the storm in my soul
as a sacred unease
rises, shifts and rolls
i cannot name the thing
which inside me grows
This often happens when I sit to intentionally write some poetry. A still, quiet moment allows me to hear some of my more painful inner movements that are drowned out in the usual activity of the day. It’s not that I’m totally filled with melancholy, but it’s there.
In recent months I’ve been in several different situations discussing the impact of depression on our lives and those conversations have had me thinking. I have lived with the ebb and flow of depression as long as I can remember. I don’t think it’s ever outright owned me, but it’s been there. I’ve learned to watch the seasons and to be aware of their impact on my moods. I’ve learned to listen to the people who love me and live with me; Teresa will let me know when I seem to be letting it get an upper hand.
I’ve been thinking about some of the ways that being a person of faith has impacted the way I deal with my depression and darker moods. I think that growing up with a “seen and unseen” worldview has been helpful for me. I was raised to put my faith in something beyond my senses, beyond my ability to perceive, as I could perceive other things. So when the dark thoughts come and I perceive no hope, I have this reflex to look past it and try to see what may not be seen.
I have a cognitive trigger built into me that causes me to seek. When I seek I am in movement. When I am in movement I cannot be held in the grip of anxiety, fear or hopelessness for too long. So when I am in the grip of depression, it never holds all of me, there is a bit of me still free to roam.
I’m not saying that this idea is a panacea or a magic cure all of some kind. And there will always be times when our imbalanced physiology demands the help of trained professionals, both for counseling and for medication. When I stop seeking, then I think it will be time for me to see a professional.
But having that safety valve built into me allows me to be very open about the presence of darkness in my soul. I can deal with the fact that even as a creature of the light, I retain these shadows; I own the shadows. But the shadows don’t own me. I’m grateful to God for this. And so even as I write something that questions what “inside me grows” I am also very assured that it will not one day rule me and destroy me, or supplant in me what God would do. My unease is sacred.
Chick-fil-A vs. Muppets… What A Bummer
I have avoided writing or saying much on the Chick-fil-A vs. Muppets squabble. I like Chick-fil-A’s sandwiches and their slaw is awesome. And I like the Muppets, a lot. But since I didn’t even realize they were doing business together, it’s no heartache for me that they broke up. I suppose that I have been most afraid that saying something lends validity to the squabble, but it’s grown big enough to captivate a nation without any input from me (said tongue in cheek, since probably twelve people will read this blog), so here goes…
It’s been common knowledge my whole life that the Chick-fil-A tries to mix it’s owner’s values with the way they do business. They’ve always been closed on Sundays. I’m pretty sure they used to have Veggie Tales toys and prizes, and I am quite sure they have had other kids toys of that tied into Bible stories and characters. That’s who and what Chick-Fil-A has always been. I have to wonder what the Henson folks were thinking when they entered into a business relationship with the group if they weren’t aware of this.
Chick-Fil-A has given money to organizations that promote heterosexual marriage and oppose same-sex marriage. However, I’ve not found any articles or accusations that they have discriminated against people in their hiring/firing policies or broken the laws of our country. I’d be curious to know if they have had such accusations or problems.
Then, there’s the actual quote that this whole broo-ha-ha has grown out of… did you read it yet? Before presenting the quote, I’d like you to do something: Stop thinking about gay marriage! Gay marriage doesn’t seem to have been mentioned in the article, and Mr. Cathy wasn’t asked about it. Try for a moment to step back and let the quote be itself: “‘We are very much supportive of the family — the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that,’ Cathy is quoted as saying.”
Ok, so this guy is all about the “family.” And he invokes the idea of a “biblical definition” of the family. We can all read different things into that depending on our theology and cultural experience/tradition. We can even safely assume he would include defining family as based on the marriage of a man and a woman. But he didn’t decide to go there. When he expanded on things he said this… “We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives.” What? What?!
I understand that someone reporting on this story may not be up on all the conservative Christian vocabulary that gets thrown around, but I’ve not heard a single friend or Christian writer respond to “first wives.” Now, if Mr. Cathy were Mormon, then maybe he would mean that those men in his family aren’t polygamists. But he’s Baptist, and “first wives” means that they don’t practice the ultimate evil (at least it was before gay marriage supplanted it) of divorce. That quote is a direct slap at divorced people, not gay people, by it’s own explicit content.
Of course, we can assume he would exclude gay marriage from his “biblical definition,” but he chooses to hang his hat on the absence of any “second wives” in his family. I know a lot of Christian friends who have been like “Whoo Hooo, let’s go support Chick-Fil-A!” who are also divorced, the spouses of second wives and even, dare I say it, “second husbands.” Why aren’t they aggravated at the lack of grace Mr. Cathy showed for divorced people? I think it’s because of the great law of media that once a story has been framed one way, it doesn’t get a second framing. A wise friend who spent years in news broadcast around the DC area let me in on that media law, and it’s so true. The story was framed around gay marriage, and there it has remained.
Plenty of people have written on the absurdity of this public debate over eating at Chick-Fil-A or not. I haven’t seen anyone actually pointing out that Mr. Cathy was blithely devaluing divorced people, not gay people. Why not? Because the story was framed about gay marriage, and that framework holds, it sells, it galvanizes, it’s fires people up on both sides of a silly culture war that no one will win. And that framework has no place to process the “first wives” vocabulary.
So, what do I do with the “first wives” thing? I would say to the divorced people out there, the second wives and second husbands, “You’re welcome in my church family!” I say that because my biblical definition of family is inclusive of biblical things like grace, love and humility. We don’t distribute labels in our church family like “divorced,” “first” or “second.” I personally thank God for my wife, not because she’s my first wife, but because I get to share life with an amazing woman. I’ve known many people who felt the same about their second spouses. I’ve spoken with and read things by gay friends who felt that way about their partners and spouses.
What do I do with the whole “gay” thing? I would say to gay people out there, married or not, divorced or not, “You’re welcome in my church family!” I say that because my biblical definition of family, whether we’re talking about my biological family or my faith family, is based on biblical things like grace, love and humility. We don’t distribute labels in our church family like “straight” or “gay.”
Grace, love and humility. God forbid I ever make a move or say a word to win an argument or achieve dominance in any cultural arena of thought, if I have to trade one single opportunity to show grace, love or humility to claim that win. So where’s the grace, love and humility in this whole Chick-Fil-A vs. Muppets carnival? I’ve not seen much on either side of the argument. So, it’s not my argument. I’ll let Chick-Fil-A and the Muppets handle their own fight, after all they’re the squabbling couple. I’ll just keep trying to find those moments when I get to live the grace, love and humility the Bible has taught me. And I’ll pray I’m better at it today than I was yesterday.
On Preachers Who Incite Violence
Here are some of my thoughts on the seeming trend with preachers down in North Carolina who have turned to inciting violence to effect change in people. Have you followed the recent hermeneutical gaffs coming from North Carolina? Here’s the lineup: Mr. Worley & Mr. Harris. They have incited a violent reaction toward male children not acting macho enough and even dreamed of fencing off gay people to ensure their extinction. (Wait, did Worley unintentionally admit that he understands homosexuality as genetic and not preference with the fence idea? And gay people are only born from other gay people? Confusing.) This whole thing of preachers inciting violence on the basis of their personal beliefs is extremely problematic from a Christian standpoint, and so weirdly American.
So American?
Let’s chat about why it’s so oddly American. Does anyone catch how ironic it is that Mr. Worley is constitutionally protected to freely speak his beliefs even while he asserts the idea that a group of people might be forcibly and illegally interned behind fences, which won’t happen precisely because of their constitutional rights? As he lays out his grand idea for how he’d like to deal with gay people one has to wonder if he’s cognizant of the fact that he’s wasting everyone’s time on an idea that will not ever come to fruition. I’m guessing not. People are free to speak, even their dumbest beliefs and ideas, and even when their dumbest ideas and beliefs can’t become a reality because of the same constitution giving them their speech rights. This is a true American Drama.
But there’s a dark side to the humor of how silly these preachers sound. We can laugh that this pastor is wasting his time and the time of his congregation by expounding on ideas that cannot happen and therefore are not worth consideration, and yet we all know that as a nation we carry a guilty conscience. Did anyone immediately think of the forced interning of Japanese Americans during World War II? I did, and that’s why this drama has such a dark side. Did you think about the forced chemical castrations we have committed against citizens in the past when identified as homosexuals? I did, and these kinds of national memories scare me. We Americans as a mob/nation can be so fearful as to act outside of our constitutional values. We did it before. Might we do it again? And does this man really want that on his conscience?
And then there’s the case of the other preacher, Mr. Harris. He actually had the temerity to encourage physical violence against one’s child. He crossed the line in advocating violence. He wrapped up his own personal ideas of masculinity and what he perceives as an acceptable male role, disguised them as scriptural expectations, and called on fathers to enforce them with violence. “Walk over there and crack that wrist. Give him a good punch.” Yes. He did. But wait… what could be more Americana than the strapping sawmill father who rules the roost with an iron fist and fast flying leather belt? What could be more Americana than depressed, guilt-ridden fathers who are made to feel that they have failed in their one great cosmic duty (to raise heterosexual sons and subdue wives), and so turn to their only two possible balms: booze and beating said sons and wives. It’s sad, but so American it hurts.
Problematic for a Christian, Much Less a Preacher
This is all very problematic for a Christian, especially a Christian Pastor. One simply cannot find Jesus making sexuality a keystone of proclaiming the Kingdom, and therefore these preachers must realize when they are “leaving the map.” In the most memorable cases of when Jesus might have made sexuality an issue (in the cases of two women, one at a well and one about to be stoned… John 4 & John 8), he did not. Indeed, human sexuality is a complex and very present topic throughout our scriptures, and therefore does enter into sermons, but a preacher must ask himself or herself why they have made it a keystone salvation issue and Christian identity issue when Jesus didn’t. And even when sex and sexuality is a needed conversation from the pulpit, where does this sense of entitlement to meanness and inciting violence come from? Not the Bible. Encouraging fathers to physical violence in the name of Christ is simply despicable. Enjoying fantasies of fencing off the people you don’t like and denying them dignity and joyful existence is sick. This sounds a lot less like preachers fretting over a culture war and more like terrorists plotting their next move.
Hey, I’m a preacher. Can I just say that I get how intoxicating it is to feel an audience vibe? Can I admit that it’s so very tempting to say things that will get an amen, a nod, a smile, an affirmation that I’m ok? I know how Mr. Worley and Mr. Harris both felt that morning. They were on top of the world! They were feeling great. Did it bother them that their personal elevation was effected at the cost of encouraging violence toward children or fantasies of forcibly interning American citizens? It seems not. Did it bother them that they were garnering feelings of affirmation for themselves by inciting feeling of disenfranchisement for others? I guess not. Once you start to get the buzz, the bar tab gets a bit hazy and you just keep ordering drinks without worrying about the cost. These guys might be good teetotalling Baptists who never touch a bottle, but they obviously like the buzz. Preachers need to renounce the buzz. And the next time a preacher says something so amazingly dumb and a friend asks, “Is that dude high?” you can answer, “Yeah, he totally is.”
And to set the record straight, at least from my view of scripture and the role of a pastor, and the message of Jesus Christ: These pastors are definitely not just “defending the Bible”. These pastors are not simply defending their beliefs or taking courageous stands, as cornered supporters like to say. Though constitutionally free and able to make those statements and hold those beliefs, they are not defending a Christian message when advocating physical violence to change a child’s character, identity or sexuality. They are not defending the biblical message of Christ when advocating the forced incarceration of U.S. Citizens based upon their sexuality, even if the pastor is so kind as to suggest dropping food behind the fence for them. If they want to defend the Bible, or in actually have the Bible defend them, then let them take their stand on a beautiful line from St. Paul, “Let your gentleness be evident to all.” (Philippians 4:5) Because you simply don’t fence your neighbor off from life and liberty or crack your son’s wrist with gentleness. Those actions require violence. Those actions are not biblically defensible, nor can they be invoked in defense of biblical things.
Jesus Has Left the Building
I believe that when these preachers go off into their dreams of violence that Jesus catches the bus to the mall. He has left the building. The Jesus who sat in the midst of dropped stones will not be standing up there with the preacher waving his stone from the pulpit. As American as free speech might be, this is not at all Christian when “Christian” means “identifiable with the life, message and meaning of Christ.” When these guys sober up, I hope they get it right.
toddthomas.net 