Three

This video made me think these things, in this order:

1. Holy crap.
2. I should be embarrassed about every little complaint I've ever had.
3. I should be as grateful as those high school seniors.
4. Dad should see this. Alex should. Everyone should.
5. This proves my family should move to Texas.


Hat tip to Deacon Greg

66 Years Ago

...Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Japanese. 2,388 Americans were killed. I won't go into the rest, you know it, but I would not be my father's daughter if I didn't make some small mention of the day, and in my teensy little manner honor those who fought and died that day, and in all the days the have followed. It's especially important as the number of veteran who were there dwindles each year. This is not an event that should be forgotten.

Thank you.

...O Mango

**UPDATE: How the creation of this category had unforeseen and alarming consequences**

In my dad's tier on the family tree, there's a long-running inside joke involving mangoes. As I understand it (do correct me, dear Dad), my Tia Irma's family would offer guests things to eat and drink, ending the litany of options with, "...o mango" ("or, mango"). The mango was extended to other things, like activities, so a conversation might go (imagine this is all in Spanish):

Persona A: What ever shall we do this evening, old chum?
Persona B: I say, I don't know. We could take in a show, have a promenade on the beach, visit the old boys at the club, o mango.

Aside from being a teeny little family tradition that warms my heart, it cracks me up. Mangos are funny, dagnabbit. It also perfectly fits a new category of post, which I am initiating now. For all those random, pointless posts that just don't fit under any label, I hereby instate the "o mango" label as a catch all. Think of it as a miscellaneous, or a lagniappe.

...O mango.

Really Gone

An actual conversation with an unnamed, blond, wonderful friend:

Me: I just heard a duet between Robert Plant and Allison Krauss, which sounded like a terrible idea at first but I actually really like it.
Be-- er, Friend: I love Allison Krauss! ...Who's Robert Plant?

Oh. My. Gracious.

Can't find an embedable video of said song, which is fine because I find the video to be rather odd, awkward, and lame compared to the really awesome song. Here's some glorified audio:

Holy Old St. Nick

Today is St. Nicholas of Myra's feast day. You probably know him better as Santa Claus.

St. Nicholas, by Elisabeth Jvanovsky

Born somewhere between AD 260 and 280 (yup, he's a real guy), St. Nicholas is largely legendary, meaning what started in fact has grown and been elaborated over time. This site has an abundance of information about St. Nick, from the legends surrounding his life to the historical evidence supporting the legends. I was previously unaware of this legend, and am quite impressed by it:

Another story tells of three theological students, traveling on their way to study in Athens. A wicked innkeeper robbed and murdered them, hiding their remains in a large pickling tub. It so happened that Bishop Nicholas, traveling along the same route, stopped at this very inn. In the night he dreamed of the crime, got up, and summoned the innkeeper. As Nicholas prayed earnestly to God the three boys were restored to life and wholeness. In France the story is told of three small children, wandering in their play until lost, lured, and captured by an evil butcher. St. Nicholas appears and appeals to God to return them to life and to their families. And so St. Nicholas is the patron and protector of children.

St. Nicholas is patron to a lengthy list of persons and causes, including unmarried women. I made a new friend!

People Parody Themselves

I'm endlessly baffled by people who react to some stranger's opinion with such venom, you'd think the former had told the latter there is no Santa Clause. What's funny is how often such rancorous folk will prove the very point being made by the offender. Case in point: this article by Melanie McDonagh has some interesting things to say about the idea that Catholic-bashing is the new frontier in prejudice and blind hatred. The very first comment following the article reads:

oh PLEASE!

anti-semitism is a *racist* vilification, the jew is hated because of what they are *born* as, not because of what they choose to beleive.

a catholic could easily leave the dark ages and follow a more enlightened philosophy (one that does not hate women, regarding them as so inferior they are not even allowed to be initiated into the 'secrets', to become members of the priesthood, or one that does not beleive that absolute power should be given to someone chosen by a small and select group, ie is not profoundly anti-democratic, one that believes not that Man is here to abuse and rape the Earth as we see fit but are guardians of Her for future generations and other species, one that is not so insane as to beleive in armageddon and all the other apocalyptic BS the catholic Empire and all (most) of the other so-called 'christian' stand for.)

why do people vilify the Church? Because it deserves it. Simple as that. And NOTHING comparable to anti-semitism.

Seriously? I'm really asking, is this for real? I could swear it's a parody of what McDonagh is talking about. It's hyperbolic, caustic, and utterly free of any facts of history or church teaching -- we shall leave alone the weak writing and shaky mechanics.

On the upside, I know better and you know better, and whatever such angry personages may say, I will rest contently in the knowledge that not only am I right and they're wrong :wink:, but I am also a much better writer.

Yeah, I Just Got Back

But, I'm still allowed to be excited that:

It is 15 days, 1 hour, 17 minutes and 45 seconds until Thursday, December 20, 2007 at 11:40:00 PM (Baltimore time)

which is when I land a BWI for my shore leave with my family. Woo!

Meme ME??

Well, slap my mouth and call me Sally. I feel like the little kid with training wheels on his bike who gets drafted into to race around the cul-de-sac with the two-wheeled biguns. My humble family-oriented little blog has been tagged for a meme by the actual practicing blogger Paul at Alive and Young (that's the one in my sidebar with the parenthetical note of acquaintance, such as you would expect from a big nobody when dealing with someone who actually has a reputation in the blogosphere). *Bows* I am honored you would think of me.

For those of you, Dear Readers, who don't know, in a meme a blogger assigns another blogger a task designed to reveal information about the latter that probably wouldn't come out in the normal course of things, but is none the less amusing or gratifying. For example, in reading Paul's meme I discovered several things he and I have in common, especially a fondness for brews and a view of bagels as mere vessels for cream cheese. Here's how this one works:

Rules:
Each tagged person must post 8 random facts or habits about themselves on their blog. At the end of the post, choose 8 people to be tagged and list their names. Don't forget to leave a comment telling them that they are tagged and to read your blog. Have fun!

1. I love cheese. This is the same as Paul's first fact, but my quesophilia is of such great magnitude and is so central to my very being that I couldn't take it off, not even for originality's sake.
   
2. I simply cannot tolerate the sound of electric pencil sharpeners. I teach a class in my neighbor's room, and she has one such sharpener. When my kids ask to sharpen a pencil, I make them take it out into the hallway. Most just find another pencil.
   
3. The song "Awesome God" infuriates me. I find it so theologically banal, it's offensive. The first line, "When he rolls up his sleeves, he ain't just puttin' on the ritz", is enough to send me into raving fits. God is not limited by a corporeal nature! God does not have arms! He doesn't have sleeves! If he did he wouldn't need to roll them up, because he is omnipotent and never gets tired and never exerts effort. No! It's just WRONG!!
   
4. I have never once, in the almost ten years I've been playing the game, lost a single match in Diddy Kong Racing on the N64. Sadly, this is probably the closest I will ever come to some kind of athletic accomplishment.
   
5. My students don't know how old I am, or that this is my first year teaching. I promised to tell them my age on my birthday -- they don't know when that is, either. That I'm a rookie will remain secret as long as I can keep it that way.
   
6. To this day, if I had the chops and the self-discipline to pull it off, I would drop everything and be a writer. Since high school, that could also include "or a photographer". In very recent times, that's been amended to include "or a theologian". All three will probably remain lifetime hobbies.
   
7. The one thing about my rearing I wish had been different was my utter lack of involvement in after-school activity kind of things. I would love to be able to play the violin now as a result of being forced into it at eight. Consequently, I'm very glad my baby siblings are getting into that stuff now, at seven and nine.
8. My favorite number was 42 long before I heard of Douglas Adams and his assorted brilliance. Which makes me think somewhere in this muddled head I posses the answer to life, the universe, and everything.
   

Now, to tag. Let's find out about:

Jeromey at Romey's Ramblings
The Wanderer at Only a Glimpse
Mr. Bramblefoot at Gnome Bandits
Jon at Posses Yourself
Mark at his mind-spew receptacle
Marcel and/or Sarah at St. Mary's Aggies
The Saginaw Seminarians (er, maybe they can decide which one...)
An unnamed quasi-blogger, who some of my readers also read. The rest of you will just have to live with the knowledge you're missing out.

A Falling Out

Words and I have had a falling out, it seems. I wasn't aware of this, but lately words aren't coming through for me like they used to. They seem to be avoiding me, actually, and I can only surmise I did something to offend them. My deepest apologies, words, but do come back to me.

See, I have a lot to say. I have a sea of things to let out, to set forth unto the universe, and it doesn't seem right that it should all remain settled down in the heart of mine. I feel a multitude of incredible things that, at some point, someone saw fit to plant in me. I hear strains of such indescribable melodies, sounds of such unearthly, authentic beauty as I have never heard before. I see charity and grace walking, living, breathing, acting and moving, to the complete oblivion of the people they touch.

It's too much for me to keep in, frankly, but words have gone off and left me. Whatever I did, I'm terribly sorry, words, and I'll do whatever you like, just come back and help me out.

But then the thought occurs to me that maybe there aren't supposed to be words for all this. Or maybe there aren't words for me for this. I would probably botch it if I tried to get into it too much, and God forbid I misrepresented the glory of the things I have glimpsed. Even if I could put it into words, would it make much difference? I've read parts of The Interior Castle over and over for years, and I thought I had a clue what St. Teresa was talking about. In the last few months, as I've re-read those parts, it's suddenly clear to me that I had no idea what she was hinting at until I saw it myself.

When I did Young Apostles, one of the other kids told us about this quasi-vision someone he knew had: that when we adore the Blessed Sacrament, all of Heaven -- all the blessed souls, all our saints, our patrons, the angels, the divine beings -- joins us, and the sound of creation praising its God is thundering, deafening. That image struck me and stayed with me, and it remains one of the defining moments of my faith journey. Living in this house of prayer, that image keeps coming to me when I do mundane things like wash dishes and sit with the sisters. The Kingdom of Heaven, I see, isn't confined to Heaven. The oneness of the Church militant and triumphant is not limited to intention. Those saints walk with us whenever we are doing God's work, whether we realize it or not.

Most of these thoughts existed in my head in some fashion, be it a solid idea or a wisp of a notion, long before I came here, but now it seems so obvious. How the hell did I miss this? How did I not notice that I was living in the midst of such a huge thing? It's like living your whole life in the Amazon and only years into it hearing the racket, looking up to see the trees, the leaves, the flowers, the creatures, the birds, the sun – my God, the sun!

I realized tonight that I am afraid to leave this place, where I have a chapel at my disposal 24/7, where prayer is assumed and is part of the routine, where Mary walks so tangibly, where the best is assumed and expected of everyone all the time. I also realized I damn well better own this and make it stick, because leaving here and leaving the sun behind is just not an option. Perhaps this is why I’m so eager to put all of this into words, so I can refer back to it, and quite possibly that’s why I can’t, so I have to actually absorb it and make it my heart. Words might help with that, but only The Word can really do it.

Rapport

At the basketball tournament last night. I climb the bleachers and sit near a group of my 6th grade boys, enjoying my pizza.

Studnt: You gonna let me have a pepperoni, Miss C.?
Me:Mmm, nope.
Student: What about sharing and being nice?!
Me: I'm teaching you for free, isn't that nice enough?
Student: That's just a bad deal, is what that is.