Past and Future (tweaked repeat 2015)

“…It’s got me hoping for the future
And worrying about the past
‘Cause I’ve seen some hot hot blazes
Come down to smoke and ash…”
a few lines from Joni Mitchell – Help Me

(Thistles at the The Cliffs of Moher/ Co. Clare, Ireland/ Julie Cook/ 2015)

Has the past left you worrying about the future?
Will the future find you wistful for the past?
Does the present find you hopeful about much of anything?

Have you turned on the television, read the paper, seen the stories?

Terror attacks on a beach.
Heads chopped off like weeds.
Migrants flooding across both land and sea.
Legislation turns topsy turvy.
Killings where we worship.
Good guys now set bad guys free.
Sharks lurk hungry in the surf,
While flags flap in the wind.

A culture sees what was and decides it’s now time to
strike it all from sight, from history, from acknowledgment—
Seek and destroy quickly lest anyone notice.

And so hysteria cries foul as the masses must now acquiesce.

Wipe it clean with the sweep of a pen and that’ll make it right.
But do it quick and don’t dare pause to consider the bigger picture.
Just erase it from view and that’ll be the end of it…for now.

Rewrite what was and that’ll keep them happy, quiet, confused…
or out of sight and out of mind as we lose our minds.

Is straddling that fence getting uncomfortable?
Is the grey any more clear?
Upside down for one is now right side up for many.
Thought you knew which way to go? Think again.

Masked and muzzled.
Vaccinated with a passport.
When rainbows once came after the storms and
Hope grew out of the past…

History once directed our future…
and we thought everything simply made more sense…

Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal
that has come on you to test you,
as though something strange were happening to you.
But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ,
so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed.
If you are insulted because of the name of Christ,
you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you.
If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any
other kind of criminal, or even as a meddler.
However, if you suffer as a Christian,
do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name.
For it is time for judgment to begin with God’s household;
and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who
do not obey the gospel of God?
And, “If it is hard for the righteous to be saved,
what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?”
So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves
to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.
1 Peter 4: 12-19

“A drop of ink may make a million think”—(A rerun)

(image, www)

Yesterday, a fellow blogger and pastor known as Slim Jim,
(https://veritasdomain.wordpress.com/2019/12/26/what-is-your-favorite-post-that-you-wrote-in-2019/),
asked his fellow bloggers what was their favorite post from the year.

Not which post may have generated the most views or likes or comments…
but rather what post did we enjoy writing the most or felt as if we’d hit the mark the best…?

Maybe it’s because I was in the middle of dismantling the Christmas tree and was feeling
my typical sense of melancholy and discontent or maybe it was because I had not eaten all day
and was feeling somewhat brain dead and hangry, but I just couldn’t bring to mind any one particular post
from the past year that stood out…

However, I did remember a few from the past previous years that stood out.

I’ve also noticed, from time to time when looking over my stats,
what previous posts have received a high number of visits despite their
having been written several years prior.

There was one post in particular that I actually noticed yesterday,
from way back in 2013 which was shortly after I started this blogging business,
had received several views.

I often wonder what brings multiple viewers to a years-old post.
Was it a random search?
Was it the sharing of something found by one, offered to another?
Who knows how people find things…but find they do.

This particular post was one that I actually recall with a sense of satisfaction…
in that I liked it, I felt it said something and I still find it relevant.

I pulled it back up, cut and pasted, added a few grammatical corrections…
and so without further ado… let’s look back to 2013…

The title of today’s post by Lord Byron, albeit a bit poetic,
certainly prompted me to think–as in I imagine that was Lord Byron’s point.

Just mere ink on paper…forming letters then words has, down through the ages,
changed lives,
changed governments, changed nations…
From the Talmud on ancient scrolls, to the Magna Carta, to our own Declaration of Independence,
ink and paper possess tremendous power.

Men and women die defending ink and paper.
We fight one another over ink and paper.
Ink and paper have sadly caused people to take their own lives.
It’s all a rather overwhelming combination when you actually think about the simplicity
of the two as single entities, and yet when combined together,
how staggeringly strong and powerful the two become.

Nathaniel Hawthorn, the early 19th-century American novelist,
reminded those of his day that:
“words—so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary,
how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them.”

This statement coming from a man who wrote the Scarlet Letter—-
the powerful tale we all read in High School. A tale about a single red letter.
The red letter ‘A’ which was literally forced upon a young woman, as a mark about her life.
She was to wear this scarlet letter for all to see… a visible sign of a private indiscretion
made very public.
A single written letter, worn and changing lives forever.

And when I think of a small rather pitiful man who took pen and paper to write about
his “struggles” in Mein Kampf, and how that combination of letters which formed words,
became a psychotic manifesto of a single disturbed individual which worked an entire nation
into a frenzy of death and murder…I am amazed.

Or what of another angst-ridden man who put ink to paper, forming a doctrine of living
which in turn sent another nation to revolt against it’s ruling czar,
changing the course of history and our own lives forever—

It becomes so overwhelming…
Because it all started out so simple…
It started firstly with ink added to paper, with the forming of letters and finally words…

Sadly today so many of us casually, and even callously, throw words around,
never taking time to ponder the consequences or outcome of those words…
words that are now so easily clicked off on a computer or phone.

From toxic and viral e-mails to emotional ranting tweets—
words and their piercing effects are almost unemotionally thrown out toward individuals,
thrown out with the intentions to hurt, to mock, to belittle–
allowing the offender to hide behind them—

No longer is it really ink on paper.
Letter and words now form on screens—be it the screen of a computer or a screen on a phone.

And so I wonder…
Did we think more clearly, more carefully, when we were actually having to take a pen or pencil
in hand to a sheet of paper?
Thinking more thoughtfully before today’s rapid-fire texting?

Did we consider our words more carefully when we were actually writing slowly,
letter per letter, word built upon word?

Were we kinder, more thoughtful, more determined, more committed?

Perhaps or perhaps not—but what if we were more thoughtful of our words
and of the choice of those words…..what then???

So on this Monday morning, a new day to a new week, consider the words you write…
the words you type—the words you spit out during the course of the week—
Think about how powerful are they.

What is their true intent?
Do you wish to harm or to help?
Do your words represent who you truly think you are?
Be that a kind and benevolent or rather a caustic and trite individual…
My hope is that we may become more mindful when combining letters into forming words—

And thus the question remains…what shall your words be…?

How do I contact you in Heaven?

If you tell God no because He won’t explain the reason He wants you to do
something, you are actually hindering His blessing.
But when you say yes to Him, all of heaven opens to pour out His
goodness and reward your obedience.
What matters more than material blessings are the things
He is teaching us in our spirit.
Charles Stanley

(my godpoppa and me on the day of my wedding–with Mother looking on,
he was the priest who presided over my wedding in 1983)

I use to write letters.

Real letters with a real pen and real paper.

Real words.

Real scratched out mistakes.

Numerous misspellings.
Typos.
Grammatical errors.

There was no spell check—only a dictionary.

Sometimes your letters were typed, sometimes written by hand.

Mine were always by hand.

I use to write you so many letters.

You use to write to me as well.

I still have a box with so many of those letters and cards.

If the truth be told, we really meet through a letter, you and me.
In 1975.

I still have the card you sent.

When I went away to college, I use to sit at the bus stop writing feverishly before the bus arrived,
whisking me off to yet another class miles across campus.

I’d sit in the park, back propped against an ancient oak tree, writing.

I sat up late on the night before my wedding, writing.

We wrote one another long before there were computers…
ages before there was texting.

We wrote on paper and cards.
We put stamps on envelopes and we put letters in a post box.

We would each excitedly spot that telltale script…written and addressed
with our name—
it would arrive in the day’s mail.

I checked my box at least twice a day.

Wonderment and even excitement filled our thoughts.

We’d each steal away…to a quiet private place as we’d tear open the postmarked envelope.
Savoring the “Dearest Jules” or the ‘Dearest Godpoppa”

Apprehensive and anticipatory wonder mixed with anxiousness…
coupled with a deep sense of joy…
accompanied the arrival of each letter and every card.

What was the word?
What was the news?
What was the need?
What was the advice?

We wrote for nearly 40 years…back and forth…just you and me.

The subject matter growing often hard and difficult with time.

Those letters…the writing and the receiving.
The intimate words shared between a surrogate father and his adopted goddaughter.

The pouring out of the most sacred and secretive thoughts from the novice to the wizened
sage.

Confessions.
Encouragement.
Idle chatter.
Hope.
Love.
Compassion.
Warnings.
Advice.

You were born in 1922
You were adopted in 1923.
I was born in 1959
I was adopted in 1960

Lessons taught and lessons learned.

And yet now, now when I need to hear from you the most, how do I write to Heaven?
How do I address such a letter?
What would you tell me now…how do I proceed?
What should I do?
What would you say?

I’ll be waiting…and I’ll be listening.
Somehow I know you know.

“Out of the heavens He let you hear His voice to discipline you;
and on earth He let you see His great fire, and you heard His words from the midst of the fire.
Deuteronomy 4:36

“A drop of ink may make a million think.”

(photograph: Julie’s desk 2013)

The title of today’s post by Lord Byron, albeit a bit poetic, certainly prompted me to think–as was the point I suppose. Just mere ink on paper…forming letters then words has, down through the ages, changed lives, changed governments, changed nations….From the Talmud on ancient scrolls, to the Magna Carta to our own Declaration of Independence, ink and paper possess tremendous power.

Men and woman die defending ink and paper. We fight one another over ink and paper. Ink and paper has caused people to take their own lives. It’s all a rather overwhelming combination when you actually think about the simplicity of the two as single entities and yet when combined together how staggeringly strong and powerful the two become.

Nathaniel Hawthorn, the early 19th century American novelist, reminded those of his day that “words—so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them.” This statement coming from a man who wrote the Scarlet Letter—-the powerful tale we all read in High School of the single red letter A literally forced upon a young woman, to wear for all to see, as a visible sign of a private indiscretion made very public. A single written letter, worn, changing lives forever.

And when I think of a small, rather pitiful, man who took pen and paper to write about his “struggles”, Mein Kampf, and how that combination of letters, forming words, became a psychotic manifesto of a single disturbed individual who worked a nation up into a frenzy of death and murder….or of another angst ridden man who put ink to paper, forming a doctrine of living which in turn sent another nation to revolt against it’s ruling czar, changing the course of history and our own lives forever—it becomes so overwhelming to me….it all simply starts first with ink, then paper, then letters, then words…………….

Today so many of us causally throw words around never taking time to ponder the consequence or outcome of those words which are now so easily clicked off a computer or phone. From toxic viral e-mails to emotional ranting tweets—words and their piercing effects are almost unemotionally thrown out at individuals, with intentions to hurt, to mock, to belittle–allowing the offender to hide behind them—-

No longer is it really ink on paper. Did we think more, do we think more, when we are actually having to take a pen or pencil in hand to a sheet of paper rather than the rapid fire texting we seem to have reduced ourselves to today….? Did we consider our words more carefully when we were actually writing, slowly, letter per letter, word built upon word….were we kinder, more thoughtful, more determined, more committed? Perhaps not—but what if we were more thoughtful of our words and of the choice of those words…..what then???

On this Monday morning, a new day to a new week, consider the words you write—-type—during the course of the week—how powerful are they? What is their true intent? Do you wish to harm or help?
Do your words represent who you truly think you are—kind and benevolent–or caustic and trite….my hope is that we may be more mindful when combining letters into forming words—
What shall your words be….