BECAUSE I AM WRITING THIS, I AM NOT DOING THIS (SEE PICTURE)

To those for whom it is Jan. 1, Happy New Year.


To those for whom it is already Jan. 2, Carry On, and many more.


To those whose calendars are still awaiting the new year, don't feel too bad about being reminded twice in a short span of time that you are one year older.
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This is a picture of a simple rubber band motor powered model airplane.  It is constructed from simple plans which serve as the outline for balsa wood strips that form the skeleton of the aircraft.  You can see them clearly through the light tissue paper "skin" of this cleanly built model.
A model of this size could be purchased for $0.25 in the 1940's and early '50's.  Young people such as I was then would build one or two per week, and compare them with what their friends had done.  We would then go out and fly them until they were so thoroughly destroyed that we would beg our parents for another $0.50 for another model, glue and 1/8" rubber band.

THE ZERO -- NOT A SINGLE ONE LEFT -- I HEAR

THE STEARMAN -- STILL A DREAM IN A BOX

In fact, I still have two of them in the box, untouched.  One that I built numerous times in my youth, the famous Mitsubishi "Jap Zero" and one that I have only dreamt about, The Stearman Bi-Plane.  I pray that I will have the time to see these dreams through to reality.
Maybe I should make this a secondary New Year's day resolution...spend some time building model airplanes.  Hhhmmm... Just a thought.


I was about 10 when I built my first "flying model".  A picture of what it should have looked like is right here.

No, mine did not look like this!

The second one was a Stinson Avenger.  My father bought this one for me because it was the first model that he had built as a boy.  He used to tell the story about how well it flew.  He, and I, were hoping that I could duplicate his feat of many years before.  I did not succeed in making the finished product fly on its own.  It was quite a personal defeat for me.  Frankly, I suffered many a defeat in this area.  It wasn't until I had children of my own and taught them how to build "flying models" that we succeeded in building some winners.  But before then I built a "ton" of quasi winners and another, larger "ton" of losers.  Here are the numbers 2, 3, 4 in order.

Stinson Avenger

This one turned out looking a lot better than the P-47 Thunderbolt, but it too did not fly under its own power.  It was good at gliding, which the P-47 was not.  So there was a little progress in my life.

Piper Cub -- Excellent glider

This was a great glider but once again, even though it flew well from a hand launch, I was defeated in the effort to make it leave the ground on its own.  This was actually, as is pictured, the time when I learned to keep the wings separate from the fuselage and secure them with a rubber band, as is shown here.  It was the first "trick of the trade" that I learned.

Messerschmidt -- What a loser

Fokker D8 -- Another disaster

These two German war planes were disasters in two ways.  Although the Fokker D8 looked and performed better than the Messerschmidt, it was not very good, although I made it look good.  Secondly, all my friends really got all over me for not sticking to American war planes.  So, you know what that meant.  No more German for me.  I succeeded in getting praise from my friends for the following efforts, not necessarily in any order from this point on.

Grumman Hellcat, Spitfire, Corsair, P-51Mustang, Douglas Dauntless and once again I went German with the Stuka4 and finally, because the Zero was getting a lot of attention as being better than our American planes, we all went to building Zeros.  I confess that we related to the fact that the Zero was giving our boys huge headaches over the Pacific, they were also giving us children headaches too...As good as they were in reality, we couldn't make them fly any better than any of our models of domestic and British products.  Seriously, this meant something to us.  We could not figure out why these planes could be better than ours in reality and not be better in our own hands.  Think it over.  Maybe there is to this day something of that type of relativity in your own minds.  I know that whenever I hear a politician or talking head say that we have the best of anything in the world, I snicker because I know that it is erroneous to its core.  There might be one or two things, but 95 out of 100, it's wrong.

All during this time we were building the occasional Piper Cub, Aeronca, Curtiss Wright biplane and one guy even tried a Sopwith Camel.  Biplanes were too much of a challenge for us, so we shied away from them.  Note that it was not a time when we went to the hobby store and sought out "easy to fly" designs from engineers who were seeking the solution to the "guaranteed to fly" promise.  We were seeking to replicate the real world in miniature so that we could see it in our own back yards and live it in our own way.  


I grew older and the sport of baseball took my time away from the model airplane table.  I did not lose the desire to build better and better planes.  In fact, as I grew older I became better at the craft and did some pretty nice things with my children when they got to be 8 or 9 years old.  Together we built models that really flew very well.  We've gone beyond that now.  I live with the desire to realize my masterpieces.  There are some decisions that the Voice from the Kitchen and I have to bring to fruition before that.  I wonder if God will give me the time and the health to do it.  I hope he does because these two plans cost me $35.00 each.  In the old days (late 40's) they would have been $1.00.  I know because at that time my last model was a Grumman Hellcat of the same dimensions as these two and it cost me $1.00.  I finished it.  It looked swell, like we used to say, but because I did not have the savvy that I have now, I couldn't make it fly.  I guarantee that if I get a lick at the two I have in the box, they will fly.  Stay tuned.

HELLO, I'M HERE. ARE YOU THERE?

To those for whom it is already 2011, Happy New Year.
To those for whom it is not yet 2011, catch me tomorrow.
To those for whom 2011 is already ancient history, I wish you health, happiness and peace no matter what calendar you follow.
To you Chinese, I beg that you pray for me.  I have 11 more years to go before completing the 7th cycle around the Zodiac.
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Now, here's a thought.  Not a new one.  One I have spent a lot of time with and expect to spend a lot more time with going forward.  I am even intrigued by it right now.  I think that there will be some human, somewhere who will read this.  In fact I really believe that there will indeed be a human who will read this.  The intriguing part of it is, I don;t know who that human is and more than likely will never know.  Believe it or not, it really feels rather strange to be in this position.  
It all started when I was still young and I wondered how the radio announcers knew that there were people listening to them.  I had to really twist my brain around some tortuous logic to get an answer that was really not to convincing to me.  I got myself to answer the question to myself by reasoning that the announcers themselves listened to the radio and came to the conclusion that there were some announcers whom they liked and some whom they did not.  I had to twist myself around the same logic for other things, like newspaper reporters, movie actors and actresses and authors of books.  I was mystified by the separation that existed between the sound and the human making the sound.  The real mystery was that we, the listeners were developing emotions resembling those of real, live, tangible, person to person relationships with the voices that we heard over the radio.  It also seemed that the voices over the radio were developing "relationships" with us.  Not that, whomever you may be, was real creepy to me.
I had the good fortune to get something of an answer to my thought from my brother who had a fairly long term career as a radio announcer.  He said that over time the audience grows and also over time, the audience comes to know you in person through certain inter-active social events.  
After a while, says he, it gets to be like you're on the telephone but no one answers.  You don't mind because you really don't want to talk to them anyway. (I just made that up for effect.)
So now, here I am, writing away and although I know that someone, somewhere, somehow is going to read what i write, I confess that I can say "I know" because I believe it, not because I am absolutely, scientifically sure that it will indeed happen.  It is rather challenging to convince myself that I am really contributing to the social and spiritual treasure of the world by what I do.  Every writer has the same challenge.  Well, not every author, just about 98% of us.  I have to tell you, it is very fulfilling sitting here and contributing to the world's pool of written ideas, not matter how many will actually read what is here.  Let me just say that I do it as much for myself as I do for you, dear reader.

I DON'T WEAR A SUIT AND TIE TO CHURCH ANY MORE

This is not church, but it is comfy!

Now, ain't that something?  The first thing that happened is that 35 or more years ago I moved to California.  That was an awakening about the meaning of dress.  of course, even in California things were a lot more formal than they are now, but a lot less formal than they were in Massachusetts.  Slowly but surely I got a little more detached from the formal duds.  Then I suddenly decided that at my age I didn't have to impress anybody any more and besides, God, who knew me in my mother's womb, wasn't impressed to begin with.  So I started to relax my stringent personal rules and did away with the necktie thing.  Oh, I'm not completely scraggly and gutter snipy (That's not a word.  It comes from "snipe", like in "gutter snipe".  My spell check is going nuts.)  I still don a suit coat for some special occasions, mostly for church stuff if I have to appear in front of the whole congregation.  Now, here's the truth.  I'm actually typing with one hand because I have my right hand in my heart to show you that I'm not lying.  Oh, and by the way, I know what it means on the Internet to "be typing with one hand."  So to all of you who snickered, I caught you.  Now, back to my secret.
My father was a stickler for formal dress.  I mean, a stickler.  Me?  I hated it.  I wanted to be in my dungarees all the time.  BTW (That's Internet for By The Way), there are no "dungarees" in California.  There are only "Levis" or "Jeans."  So, all my life I fought this whole "to live with people, you gotta be people" axiom all the way.  I didn't help myself when I got to be clergy.  Talk about dress code.  You could get excommunicated in Rome if you were caught out of cassock and collar.  It was quite a relief when I went to the Philippines.  We actually had a work clothes wardrobe.  It was rather comfortable and the bishop never scolded us for it.  We had a reputation for being the Coca-Cola priests because our "uniform" was approximately the same color as that of the Coca-Cola delivery truck drivers.
So anyway, now I am comfortable.  No one tells me what to wear anymore...(Ssshh, don't tell her I said that.)  I'm sure  that God doesn't mind.  It is a little bit of heaven on earth for me.  I thought of this because it is the 50th (actually 51st year) of EFR Dion's birth into the Eternal Kingdom.  I figure he is safely and snuggly under the wings of the Creator, so I can get away with dressing the way I want.  I wonder if that will get me more purgatory time?

WE THREE KINGS OF ORIENT ARE,

The other day I got an idea that struck me as something that is totally new to me and had never entered into my life before.  I have been rolling it around in my gourd since then and I have finally decided to try to put it down in concrete terms.  I have to tell you that it is once again another religious thought, or at least one that takes its meaning from my interpretation and understanding of a religious event..
I happened to be thinking of the Magi, the "Three Kings" who came to visit the Baby Jesus, per the Bible story with which we are all familiar.  This event is traditionally interpreted by professional Bible scholars as the moment when God enlightened the rest of the world, outside of Palestine, concerning the universal presence of His Son in the world.  This is the New Testament announcement of the presence of God to all humankind.  God had actually taken steps to make His Chosen People realize that they had a mission to others, but they never quite caught on.  Even in politics, none of the alliances that the Israelite kings tried worked out very well.  Now, in the Gospel stories we have "kings" coming to Jesus and bringing valuable gifts.  They recognize Him as a king also and they are warned to protect Him in a spiritual way.  The same way that Joseph had received his message from God.  Love those dreams!
The thought that has been rattling around in my cage is this:  by giving gifts, they came to know Him better.  By giving gifts, they came to know His reason for being better.  I get the intuition that this is a way that God has of revealing Himself to us.  I think of the Old Testament sacrifices and the expectations of God regarding them.  The demands he puts on His Chosen People (us, really) are very strict and very bold.  Offerings must be offered to Him and to Him alone.  They must be the first born, unblemished male of the flock, not the runt.  By giving the least, we show that we love ourselves more than we love the one to whom we are giving the item.  Think of Cain.  When we think of giving a gift to someone, we look into ourselves and try our very best to understand what would make the greatest impact on the recipient.  This forces us to enlighten ourselves about the person.  Even if it is our spouse; our child; our parent.  When it comes time to give a gift, we realize just how little we know of the person to whom we want to offer it.  It is in preparing for the act of giving that we delve into ourselves to try to uncover some more of the mystery of the beloved who is destined to receive a part of us.  This preparatory period even creates a change in us.  We many times feel apprehensive about how the gift will be received.  We ask ourselves if it is proper, or if it is good enough, or if it "fits".   I wonder if the Gospel writer thought of all these things before putting his story down on paper.  I bet that God was thinking of it and saw to it that we too would come to understand it at some time in our lives.
Thanks for letting me share this experience of mine with you.  Let it be one more reason why you should not offer me tears at my funeral.  By reading this, you know that it is one gift that doesn't "fit."

ADOPT A FAMILY, AND NOT JUST FOR CHRISTMAS. JUST A THOUGHT.

The pictures you see here tell a small fraction of the story of the Adopt a Family Ministry at Holy Family church/parish in San Diego,California.
The picture at the immediate right is a view of some of the 125 boxes prepared for the families who were judged to be the most in need of help at this time.  There were more than 125 families in the program, mainly through the food bank distribution center of the parish, but the overflow of about 100 families was channeled to two other Non-Profit Social/Spiritual programs who partner with the program at Holy Family.  The facilities of Holy Family cannot productively support more than 125 families.
Inquiring minds will perhaps be wondering how the parish gets to identify the families who can use the help offered by the parish.  The question, "What's in the boxes" may also arise.  Well, I'm about to tell you, so hang in there for a few moments more.
This program has been in action for nearly 30 years now (28+) at Holy Family parish.  It is an activity directly connected to the St. Vincent de Paul community active in the parish.  It was introduced by the members of the chapter of St. Vincent de Paul during the first year of the establishment of the charitable society's chapter at Holy Family.  The leader of the project is the same person who was there at the very beginning.  Her name is Terry Clark and she is standing tall for you right here, below and to the left.

This was taken on the very day when the 125 families who had been identified for the benefit of the program would come by and claim their basket. (See picture at the top)  Each container was personalized and contained items that would answer the most pressing needs of the recipients.  Some packages were intended for widows, some for elderly couples, some for families with children, some for shut-ins and some for people in circumstances that neither you nor I can imagine.  The people are identified through contacts made throughout the year by dedicated people who are called by God in a special way to visit parishioners door to door as a ministry.  Many are also found because parishioners report the situation either to Terry, to the Pastor or to a member of the St. Vincent de Paul Society community directly.  When such information is delivered, the in-house visits begin and  will occur a few more times during the year.
The picture above was snapped a few short minutes before the real traffic would begin to move.  Terry was holding her trusty pencil so that she and her helper could keep a running tally of who took what and when.  Before this, Terry showed me around and introduced me to the packages neatly arranged on the floor (see above) and tagged for easy identification.  It was like letting me into her own home and letting me hug so many of her special friends.  In the short time that we spent together she told me the short version of how the "Adopt a Family" program started at Holy Family parish.  She told me how at first she would worry about money, but then learned to just throw it all into the hands of God Himself.  From that moment on, for 29 years, she has never had a worry.  Through the St. Vincent de Paul Community this program shares in four fund-raising events that are held each year.  Throughout the year, and mostly at Christmas many of the parishioners freely donate cash and kind for the program so that in the end, every needy person gets help.

Father Michael, Spiritual Father of Holy Family Parish

While I was listening to the story, I noticed that there were many people around helping.  Even young people.  Terry is glad to have them because some of us older specimens are not what we used to be when it comes to moving heavy stuff around.  All of the "volunteers" I saw were indeed from the parish territory and some of them were there to satisfy court orders to perform civil service hours for one reason or another.  As it turns out, there are some of the members of the St. Vincent de Paul Chapter in Holy Family Parish who help people under court orders by offering them work around the church for the duration of their sentence.  What was happening before my eyes was therefore an exercise of Christians helping one another in many more ways than one.  In the spirit of full disclosure, even I accepted a piping hot cup of fresh coffee which I consumed during my visit to the distribution site.

When all the volunteers were gathered and everything was ready to go, the pastor, Fr. Michael came into the hall, gave a short exhortation and a blessing of thanks to one and all, exchanged some polite pleasantries and exited right to allow God's work to proceed.  I distanced myself from Terry because she now had to focus on the task at hand, orderly distribution.  I remained by the side of her right-hand aide-de-camp, Alicia Esparza. Alicia, like Terry has been a key to the "Adopt as Family" program for the 29 years of its existence.  From Alicia I got filled-in about the wonderful fraternal spirit that has existed among the many different ethnic and national groups that comprise the parish.  Alicia and her husband Alberto have been our neighbors for more than 30 years, so it was very uplifting to spend these moments of spiritual experience with her.  


This visit was the first time that I had ever seen this operation up close.  I thank God for giving me the time, the freedom and the grace to spend time with the zealous disciples who dedicate themselves to His basic Mission of caring for the orphans, the widows, the sick and the infirm.   Terry suffered the sudden loss of her husband a short time before the due date of the very first "Adopt a Family" event.  Like the good and zealous servants that she is, she didn't look back then and doesn't now.  She knew that the support of her beloved would continue from above, so here she is, in the spirit of the loving Jesus and her spiritually present spouse carrying on for the comfort of God's People.  I'm declaring to you right now, I will not cry at Terry's funeral because I firmly believe that God will just take her by the hand and they'll go for a walk in His Eternally Blooming Garden.  If I don't cry for her, you don't have to cry for me, even if just to get even.

BULLETS, I'VE DODGED A FEW... I've caught a few, too...

THIS DICK AIN'T DUCKIN'

I'm sure that everybody gets these seasons when the past intrudes upon the present and it can be fun or the opposite of fun, whatever they call that.
Lately, past day or two, because "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" has been in my ear, I was thinking about the "naughty or nice" part.  I was assailed by a bunch of pictures about some of the bullets that I have dodged in my life.  Most of  them lead to some laughs, actually,proving my father's axiom about life, "when things go wrong, start laughing now because you'll laugh at this when you think of it five years from now."  I am not going to get specific and long winded here, but I do have a few that are safe for mixed company.  I'll start with the one that is the most insane, but the least morally questionable.
1. Sliding my sled down Spring Street Extension when it was rather icy.  Just once.  I am    still alive, and that means that my guardian angel hadn't bailed on me.
2. Putting live bullets (9 mm luger) into the incinerator just to see what they would do.  They popped, of course, and I was rather disappointed about  that.  Not really the kick I wanted. Booorrrrinngggggg.
3. Cutting old lady Lewis' clothesline on cabbage night.  Talk about sweet immorality.
4. Attending about 50% of my scheduled classes during the last year of university.  I wish I could say that I was home studying all that time, but I can't, so I won't.  I did discover some great German beers that year, though.  I did graduate with honors too.  The Italian (Roman) wine is what did it.  BTW, 50% is an exaggeration on the plus side.
5. Struck out 3 times in the championship baseball game for that season and stranded two runners in scoring position.  I always blamed it on the fact that I had been hanging around with the village skank most of the afternoon, but I don't know how valid  that is.  Point is, I hardly ever struck out.  The bullet I dodged was that we won anyway and no one ever found out about the other thing. 
 ("Til now, of course.)
6. One time, we were entertaining the family in San Diego and we ran out of wine.  I jumped in the car and went to the super market a mile away.  I bought the wine, jumped back in the car and headed back for home.  I had to wait for a light.  Sitting there, I got rammed in the back, just as a cop cruiser was taking a left at the light and he saw the whole thing.  I was driving a van and the guy who hit me had a Toyota "Z" and two small children with no seats to hold them.  I got out, I talk to the cop and we're friendly, but he's really tightly wrapped about the other guy.  I look as the back of the van and everything is cool and I suddenly realize that I must smell like a wine cellar.  So I say to the cop, "Ain't nothing wrong with my car, so I think I'll just be shoveling off!"  He says, with a nice sweet smile, "Sure, Digger, I can handle this.  Drive carefully."  I smile and zip off, knowing that I had just dodged a canon shot.
7.  This is the prize winner.  I'm about 12.  It's winter.  I throw a snowball at a bunch of "Harpies" from Holy Rosary who are on the other side of the street.  The missile goes awry and right through an old lady's window.  Now, this "Frog" is in deeeeep &%$(*@#.
I take my medicine like a man.  I go talk to the lady.  I give her my father's name and our address and she says that she'll send us the bill.  Well, I had a plan.  I would just intercept the mail and no one would ever know.  Let me tell you, Satan must have been wanting to put a move on me, because as a matter of fact I was able to intercept that mail.  You all know that guardian angels don't play dirty like that.  I remember it like it was yesterday.  The bill was for $1.50.  I also remembered that a lot of people did not have telephones, especially older people like that lady.  You are the first to hear this confession.  
PS  Denis, if you are reading this, this happened in Russell Mayo's neighborhood and I think we were walking together since I was going to get the bus one block up from the car barn stop.  Maybe you might have been there too.  Oh well, that's my story Santa, and even YOU did not get to know about it.

SANTA CLAUS TAKES A HIT, NOT FOR RUNNING OVER GRAN'MAW

SANTA AND JESUS

This was a good year for Jesus and an off year for Santa.  At least in  the church that we attend.  Three homilies by two different priests made the point that Jesus and Santa share the same day, and we have to choose Jesus over Santa. Here, you see the priest sitting among the children at the Christmas Mass discussing that matter with them in a question and answer format.   I have to confess that as a long time unbeliever in Santa and a life-long believer in Jesus, I was happy to hear what I was hearing.
I think that I was about 8 or 9 when I told my father that I knew that Santa is a hoax.  He asked me how I knew, and I told him that all the gifts we ever received had real people's names on them.  We were always told to thank the giver of the gift.  So I told him that I was off the Santa kick.  Much to my disappointment, he told me to be careful how I talked to my brother and sisters so as not to ruin their Christmas.  I was disappointed then, and I continue to be, because I can't figure out why my father and my grandfather would not have come clean with us.  I live with that to this day.
God blessed me with a spouse who is not from our culture, so I had no barriers to bring up my children in the truth about Christmas.  When my wife asked me about Santa Claus, I said, "We work for what we give them and they have to know that what they get is a sign of OUR love for them in the celebration of the birthday of Jesus."  When the children asked us about Santa, we told them that some people believe in him, but that we don't and that Jesus, His Mother and Our Guardian Angels mean more to us than Santa.  So far, Our boys have not been committed to an asylum, so I guess we didn't ruin their lives.
About a year ago I also developed the thought that all the creepy paranoia about privacy seems to be displaced if we try to make our children believe in some jolly old guy who works out of the North Pole with a bunch of elves who somehow has the power to know everything about us, even our inner most, most personal  behavior, even if we never see him.  Yeesh, what a crock!
Anyway, that's my thought as I have cultivated it through the years.  This year, Santa knew that I was going to expose him on the World Wide Web so he brought me absolutely nothing.  Everything I got came from those who love me unconditionally and I didn't have to worry about the reindeer ruining the new solar panels on my roof.  Oh, and we saved on cookies and punch too and celebrated by skipping our cholesterol pill for the day.
Oh, by the way -- No, I did not drink.

IT IS CHRISTMAS AND I'M STONE COLD SOBER

PRETTY AMAZING!  I won't have a drop of alcohol all day.  Amazing!  In fact I have had very little alcohol since February of 2010.  Perhaps 5 or six ounces over all that time.  It is something that I never thought I could stop doing.  There are some other things that I  have taken out of my life, but I never wanted to even think about stopping my alcohol intake.  But I did it.  I guess that proves that all those people who accused me of being an alcoholic were wrong.  I haven't even gone to a single meeting.  Through all my protestations that I am not an alcoholic, it took a nearly lethal blow to my physical well being to make me quit.  No, I take that back.  I didn't quit.  God kicked it out of me.  Now when He gets involved, Paul backs off.  I mean, I don't want to have to endure what ol' Jonah went through.  Three days in a whale's belly?  It was bad enough being nearly five days in a hospital.  At least you get out of the hospital clean and feeling fresh, even though if you're like me, you can't walk.  But at least you're not swimming in a bunch of whale vomit.
So here I am with the Baby Jesus, thanking Him for saving my $%@**& and still wondering how He did it.  I mean, I don't think that there has been a day since I was about 19 or 20 that I didn't have at least one sip (draught?) of some alcohol.  I even always had a bottle even when I was in the seminary in Attleboro.  I used to keep my Canadian Club in a shampoo bottle...yup, right out in the open.  A friend of mine from Van Buren, Maine was my drinking buddy.  2 crazy hockey players who got a kick out of breaking the rules and getting away with it right across the hall from the Big Boss's office.  Man, that was fun.  Now, it's all water.  Gotta keep dem kidneys well irrigated, says the doc.  It's all well and good, but let me tell you, I still remember how much better it was irrigating my kidney's with ethanol than it is with water.  It makes me sad to see that they are now digging into the whiskey stash to run internal combustion engines.  Yikes, what a waste!  But it's probably better that way.  What the heck, it takes an awful lot of that stuff to get a car feeling whoopie.  But just to be safe, if it gets too common, I'll just have to send the Voice from the Kitchen to refuel the family wheels.  After a while, I'm sure that she'll turn to dissing the car for being an alcoholic.  So much for domestic tranquility!
By the bye, did you notice that today is the first full month of this insanity?

SO CAL WWEATHER REPORT

ALL DAY DECEMBER 18 TO 23, 2010


                          10:00 a.m. DECEMBER 24, 2010

Now you have an idea why we live here.

I'll get serious again tomorrow -- Maybe.

It will be the first Christmas without our surrogate Mother, Florfina.

C ya 2 morrow!

NO ROOM IN THE INN, SO...

OK, I have to tell you something.  I have changed my mind about the Nativity scene since about three years ago, or the date on the picture to the right.  This is a picture of me browsing around a shepherd's cave in Bethlehem.  What an eye-opener this was.  The impact on my understanding of the Nativity is still vibrating inside of me.  This is a picture of the first time that I found myself inside one of the caves of Bethlehem.  I returned three or four times more, but this is the picture I chose because of the newness of it all at the time.
We grow up with pictures of the "creche" and we have a pretty hard time to shake that.  You can perhaps not imagine the mental and emotional shock that you get when caves start to make more sense than the stable that we grow up imagining.  My change of mind and faith came in stages, and this was the first step, actually, the second, but that's further down the page. Here we go, step by step.  Hang on, it may be a bumpy ride.
1st -- Nazareth.  Model farm like we have some in the United States where the past is recreated and the tourists parade through "oh-ing and ah-ing".  Interesting because here, for the first time, It hit me and I became aware  that caves are rather common in Israel.
2nd -- Bethlehem.  Go to the hills a little bit further in from the center of the town.  Fields at the foot of the hills and in the sides of the hills, several caves of different sizes.  I tested several of them, and each one was rather "comfortable".  They were all about 4 to 6 feet high from earth to "ceiling" and anywhere from 6 to 15 feet long and 6 to 15 feet deep.  They are real shelters and it is but natural to realize that with animals inside with the humans, even in the Israel Winter, it would not be that bad.  In fact, rather comfortable.
3rd -- Mary and Joseph are from Galilee and Nazareth to boot.  The "city", so to speak, in comparison to Bethlehem.  So a shepherd's cave rather that a man-made structure was perhaps somewhat of a culture shock.  But, like I said, not terribly bad, weather wise.  Remember, Israel (specifically, Bethlehem) is farther south that San Diego, California.  Don't forget the animals -- smelly but warm.  Think of the city dwellers here who sleep with their pets.  Think of the people in third world countries who sleep with animals.  We don't feel comfortable with the thought, but that's because we haven't ever experienced "roughing it" to that degree.
4th -- Assisi.  St. Francis and his love for animals "invents" the stable because there are no caves in Assisi and what does he know?  So, he uses his imagination and slowly but surely the pictures catch on and now for 11 centuries we have what we have, and we like it. By the way, this is not bull.  This is historical fact, thanks to my reconstructive surgery of the last 21 centuries.  But if you want, you can look it up.
5th -- My conscience.  That's it.  I now live with a new reality about the birth of Jesus.  I have to admit that I like it because it makes more sense to me now than it ever did.  There are still some questions that I have that were never satisfactorily answered about the anatomy of the whole thing, but I guess those are not supremely important.  But when you think about it, being among a bunch of shepherds would be as good a place as any to deliver offspring.  I mean, who would have more practice at that sort of thing than professional shepherds?  That's my take.  I had to come to it myself.  I never found anyone, and I mean anyone, who wanted to even talk about that part of the story.
Therefore, you now have a part of me to think about.  Wait until you read the story of what happened at the outset of the flight to Egypt.
Je vous souhaite un bon "Minuit Chrétien."
I wish you all a blessed "Oh Holy Night."

JEWISH PROBLEM

A little bonus for Christmas -- Ah, sons ...

A Jewish businessman in Chicago sent his son to Israel for a year to absorb the culture.
When the son returned, he said, "Papa, I had a great time in Israel .By the way, I converted to Christianity."

"Oy vey," said the father. "What have I done?" He took his problem to his best friend, Ike.
"Ike," he said, "I sent my son to Israel , and he came home a Christian.  What can I do?"
"Funny you should ask," said Ike. "I too, sent my son to Israel , and he also came home a Christian.

Perhaps we should go see the rabbi."
So they did, and they explained their problem to the rabbi.
"Funny you should ask," said the rabbi. "I, too, sent my son to Israel ,  and he also came home a Christian. What is happening to our young people?"

And so they all prayed, telling the Lord about their sons.

As they finished their prayer, a voice came from the Heavens:

"Funny you should ask," said the Voice.

"I, too, sent my Son to Israel - - - 

THE R.E.A.L. REASON WHY I DON'T WANT YOU TO CREMATE ME

Bumper sticker: "Don't piss me off; I'm running out of places to hide the bodies."

This is a picture of a persistent thought that I have had since I was at least 18 or 19...something like that.  Something happened today that unlocked it all and so I have to tell you about it.  It has been a part of my life for a long time.  The only person who really has met this part of me face to face multiple times is my spouse.  Brace yourselves, 'cause here it comes.
I have yearned and yearned to have a hearse to drive around in.  It would be so cool.  The trigger to this deep desire for such a vehicle started when I was working at the Holyoke Magazine Press.  There was an employee there who had one and the stories he told were a fascinating mix of the ribald, the lugubrious, the fantastic, the marginal and the downright incredible.  Every lunch time with this individual was almost like an "out-of-body" experience.  One would imagine that this was what got me interesting in the world of people who drove hearses for their private transportation.  But that was not it.  Anybody can make up stories to fit the occasion.  But not everybody can get down to the essence of the situation of hearse ownership.  This individual hit it on the head for me one time when during one lunch break he was asked where he lived.  The answer was simple, "On the street, in my car.  That's why I have a hearse.  I can live in it, but I could never drive a house."  So that was it.  Freedom.  No mortgage.
I took that and embellished it in my mind.  If I had a house to live in and a hearse too, I would have the nearly perfect camping situation.  I could throw a canoe on the roof and just go.  It was (is still) a dream that does not go away.
This morning when I got to the office address, there was a hearse of the same vintage as the one on the picture.  Same model too.  It was parked in front of the gasoline station store next to our office building.  Along side it there stood two young people sipping some fresh hot coffee.  I knew right away what was going on.  I sauntered over to them and simply said, "Nice car!"  The lovely young wife (she's his wife) said "You knew.  You like it, right?"
"Yeah, I sure do.  Looks so great.  You had it long?"
"About a year now" says the man of the family.  "It sure is comfortable.  We're just pulling in from San Francisco.  Great ride."
"Well, I envy you."
"You ought to get yourself one.  The prices are right."
"That's been tried and failed.  The Voice from the Kitchen doesn't go for it.  I'll just keep dreaming.  Enjoy yourselves.  Merry Christmas."
I walked away and went to the office because I had a lot to do.  As I was preparing my work space the thought came to me that I had better tell someone to be sure that they don't cremate me.  I have just decided that I am going to enjoy the ride of my life when the time comes.  The Voice from the Kitchen won't have anything to say about it.  I'm going to put it in my will.  So, don't cremate me because when you see me driving away to the Pearly Gates in one of these carriages, you'll know that I am happy as a clam.  So for sure, then, you'll not be tempted in the slightest to cry at my funeral.                            
SSSwwwinnggg lowww, SSWWeetttt Chariotttt --->>>

JOSEPH HAD A DREAM

He sure did.  It's not the one you think it is.  It is rather strange that after all these years I dare to think of Joseph having dreams just like any other guy who is engaged to be married.  It came to me when I got the email that had the digital Nativity story link.  It is so real, that it carried me to when I was thinking of getting married. I now know what I never knew before, not first hand, anyway.
Imagine being engaged and getting told by your intended that she is pregnant.  Imagine what would happen to your dreams in that moment. Worse for Joseph, he gets an actual dream that cuts in front of his own dreams.  We are told that this reassures him.  Huh?  What would he have been thinking?  What about the family he had perhaps already "built" in his own dreams?  He had to know his genealogy, so he had to have some hopes for a comfortable future with a family fitting to his ancestry.  Don't you think he must have  had to really love the commoner to whom he was engaged?  And now, this!
We grow up with this story.  I am amazed at the dept and the variety of understandings that grow in my mind and heart every year based on this family.  It took a long time for me to come to this level of appreciation for the dreams that Joseph must have had now that he had found this great lady for himself.  He must have shared them with her and she must have been spending a lot of nights and time during the day dreaming about the future as well.  The part of the digital story that got to me (OK, one of the parts) was the tweet about, "Joseph, we have to talk."  This is so true to life.  It so close to home.
I can't help but feel this way I guess, because I went through some of this stuff at that crucial time of my life when dreams that once were mine, were now no longer mine.  I went through a moment of wondering if the dreams that I seen through to reality had ever been really mine.  I see them now as having been only partially mine and I never, somehow, never really realized how much they were mine and how much they were Ours.  I am now convinced that, like Joseph, there comes a time when we have to see a more complete picture and we can really only do that at a moment when we are open to the Presence that really matters.  We get that moment when we get the message, "We really have to talk."
So, just like Joseph and Mary, we must believe that it is from above that our dreams reach us.  It is from above that our lives are shaped.  So, Joseph and Mary had their good times and their tough ones.  It must have been interesting having a child like this one.  It must have been interesting having only the One in a society where most families had more than one.  No doubt Joseph must have felt that too.
Oh, well, so much for that strange little Christmas thought.  Now click here and enjoy the digital story one more time.

DECEMBER 7 -->> AUGUST 15 SSSHHHH !! JULY 4 -- OH YEAH!

How many of you have worked for a Japanese company?  Hmmm!  Ok, how about a British one?  Well, what are you waiting for?  And do you remember the date of Lionel's wedding to Eileen?  Hmmm?  The thought that got me here is one about the Pearl Harbor attack because of the December date.  It also came first because the first time I worked for a foreign company while here in the United States.  I worked for a Japanese company.  There were many comments and remarks about "did you wear your sneakers today?" This, always in the privacy of some corner or closed office.
The Japanese "surprise"attack on Hawaii always caused the great silence to take place on December 7 of any and every year that I worked for a Japanese company.  I soon learned that it was best for me to stay behind my desk, take a short lunch and leave the office early to avoid the tension filled air.  Actually I remember one year when some of us got into a conversation about the Mitsubishi cars that were beginning to get popular.  One guy made us all laugh when he wondered out loud if they were going to make them steel grey with propellers on the front grille.  One guy said that, "No, that would be too expensive.  They were  thinking of making their logo "0".
That was the way we spent most of the December 7th occasions.
The August 15th days were not much more comfortable.  Every now and then we would hear an indelicate question raised about, "Gotta check with ya about did ya call Missouri yet?"  We always were very careful about what we said in front of our Japanese bosses during these two days.

The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere

Now, I have to say that the Brits were altogether different.  They had as many barbs about the Revolution as we did.  Stuff like, "after we took care of the French in Canada, we lost our thirst for anyone else."  The fourth of July was not somber, by any means.  It was a holiday, true, but the 3rd and the 5th were generally banter and needles all day long.
It has been quite a wonderful experience for me to be able to get these opportunities.  It gave me a chance to live human experiences on the other side of the coin, so to speak.  After having been the employer in the Philippines and in Mexico, I could feel some of the challenges that the people who worked for me in the other countries must have felt.  It is not until you have life experiences such as these that you realize just how different people can be in the most normal and natural situations.  In the instance of the Japanese, for example, I went from having employees who wouldn't, or couldn't ever say "no", culturally, (Filipinos) to being an employee of people who couldn't or wouldn't say "no".  To this day I still  haven't made up my mind which experience was worse.
Oh, by the way, I did meet one Filipino who knows how to say "no" and who is not bashful about it one single bit!
That's it for today.  Believe it or not, I have a couple of thoughts still in the oven, so to speak.  Some great pictures too.

IGNORANCE, INCOMPETENCE, INDIFFERENCE OR AVARICE?

PERFECT MANUFACTURED
SYMMETRY

I can't believe it.  I put my mind about fake trees on the line the other day, and I got an experience today (12/19/2010), yesterday, actually that really got my blood going.  I walked into church in a fairly OK mood.  I couldn't help it.  God is being good to us Southern Californians this year.  So far we're way ahead of the rain accumulation schedule for the season, so most of us who care about rain and drought and other things are rather happy about this.  So, despite the rain, it wasn't too cold and the rain was a good, gentle, steady, soft type of fall.  So I sauntered down the aisle a couple of steps and all of a sudden I got clobbered by an atrocious anomaly.  There in the sanctuary, one in each corner of the back limits of the holy dais stood two perfectly symmetrical plastic artifacts subbing for God's artfully crafted pine trees.  It took about 10 seconds to get me up to around 250/120 BP.
I come from the classical world of only the best that nature has to offer is what you celebrate your prayers with.  It's in the Bible.  You only offer the first born, perfectly unblemished male of the litter to God.  After all, Jesus didn't suffer under plastic olive trees; he was kept warm by real, natural, grass-fed sheep.  He Himself was not fake.  As we say, sometimes, "He wasn't chopped liver."  So I figure that the rules about church candles for the altar and the tabernacle should be at least 90% beeswax and that the plants that are used to enhance the worship space should be 100% natural. A plastic facsimile (two, actually) of a pine tree masquerading as a Christmas Tree is an insult to God.  Let me tell you why.

GOD CREATED THESE

I am not going to talk about anything from Church Law here not even from the Catechism.  Just plain ol' grouchy Paul.  True beauty and awe in nature is not born out of symmetry.  In fact what is grandiosely more awesome than symmetry is beauty that is found in judicious a-symmetry.  The fact is that the greatest part of nature is not symmetrical at all.  Truly natural trees are not perfect triangles.  Man made ones are because that's how we like to make our stuff.  Look out your window right now at your favorite view.  Is it perfectly symmetrical?  Of course not.  Even if it is only a back alley view from some dumpy Internet cafe, I'll guarantee you that it might not be pretty, but its lack of beauty does not spring from the fact that it is not symmetrical.  So, actually, why do we go for the counterfeit rather than the truly God-minted reality?  It's because symmetry is easier.  It's what we do best.  I hadn't advanced to less than 45 feet from these two horrendous blasphemies and I knew that they were perfect pictures of the sinful indifference that seems to rule the world of our times.
A few years ago I learned something about the Japanese people and  their culture as relates to what is beauty and what is not beauty.  For the Japanese, imitating nature is the way to produce beauty.  For the Japanese, symmetry is not the template for beauty.  Beauty is in a-symmetry that causes a spiritual movement of the soul upwards.  This is the kind of a-symmetry that is actually found in nature.  Think about it.  Trees, even when they are full of leaves have all kinds of "defects" but put a bunch of them together and you still appreciate the beauty of the ones (almost all) with "defects."  And what about the times when they have no leaves?  Look at  them.  They still have  the power to make us feel that they are beautiful.  Now, get personal.  Look in the mirror.  Are your eyes both the same size?  Is your nose straight? Does it have as much mass on one side as on the other?  What about your ears?  Even if you don't like your ears, look at them anyway and realize that they are perhaps not the exact same size and that  they are perhaps not on a level the one with the other. You don't even have to go to the mirror. Look at your hands; your feet, etc.  Now go somewhere to your favorite statue or your favorite painting.  Look at it.  Does it fail to follow the law of a-symmetry?  If so, is it really beautiful, or is it "technically" well constructed but contains too much symmetry?  Why do you suppose the Pietà can make people cry?  I'll bet that part of it is because the two people it represents are not standing side by side to one another.
Anyway, that's my thought for the day.  I had another one too about St. Joseph.  I've got time left for that one.  I've got it noted so I won't forget.
Somehow I hope the pastor makes the mistake of "bumping into me" in the next fews days.

IS IT NEWS? IS IT TRUE? WHAT DO WE DO NOW?

I have to talk about this because it is both humorous and serious.  I actually think about this rather often.  When the war ended in Europe, there was no big hoopla because we were still slugging it out against the Japanese.  Oh, we talked about it, but we were just little kids, I was only 8.  I remember I was at Dicky's house (Beauregard) on Smith Street and of course we were not talking politics or anything like that.  But we did get the news but it didn't stir us.  I do remember that it made me feel good because I had several uncles in Belgium and England and I had the feeling that they would be safer now.  When my father came home from work that night, he too was feeling better because his brothers would now be safer than before.

Something greater than that as far as causing an impact on my feelings was the death of FDR.  The picture on the right is a fair representation of the one that appeared in the local Holyoke Daily Transcript Telegram.  The picture of the president was transparent and the honor roll (Holyoke's honor roll, of course) was legible through the picture.  Like I said, I was only eight, but somehow this man's death impressed me.  I guess it could only be that he is the first president that I came to know growing up.  The other thing is that I was living in the middle of a community of dyed-in-the-wool democrats.  I didn't know what that meant either.  I know now, but it was still a mystery then.  I do remember that there was a somber mood all around me for a while, but it didn't really disturb me.  Not anywhere near as much as the death of my aunt Cécile a couple of years earlier.  But that is another story...the two Céciles in my life...and the Basilica in my favorite part of Rome.  Oh, boy!

Anyway, that's the thought until now.  So forward to the final point.

So now I am eight.  It is August.  My father and I go fishing very early in the morning.  It was an hour that my father always said was for crazy people.  So it was early.  We put the canoe on the car and drove off into the early morning dark, heading for a small lake where we knew there would be fish.  It was secluded, so it was nice.  We drifted and fished.  He for pickerel, I for pan fish.  He caught a couple of very nice ones.  He threw back at least three "small" ones. He was too proud to bring home anything less than 18 inches.  These two were all of that and more.  I had some pretty good sized pan fish too.  We had those for breakfast after sun-up.  We cleaned the breakfast site, packed the gear in the car and went back for a couple of hours of drifting, knowing that as the day wore on, we were out there purely for the relaxation of it.  Oh, we fished, but we knew that fish don't eat after 8:00 AM
It was therefore about noon or so when we put the canoe up and got on the road for the one hour trip back to the house.  A little after we got underway we went through a small residential area and there were people all over their yards and in the street, talking, laughing.  My father made a smart Aleck comment that I don't remember and he turned on the car radio.  It was but a few seconds before it became clear what had happened.  The Japanese had surrendered.  The war was over.  No wonder people were dancing in the streets.
The dancing in the streets became more intense as we approached more densely populated areas.  When we got to our town, the streets were full of adults and children beating on pots and pans, yelling, shouting and generally letting the Japanese know what had happened to them in no uncertain terms.  Those of you who have attained a "certain age" will notice that I am caving in to the proprieties of 21st century language when I talk about the J...'s!  There are those who know that in those days there were two "N" words.  You bet!
Anyway, that was quite a day, and of course, I will never forget it.  What I will never forget is what happened about one week later.  As the news of the wars slowly faded from the front pages of the newspaper, I announced to my father, "I don't think we will have any newspaper in September now that the wars are over."
My father looked at me and simply said, "Oh, I think they'll find something to write about."  I was amazed, but I trusted him.  He was right. Many times I wish that he had not been right.  Many times I think that we would be better off without the "papers."  We don't even need them to wrap fish any more, what with the plastics and all.  So now all I have to say is, we kicked their ass with guns and bombs, but they are kicking our ass in so many other ways.  They melted all their "Zeroes" into cars that have been sinking ours for years.  Turn about is fair play.  Hai'! Dozo...

IF IT'S GOOD ENOUGH FOR JESUS, IT'S GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME

Rahab of Jericho and the Two spies 

Note to the genealogy expert of the family (any family, really).  I have some questions that may seem to be a little bit osées (risquées?) but I'm gonna go for it.

This morning (12/17/2010) the gospel reading from Saint Matthew was from chapter 1.  It was the genealogy of Jesus.  This is a part of the gospel of Matthew that could take up a lot of time and space to explain and clarify.  My addressing this to you, dear genealogy person, is a sign that I have given this part of the bible quite a bit of thought over the years.  Now let me slip some stuff by you for simple clarification. 

The line of Jesus has some really questionable "ladies" in it.  Would our family have a madame in its past?  Consider dear Rahab in full regalia there in the picture on the right.  You can find her and her operation by clicking here.  

Then there is ol' Tamar.  Now, she's a piece of work.  You can meet her and read a part of her story by clicking here.

From Rahab to Mary

Have you checked to see if there is anyone like that on our family tree?  Now that would be quite a branch.  Somewhat more than just a twig, I would say.  Talking about the women whose names appear on the list, what about the import from the mortal enemy, Ruth the Moabite?  We wouldn't happen to have anyone like that in our line, would we?  You know, some maliciously misguided miscreant of a Protestant or something like that?  Can you assure me that we are pure there?  

Who knows, maybe we have a king in our past, after all, Jesus did.  But give me a break, a murderer and an adulterer.  Do we have to live with that too?  But worse still, Jesus goes back to the great sinner / saint (David) through the king's bastard son (Solomon) whose mother even Matthew has the decency not to name.   I sure hope that we can do better than that.  The last woman to be named in the genealogy is Mary, and we all know her story.  She was blessed and latched on to a real nice guy from another line of Jesse, the father of the aforementioned king.  It is a good thing that this happened this way because between Samuel, the first king of Israel, and a real low-life, hateful of David, all the way to the days of Herod there was a long string of riff-raff in the royal descendency of Our Beloved Lord, Jesus.  Seriously, you have checked out our ancestors and weeded out the chaff, right?  I mean, look what it got Jesus.  He didn't make it past 33.  Maybe there is some kind of strange worm in our family tree, what with all the young men and women disappearing at real young ages.  Of course, there were some interesting stories in that bunch too...and the one that sprung from them.  My feeling is "Hey, if it could happen to Jesus, who am I to complain?"

So, two things.  One:  You'll be hearing this genealogy read in church in the very imminent future, so check it out, enjoy it and remember the stories.

Two:  If you still have some homework to do to clear certain anomalies up that could make us feel better about ourselves, (Yourselves) you're invited to come to Italy and France in August of 2011 to polish the ol' apple, so to speak.  More details later.

So, how's that for a thought?  

WINTER FUN AT NIGHT

I WISH THIS WERE THE REAL VIEW THAT WE HAD
FROM OUR BEDROOM WINDOW

The picture is but a poor approximation of the view that we had from our bedroom window during snowstorms.  Needless to say, we had no digital cameras then and no television and at the time when we had the greatest fun peering out the window into the snowy world was before we were permitted to have a radio in our bedroom.  So of course, Winter was our greatest opportunity for free entertainment.
Let me say that we were not artists appreciating the wintry beauty as created by God Himself.  We were looking down at the slippery T intersection.  We spent many hours waiting and actively anticipating the slipping and sliding of automobiles that hit the right turn too fast and would skid and fish-tail their way down the intended road rather than to run into our house.  Oh, the times we had leaning on the window sills, quietly staring and whispering in a conspiratorial way about what our wager was that the next vehicle would do.  Sometimes, it would begin to snow after we had gone to bed.  If we noticed it, we would wake one another to spend time by the window.  It was the best way to enjoy the view and to enjoy one another quietly without drawing the wrath of our parents. I don't know about my brother, but I think of this a lot.  
I especially think about it when I get email PowerPoint shows with the ten commandments of how to grow old gracefully, how to protect yourself from Alzheimer's, how to keep your blood pressure low and a myriad of others that simply cause me to hit the "delete" button and start the day dream about our night "show" and the warm personal companionship in which we enjoyed it.  Those were simple times.  Those were innocent times.  Those were times that, believe it or not, formed our relationship for the rest of our lives.  I think, even more than the times after we were permitted to have a radio.  They were good times especially when we were awaiting Christmas.  If if began to snow and we could play our little game, we wouldn't wear ourselves out emotionally about what Christmas would bring.
I am not wishing for the gold old times.  I am enjoying the 21st century too much.  I must say that our present situation does have its negative aspects.  But then again, so did the past.  Those of us who were there can attest to that. 
The most important thing that these moments gave is the work of the grace of God, filling us with mutual fraternal love, then and now and forever.