THUMBPRINTS

Last Hoorah

It's our final 24 hrs. on the coastal side of things, and we've decided to start clickin'em off with a beach front view.  A farewell "wave", so to speak.

Sitting out here never gets old. Wind, shimmering blue, Starbucks...pretty much paradise for a prisoner of thought like me.  How can even the least sentimental among us not be affected by what I'm staring out into right now?  I can get my head around the concept of becoming jaded to the music industry, but turning a calloused eye toward all of this baffles me.  It could have something to do with immensity.

The vastness of what we're dealing with here, as opposed to the finite fence line of the known music industry, is much greater than anything we could possibly get our limited heads around.   In short -- what truly moves me, are those things which are much bigger than me.

Unearthed

By stepping down from her targeted perch, Sarah Palin has done more in baring the leftists' teeth than most other high profile conservatives could've accomplished in a lifetime.  It's as if she simply stood up, shook herself, and scrubbed off the bull's eye.  This move proved to be a real groove-buster for those who've secretly tried to keep her in their line of fire.  They've made it very easy for the rest of us to be onto their agenda by how rapidly their bogus, inane air-fillers began spewing through their fang-lined gums.  To accuse Palin of anything right now is like Ali accusing Frazier of throwing punches.  Amazing what time unearths...and it's still ticking. 

Flick Night

We watched The International last night.  Great flick.  It was basically an elaborate attempt at painting the impenetrable vastness of corporate corruption.  I get it.   

It revealed how sometimes the successes we achieve can grow into ogres that end up living beyond any moral compass whatsoever.  They insulate us, desensitize us, & feed that part of our flesh that craves for a penthouse built above the law.  One in which the view is always looking down upon the rest of the little people.

Even in my small slice of community there exists unforeseen swaths of allowances that are repeatedly being made for arbitrary groups of friends & relatives that are just down right shocking.  This is where actions go deeper than the mere skin of prejudice, and it all starts with subtleties.  Little words & preferences that have daggers hidden behind them.  What begins with "oh, that's just her way", or "I wouldn't read anything into what he said", or "they just weren't thinkin'", ends up being a preamble to a much longer rap sheet -- the little warts on the hide of a monster.

If these feet in the door are given their room to be nourished and grow, they soon become numb to their own devices, and embody the ethical structure that's not much different than the ficticious corporate bank we observed last night.  We all carry within us the same innate hunger to control whatever threatens our own insecurities. 

The scenario we witnessed last night wrapped up with the never ending cycle of sin.  Injustice still prevailed.  The bank continued to flourish, despite the debris-trail of bodies it had left in it's wake.  A very accurate portrail of this world's horizontal view of survival.  But as for my family & I, we will continue to aspire to a higher, vertical view; one in which we are new creations, where these aspects of the world are passed away and everything is brand new.  

Lore

Time tends to exaggerate reality. The longer a memory sits & marinates, the longer the tale grows. 

The first time I went back to my home town after years of separation, everything seemed so much smaller than I'd remembered.  The lake that went on forever had somehow adopted a new boundary.  The houses on Lake Shore Drive that used to intimidate the snot out of me had shrunk down into what seemed little more than middle-class homes.  Even the Civic Center looked like an average-sized venue.  It was as if I'd returned from the Land Of The Giants.  It was all sort of dizzying. 

And yet, what I just described, is exactly how legends are created.  The character traits in people from the pages of history books end up looming much larger than the pages of reality.  There tends to be a disconnect between them and us; and, for the sake of having heroes, we force relevance out of the picture.  We'd rather believe in a fictitious version of their life's account if it gives us an added hope to cling to -- no matter how false that sense of security may be.  In so doing, we've immortalized these figures into an almost demi-god level of status.

As a Christian, the dangers of buying into this tendency is in that disconnect I mentioned.  We start assuming that the disciples & the apostles of the New Testament were given some exclusive gift of "sainthood" that enabled them to live out their struggles from an otherwise, unattainable level of divinity.  I believe in having heroes to model our lives from; but, when the relevance is lost, it's almost as if we start exercising our spiritual walk from the foundation of denial instead of the rock of reality that Jesus so longed to build beneath us.  These guys were just like us.  The very reason their lives were included within the canon was for the sake of relevance.  The ferocity of their struggles was just as impossible as ours.  Their flesh was just as thin & weak as ours.  They were us.

What we are to read, internalize, and walk away with is how they overcame.  Not what level of sainthood they attained.  Their accounts are there for us all to unearth that enemy-clouded hope of actually winning this thing.      

Ready, Aim...

My father-in-law treated Seth & I to a semi-annual gun show expedition this morning.  It was amazing.  It embodied the fantasy of most south-of-the-Mason-Dixon-Line-husbands by selling everything that couldn't legally make it into an average flea market; and yet, it still somehow managed to maintain the same vibe.  Each kiosk displayed unique varieties of stylized tools to cut, dismember, or totally obliterate anything in its path.  Nothing like a good, old-fashioned, Uncle Sam shot of testosterone to kick off this 4th of July.  I think even my neck now has a slight hint of red to it.

So, what did I walk away with?...Slingshots.

Yep.  The heavy duty kind with the wrist guards & surgical hose.  All you need are a lot of rocks and a few soda cans & hours of boy-fun lay in front of you.  I'm now sitting on the bench swing in the back yard, watching that exact scenario play out in front of me.  The moving picture of Bishop & Seth taking aim in a very familiar stance seems crazy to me.  It really doesn't seem that long ago when yours truly struck that same pose down in Soutwest LA.  With the exception of this laptop, life now has that "not much has changed" feeling.  And yet, anyone sane can readily see how that's anything but true.

The world as I knew it in '74 was simple, clear cut, even archean compared to the dualistic mess my boys now have to wade through.  Complication is the artillery of our age.  Pulling the trigger on anything Post Modern has become a convoluted task.  True independence no longer exists in that Wild, Wild West state of dreaming.  It now has to be tempered by media bias and a politically correct model of bureaucratic tolerance.  Empty rhetoric.  We've gone from the Iron Age to the Slag Age.

So, it does my heart good to rediscover this day of independence through my two sons.  Outside of true freedom (read my wife's blog), there's something to be said about just grabbing a rock, pulling it back, and lettin' 'er fly.  

Vacation To Mars

It's hard to define the amalgam of thoughts and emotions that went careening through my brain while staring into a Nags Head sunset last night.  My family & I packed up the truck & drove from the in-laws' early yesterday morning toward our trip-within-a-trip on the Outer Banks.  Being only 1.75 hrs from yet another piece of heaven makes for a ridiculously cool family getaway part deux. 

After 4 hrs. of beach-side ocean gazing, and the greatest buffet of crab legs we'd ever witnessed, much less gorged upon, all four of us were teleported to Mars to watch our sun paint out the rest of the day...

If you've never had the privilege to experience the sand dunes of Nags Head, trust me when I say: it's like no other place in the Northern Hemisphere.  Through all of my travels, I thought I'd seen sunsets...but after last night, I now feel as if I'd left my planet for the first time.  Hundreds of people festooned the horizon of each and every dune crest in a stippled pattern of moving outlines.  Kite strings dripped to earth, connecting sky to sand at random intervals.  Water from the sound-side glistened from the falling sun's ever-morphing palette, while the wind carried traces of brine from the Atlantic's endless view behind us.  Above us, the growing moon loomed like an approving celestial eye, taking it all in.  And, before I exit this diatribe of descriptive prose, the main ingredient needs to be exploited to the nth... 

Serving as the backdrop to everything was a sunset that could've only been rivaled by the aurora borealis.  When the sun disappeared, the light show was just starting.  The intensity of hues that brush-stroked the sky's canvas looked more superimposed than real.  The deepness of reds, pinks & oranges emitted a euphoric grandeur that was downright interplanetary.  While standing underneath it all, "surreal" wasn't a justifiable enough adjective. 

Carrying all of these memories back to Hampton made our late-night return trip bearable.  Even with sand still in all the wrong places.

Double Date

Sheri & I had dinner with Loren & Felicia Barton last night.  For those who don't know, Felicia was one of the unfortunate souls who fell victim to the wacked TV agenda of American Idol this past season.  I remember watching her perform, being blown away by her chops, and then imagining my hand reaching through the LCD to strangle every deaf alien that had a hand in sending her packing back to VA.  Dumb, dumb, dumb. 

As it turned out, Sheri had grown up with her in-laws, the Bartons (actually baby-sat Loren when he was 4, but we won't go there).  So, when we were asked to have dinner together in VA. Beach, we accepted without question.  Any time we have the chance to affirm the credibility of God-given talent in those who've felt the acute sting of things like secular bias, you gotta know we're on it -- ears ready & heart wide open.  Don't get me wrong, they weren't in emotional traction & tossing in the life towel by any stretch' they're actually at areally good place right now; but, it always helps to be encouraged along the way.  Believe me.

After the seafood disappeared, we watched their amazing 2 yr. old, Malechi, dance free-form around a city fountain while we kicked back & chatted without letting time dictate one second.  Hadn't done that in a quite a while.  Talk about catharsis.  We'd forgotten what life was like without the tick-tock of diapers, cereal, milk-warming & naps yoked around our necks.  I even remember smelling the downtown air and re-discovering my senses, as kooky as that sounds.  Deprived? - maybe; blessed? - without a doubt.

We capped the evening off with a quick listen-through the working demos they'd carved out thus far, and let me be one of the honored first to say that the world will be hearing a lot from Felicia Barton in the very near future.  She's definitely on the right track.  As a matter of fact, she's on the right 10 to 12 tracks.  No matter what man does to thwart true talent, God has an amazing way of looking after His gifts, and seeing them through to the end of His will.  If He gets lifted up, nothing in this world is as unstoppable as His hand.  Not even 100 million viewers.

 

Angler Man

Yes sirree.

As the inset shows, this guy is into some serious angling.

Not only do I love to reel in the big ones, but I make it a habit to show my appreciation for each one allowing my hook to maim and disfigure their mouths for the sake of timeless shots like this one. 

Joining me on the Buckroe Pier were my father-in-law, Curtis; Cousin (in-law), Sam; and my 11 yr. old, Seth.  For our 3 hrs. of labor, we managed to snag 5 fish, total.  Out of which, 1 barely reached the status of keeping for a future half-meal.  But then, that wasn't the goal anyway.  Just hanging out over the railing with the the setting-sun's wind in our faces was objective enough. 

At least, it was for me...

Ft. Monroe

My in-laws treated the entire family to a brunch buffet spread at the Officer's Club in Fort Monroe yesterday.  What a cool place.  As a self-proclaimed, arm-chair archaeologist/history buff, this was an unexpected needle in my big blue. 

After about 20 min. of security check points, the incredible view began to open up.  From the general's estate, to the barracks, to the ever-eroding ruins with their mold-upon-rust exteriors; the shockingly short drive to the restaurant made for a visual appetizer.  What added to the effect of it all were the sounds blowing in from the surf to our immediate right.  Having an inlet beach fed from the Atlantic as our backdrop to everything was just down right overwhelming to a creative sap like me.  

Once in the restaurant, our table hedged a parquet dance floor that wasn't just there for looks.  It was never empty of moving couples.  Ballroom moves dominated.  Midi-heavy, latin grooves filled the air -- the sounds of which brought me back to an early '80's mall stroll past the organ stores.  My resurrected reunion with Boss A. Nova, if you will.

Then, the food entered my mouth.  Wow...

The sensory over-load was complete. 

Hard to believe the rumblings of our government shutting that place down very soon.  If those rumblings are accurate, I'm so glad I had a chance to soak it all up now. 

Moments

Interesting day. 
Sort of a lull after yesterday. 

I know life can't always give you 24 hr. cycles of birthdays; but then, it's not supposed to give you the news of famous people dying on a daily basis either. 

When Seth, my 11 yr. old, told me that Billy Mays, the celebrated pitch-man, had just been found dead in his FL. home, those smudgy glasses of surrealism suddenly flew down over my eyes.  Not that I was a big follower or anything, but I did sit next to the guy on a flight home a few months ago.  He was cool.  Not nearly as arrogant as you'd expect his persona to make him out to be.  How crazy is it that he & these other mid-lifers have dropped off right under our media-heavy noses.  Talk about feeling no control. 

This week should serve as a megaphone for everyone who lives by the notion of invincibility.  As a matter of fact, Mr. Jackson even used "invincible" to title his last studio project (which reeked, regrettably), & he obviously wasn't.

So, here I go again.  Ranting about holding my wife & kids a little closer today.  Allowing my heart & mind to settle into even more reflection.  Treasuring hours vs. throwing away entire days.  Living the PLAY button less, pressing PAUSE a lot more...

These truly are the moments.