What Matters to Me

In recent months I’ve taken up grad school and stepped away from the blog. My life is still interesting, I swear, but I just haven’t had much time to reflect. I got in my first real car accident on Saturday, and it made me slow down for a second and just relax for a moment. I went back and read through some of my posts over the last year and was impressed with the online journal of my life that I had created. This reflection has once again motivated me to continue my efforts in maintaining this blog.

So what is there to talk about? My life does revolve around a weekly cycle of routines. Monday through Wednesday I focus on grad school. I’m supposed to be committing about 20 hours a week to this endeavor, and it’s limited to these three days. In the past this time was used volunteering with Community Hope and attending some sort of church group. I hate having to spend all this time on school, but what are you going to do? Friday is either high school football night, or watch a movie and go to bed at 9 o’clock night; “date night” as Stephanie knows it. Saturday is my Sabbath and is dedicated to watching Michigan football with my old roommate from college. This typically involves the nervous consumption of beer, as our team has become very exhilarating to watch. Sunday’s typically involve a walk to Morning Times where I call my various family members along the way, followed by a few hours surfing the web when I should be studying, and then a trip to the grocery store to buy food for the week. And there’s my week. Oh, except for Thursday…raise your hand if you noticed that I left out Thursday.

A night that used to be dedicated to NBC’s spectacular comedy lineup is now known to me as dinner night. Stephanie and I decided a while back that Monday’s in Moore Square handing out sandwiches and hanging out, just didn’t have a place in our busy lives. We wanted to focus on maintaining the relationships of the friends we already had, rather than shooting the shit with whoever happened to be in the park. After I got back from my summer hiatus, some of the guys down at the homeless shelter wanted to catch up, so Stephanie and I hosted them for dinner at my place. We had such a good time that Stephanie suggested that this become our new weekly ritual….and it did.

So every Thursday around 6:30, either Stephanie or I drive down to the South Wilmington homeless shelter and sign out Michael, Clint, and T. I write down “Visio Dei Church Community” as my organization for whatever that’s worth. Whoever is not picking up the boys is usually preparing a wild dinner. When I say wild, I mean wild…at least by my standards. It started with Stephanie preparing some pretty incredible meals, and then I felt the need to participate. It’s turned into an exciting experimental experience every Thursday as we’ve created some of the most fantastic and fun meals I've ever eaten. We’ve done “Whities” (a sloppy Joe version of a White Castle), make your own Calzone, Fondue night, inside-out burgers, Boston Coolers (a Michigan favorite), roasted smoares, and these are just the meals I’ve played a hand in helping with (Stephanie has done some much better cooking than I). My roommate Joanna usually eats with us and is in charge of experimenting with another wild creation this week. Stephanie’s brother is the only other regular, but some of my other friends like @thesamed and @billkcummings make guest appearances.

The meals have been fabulous, but the highlight of Thursday night is the post dinner Corn Hole competition. Usually around the time the rest of my friends are watching The Office, I am dominating the Corn Hole sidewalk in front of my house with my partner, T. There have been some epic battles the last few weeks that I won’t bore you with, but I will let you know that it has been legendary…and T and I always win.

In the details here, I’ve forgotten to mention my friend Ricky. We do not need to pick him up at the shelter as he has just recently moved off of the streets and into a rental house. Last week he called me to let me know that he couldn’t come to dinner as he was in the middle of painting the inside of his house. I said, “That’s a shame man, we’re having inside out burgers this week.”

“What’s that?” he asked.

“It’s a hamburger with cheese and bacon on the inside, topped with cheese…and bacon-“

“-when can you pick me up?”

At the end of the night, I drive the boys back to the homeless shelter. They typically complain about having to stay there and how they spend all week looking forward to Thursday. I never tell them this, but the truth is, so do I.

Guatemala

On Sunday, I returned from another awesome trip down to Guatemala. I was just there back in April for Painting Lemonade, but when I was leaving I looked out the window of the airplane and saw an incredible view of green mountains and towering volcanoes. I told myself that I had to come back and explore this country. So just a few months later I was back with my friend, Chris to ride around the country on rented motorcycles. Probably not the most sage decision on our part, but we managed to both make it back in good health. Although, there was one run in with a chicken bus that left Chris off the bike for a few days, but he recovered and we had a great time. As usual, here's a video, but you can also check out all of my pictures here.

If you ever get the chance, Guatemala is a fantastic place to travel. The volcanoes are incredible, the food is terrific, the people are friendly, and it's all very affordable. You can usually fly there for under $400 from the states, and stay there for between $5-$20 a night depending on your standards. From Antigua you can take a bus to just about anywhere in the country for less than $25. With many more volcanoes and Mayan ruins left for me explore, it's a safe bet that I will be back.

Home

First it's off to Guatemala to ride through the country on motorcycle, but then I'll be heading home. I've learned that home can be wherever you make it to be. Life in Arizona has been great, but I'm ready to come home. I've got something special waiting there for me.

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Life In Arizona

Aside from just trying to find a warmer place than North Carolina for the summer, I am out in Phoenix to watch over my sister's children. She is going through chemotherapy, trying to work full time, moving next weekend, and her children are out of school for the summer. It's great out here. There's good ultimate 3 nights a week, awesome hiking if you can bare the heat, I get plenty of time to work on my graduate classes, my parents are just an hour away, and it's absolutely gorgeous. This morning I hiked to the top of Camelback mountain.

As far as city hiking goes, Camelback is probably the best in America. It's very similar to Flattop Mountain in Anchorage, Alaska. It's very satisfying to see exactly what you are hiking to the top of and then get rewarded with an incredible 360 degree view when you get there. From the top of Camelback you can see the entire Phoenix area.

If I lived in Phoenix, I'd probably try to capture the sunrise from up here every few months. They say 300,000 people climb to the top of Camelback every year, and I would consider it a must if you ever come out to visit. However, city hikes are not my favorite. The top of the mountain was small and crowded with about 20 people when I got there. I didn't stay there long before heading down the backside and getting off the trail to summit a lower peak at the far end of the mountain. From there I got to soak up the scenery by myself without the distraction of so many people. I even took the time to practice some self photography.

During the week I get to entertain the niece and nephew. They are 7 and 5 respectively, and all they ever really want to do is swim in the pool. With the temperature frequently breaking 110 degrees, it's about the only thing we can comfortably do outside. Fortunately my sister has a great, little pool that offers some relief from the sun. This is key as I probably spend about 2-3 hours out there every day.

I've learned that one of the best strategies in raising children is to wear them out during the day. If I get these two in the pool and toss them around for at least an hour in the morning, they'll have no problem at all going down for their nap after lunch.

Seeing that my family lives in Arizona and I live in North Carolina, I only get to see them maybe twice a year. Fortunately, because of my job as a teacher, this is the second time in three years that I've gotten to move in with my sister for a month. It actually fits my personality quite well. I don't keep up with my friends too well, but get us back together and it's like we've never been apart. Most uncles would never have this opportunity to live so closely with their niece and nephew, even though they'd probably see them more regularly than I see mine.

It would be nice to live out here someday, maybe after I spend some time in Africa. More likely, this will probably just be a place I get to stop in for extended periods of time. I'm about half way through my time here, and I'm going to try and enjoy every last minute of the time I have left.

South Africa preps for World Cup

Is there any doubt that OTL is the best show on ESPN? I'm a little concerned that South Africa won't have everything completed before the cup, but I'm sure they'll be fine hosts nonetheless. This should be good for thier image, good for their economy and a very enjoyable experience for them. FIFA is doing a lot of things all over Africa and their efforts are very well accepted by the locals. Hopefully these programs will continue after 2010. Here are some thoughts from some boys in Soweto on what football and the World Cup mean to them:



On a personal note, I had been planning on living in South Africa next year before my plans fell through. Not to sound too cliche about it, but I think it is for the best. My interest in Africa has a lot to do with getting away from the hustle and bustle of Western life and moving to Joburg at the time of the World Cup may have been a nightmare for me. I'd prefer to watch football in Gulu at a bar with just a 13" screen and about 50 guys crawling on top of each other, rather than a packed staium with $10 beer and obnoxious drunks, but I'm kinda weird I suppose. Also, I have fallen in love with my girlfriend, Stephanie and I can't imagine what it would have been like to have to leave her for a year. America's not too bad I suppose.

CAMPING FAIL

I told my mom that I was bringing my camping gear out to Arizona with me this summer so I could do some hiking and camping. She said, "Yeah, that's a great idea, and we should take your niece and nephew!" My idea of camping is filling up my backpack, hiking a challenging mountain trail, and sleeping in a remote area; none of which I can do with the niece and nephew. I was planning on going solo, but my mom anxiously misinterpreted my intentions and put together a family trip. I practically grew up on a KOA, so I can understand her confusion. Trying not to be a camping snob, I convinced myself that it would be fun to sleep outside and "ruff" it with my 7 year old niece and 5 year old nephew.

Not having much interest in site camping, I let my mom set up the whole thing. We drove about 40 miles south of Tuscon to the Coronado National Forest. The site was supposed to be at elevation, but instead it was located at the base of the mountains. It was 99 degrees when we walked out of the car around 2pm. Our "campground", was an RV park and we were the only campers crazy enough to pitch a tent on this day. My niece and nephew laughed at the meager size of my tent as their tent towered over mine. Dying in the heat, once we got the air mattress set up in the house tent, we hit the pool.

After pool time it was dinner time. We discovered a community grill next to the front office and I went over to cook some hot dogs while my mom was going to cook some canned corn on their old Coleman stove. I was turning hot dogs over the grill with my fingers when I heard, "CHRIS! CHRIS! HELP!" I casually turned around and saw my mother standing next to a roar of flames. It appeared that the picnic table was on fire and my mom was in a panic. Fortunately, I was next to the front office and I sprinted into it. I threw open the door and said, "My mother just lit our picnic table on fire!" The lady behind the counter had no idea if they even had a fire extinguisher and we both searched the room. She grabbed the phone to call the fire department when I found their extinguisher and took it outside. I'm not going to lie to you, I've always wanted to rip away that plastic cable tie and pull the metal pin from a fire extinguisher, and it felt pretty cool to finally do this for the first time. I ran out there and blasted the plastic table cloth that had blazed up so wildly.

As we all caught our breath, I was proudly grinning to myself for saving the day. A man standing near us pointed and softly spoke, "Hey hombre, your tent."

I turned around. "Shit!" Some of the smoldering debris had found it's way in the tent and the air mattress was ablaze. I blasted the tent with the extinguisher as the mattress shriveled up to nothing.

Despite the interruption, the hot dogs I was cooking turned out fine, but with the damage to the sleeping bags and tent, this camping adventure was toast. We arrived back at my parents house just 7 hours after leaving that day. I found the whole experience to be quite funny, while my mom was a little more shaken, exclaiming that she thought the entire desert was about to go up in flames. The probable cause of the fire was high wind gusts combined with a poor connection to the fuel line in the Coleman (mom's fault, not mine). My mom claims that the tent fire was my fault as the blast from the fire extinguisher (not the heavy wind, mind you) blew hot debris into the tent. She also went on to complain about the white dust I got on everything.

Oddly enough, camping with the family turned out to be just like I remembered it being as a kid. It's no wonder neither of my siblings like the outdoors.

Prosperity Gospel

The older I get, the more I realize that the message of the gospel is a tough sell. This message will likely cost you your wealth, your security, and possibly your life. This message led Jesus and 11 of his 12 closest followers to the grave. I don't know about you, but that's certainly not a path I want to go down.

A much easier message to sell is to give away 10% of your earnings and the Lord will pay you back and then some; giving money to God is an investment. This is the message of the prosperity gospel and here is a great ESPN piece on high profile athletes and their high profile churches.



If you want my humble opinion, there's probably a special place in the afterlife for men like Creflo Dollar. I hate to say it, but I think my heightened image of Kurt Warner just fell a bit. Not to be too hard on the guy, but I honestly think that he is more comfortable getting involved with ministers who are wealthy. It would probably make him feel very uncomfortable dropping by Joyce Meyer's house if she lived in a modest home, or heaven forbid in the ghetto. What we have here are prosperity ministers who tell the rich exactly what they want to here: God loves you and has blessed you and will continue to bless you abundantly as long as you do a list of things. And I think it's safe to assume the list includes tithing 10% and the blessing includes personal achievement and wealth.

Messages like this make me want to rip out the Old Testament of my bible and throw it in the trash. That or steal a bunch of money from people I consider my enemies and take it back to my giant home full of wives and slaves, as I could make a pretty good biblical case for that. Giving away money is NOT an investment, it's a way of life that shows that your values are greater than money. I don't get how these preachers read the same bible I read and live such different lives. The message of prosperity and even security died with Jesus. Am I missing something here? What scares me is that I actually think Creflo Dollar believes what he preaches and is justified in acting the way that he does. What's scarier is that more Christians probably agree with him than me.

A message to Kurt Warner, if this ever finds you, please stop giving your money to a mega church and just give it to the poor.