Fall has fallen

The leaves that is. We have 5 pecan trees in the yard and they are working overtime on making leaves, or at least making them fall. The picture is only showing less than half of them and the street is full as well along the curb. Raking and bagging the leaves is probably my least favorite thing to do. Usually we just mulch them with the lawnmower but this year there were too many. I have blown them into piles and am slowly getting them into bags. The city picks them up and they dump them out of the bags. It would be nice if they would invest in a large leaf vacuum and just come by and vacuum them out of the yard. I'm sure that will never happen, but it would save on bags.

Martha is on holiday for Thanksgiving and we will go to visit some friends for Thanksgiving day. We have much to be thankful for at this time. I recently traveled to our daughter's house in Louisiana and stopped at our son's house on the way. I had time to spend with both and with all our grandchildren. we are blessed beyond measure to have them all and we don't get to see them often enough.

As I drove through the forests of east Texas with rays of sunlight filtering through the trees with their red, gold and green leaves, I was reminded of our creator who gave it all to us to care for and manage. We haven't done the best job of that but even so, it is beautiful. We are reminded by Paul in 1 Thessalonians 5:18 to give thanks in every circumstance. The apostle does not say "for every circumstance" but "in every circumstance". No matter what comes our way we can rejoice and be thankful that God loves us, cares for us and is in complete control. He is still on His throne and always will be.

Have a blessed Thanksgiving, not forgetting to really give thanks to Him for all we have.

The cat who came to bathe

The cat who came to bathe

We love cats but currently don't have one. We did have 2 who were brother and sister but they died after 14 years and we haven't felt like we should get another one. We do like them however and several seem to enjoy passing through our yard and drinking water. We keep water dishes in back for the birds and other animals that might pass through and the cats are frequent visitors. Usually they shy away when they see us and will not hang around. This morning though, one stayed around for most of an hour. He knew I was watching him and kept a wary eye in my direction but didn't leave. He would get a drink and then go lay in the sun and bathe. Then get more water and bathe some more. He left once for a minute but came right back to his spot. I enjoyed watching him for quite a while and I took a few pictures for all to see. Here is one of them.

Maiden Voyage

The Builder Chapter 7


The big boat that dad built was in the water but it was 70 miles away in Galveston and dad was itching to get it home to the creek so he could continue working on it. He had already begun to prepare wood to make the mast. It would be made from many pieces of wood and carefully glued together to form a very strong spar. Dad called me in December of that year and asked if I was interested in the maiden voyage. We would use the outboard to travel from Galveston to the house, a distance of about 65 miles by water. Thus I found myself in dad’s VW headed for Galveston way before dawn on a Sunday morning in December. We were to meet my brother there at the boat and be on our way by first light. We had snacks and drinks with us as well as charts of the Intracoastal Waterway which would serve as our highway home. My brother was coming straight from work and ran a bit late but by full light we were under way. We had traveled less than a mile when heavy fog set in and we were forced to put down the anchor and wait for it to lift. An hour later it did and we were once again on our way, but slowly. There was still some fog and we were headed against the tide. The remainder of the day was like that, patchy fog and contrary currents and what wind there was blew against us as well. There was a distinct chill in the air but after all, it was December.

Now the thing was, mother was expecting us about 7:30 or 8 PM and she was preparing a feast for our arrival. You might remember also that in 1972 there were no cell phones and there were few if any places where we might have stopped and called, but in fact I don’t remember that we even thought of it. We were on an adventure and even though we realized that we were hours behind schedule we still didn’t think of trying to let mom know. By dark we were crossing the Brazos River and had about 20 miles to go. At the speed we had maintained all day that was about 4-5 hours. We cleared the locks on the Brazos and continued through the night towards home. In the dark it was hard to gauge progress and we didn’t realize that we were now traveling with the tidal current and were going much faster. The fog was setting in again and it was cold and misty. At times we could not see the bank at all and we were running along very close to it. This part of the waterway has many small lakes on both sides and we were watching the shoreline as it disappeared and reappeared each time we passed the entrance to one of these small lakes. We had crossed the San Bernard River and thought we were crossing the entrance to one of the lakes since the bank had disappeared. We had gone quite a ways in the fog without seeing anything when the boat ran up on the bank and lodged there, firmly stuck in the mud. It was nearly 10 PM and we didn’t have a clue where we really were. At the house, mother was wondering if she should call the Coast Guard or the Sherriff. Supper was done 2 hours ago and now was getting cold. Back aboard the boat we studied the charts and finally figured out that we had been going faster and were about 4 or 5 miles further than we thought we were. The canal makes a left turn at that point and we had crossed the canal and run up on the bank on the far side. The boat was light and we were able to get off the bank and back into the canal. Once we realized where we were, we were able to head on toward home. We finally arrived around 11:30 and after all the apologies and excuses, mom insisted that we eat. So supper was warmed and we ate at midnight. I had to be at work the next day in San Antonio so I left and headed home. Needless to say I was pretty tired by the time I got there but the boat was delivered safe and sound and we had an adventure that I have never forgotten. I don’t think my brother has ever forgotten either and if mom were alive she would remember as well and probably still be upset with us.

Building a big boat

The Builder Chapter 6

Launching the boat

Do you have dreams? I’m talking about those dreams where we envision what we might be or maybe what we want to be, or … I think all of us have them at various times of life. We have a childhood dream of being an astronaut or a star athlete or some other equally stunning career. Later we dream of a mate and a family and by middle age when the family is scattered we dream of reunions and grandchildren and worry that life is slipping away and we haven’t accomplished what we dreamed about. In the golden years, the autumn of life, we dream of retirement. Some will dare to dream big, sailing off into the sunset, exploring the unknown, searching for the meaning behind all that we dream about. I fear that most of us simply dream and never really attempt to bring those dreams to reality or maybe we try and somehow get discouraged and it just never happens. There are those however, who dream big dreams and forge ahead to make them happen. They have that determination, that spark that drives men and women to be successful in endeavors that seem to be huge to those of us that are “want to be’s”. This chapter and perhaps the next two are about such a man who dreamed big and a lot of it came to pass.

I don’t know exactly when dad began thinking about building a boat but it was in those years when I was away in the service. I would come home and he was surrounded with boating magazines. He would talk about the different types of boats and what he thought would be good. He was talking about sailboats and not small ones either. He talked of a long trip aboard the boat with mom as they would travel aboard their own sailboat. After a lot of study and correspondence with others who had done this, he ordered the plans to a 30 foot trimaran sailboat. It would be built out of wood with plywood hulls and glued with epoxy. The year was 1966 when he got the plans and after studying them for weeks, he brought the first pieces of wood home on the roof rack of his Volkswagen. Every piece of wood in the boat came home the same way. I remember coming home that summer and he showed me the first frame he had built for the main hull. This type of sailboat had three hulls tied together by beams that spanned the width of the vessel. It was to be 30 feet long and 18 feet wide. Dad had never built a boat before that I know about, and certainly not one of this magnitude. Noah building the Ark comes to mind. Piece by piece the frames were built and stacked in the garage. He built a backbone in the yard so he could assemble the hulls. Time passed slowly, months became years but always he made some progress. He was still working full time so the boat building was relegated to evenings and weekends. The hulls were finally finished and coated with epoxy and fiberglass. Then came the task of connecting them and building the beams that would be the strongest part of the boat. I think it was sometime in 1970 that he really set a goal to retire and have the boat finished by the time he did retire. The date was set for his 62nd birthday, October 1, 1972. So it would take slightly over 6 years to complete. Dad stayed doggedly on task and by late summer of 1972 it was nearly finished. The cabin was done with bunks and a galley and a portable toilet. He had ordered a sextant, used for navigation, and charts and was already dreaming of sailing off into the sunset. There was still much to do however as he lacked the mast, boom and the sails. These additions would come later but for now he had finished the basic boat. Plans were made to transport the boat to Galveston and launch it soon after retirement. Mom and dad owned the house at the creek that I write about often, so the house in Bellaire was placed for sale and they prepared to downsize and move to the creek in retirement. The boat was indeed launched in early October 1972 at Galveston and christened “Wanderer”. She still did not have sails or spars but there was an outboard motor to provide power.

I’ll continue this in the next installment, stay tuned.

A Car and a Washing Machine

The last two weeks have been an adventure for us to say the least. Martha’s car had developed a leak in the power steering pump or hoses and was scheduled to go in for service on that. As you will see, that service never occurred.

It was two weeks ago today, Martha had gone to Wal-Mart for some things and I was preparing to leave for a board meeting. The phone rang and I answered it. The caller identified himself as a sheriff’s deputy and then asked “who is the woman in your car?” Well that was a strange question so I said “what do you mean?” Finally we got to the point. There was a fire in a vehicle (ours) and they could not locate Martha. The officer called it a little fire but when I arrived there at the Wal-Mart parking lot it looked like a pretty big fire to me. By that time they had found her and the fire was out. No one was injured and no other property was damaged but the car was destroyed. We cleaned it out and they towed it away and it was sad to see it gone forever. We have owned it for 12 years and it was a good old car.

That led us to begin the search for a new car, well not new, but new to us. We looked mostly on the internet at dealer web sites and Craig’s list. We eventually settled in on a Chrysler PT Cruiser. We liked the body style and a lot of the comments from owners were positive. Chrysler even offered original owners a lifetime limited power train warranty, whatever that is, but alas it is not transferrable. We found a couple that we would like to see but they were in Ft. Worth so we had to schedule a day to go see them.

In the meantime, the washing machine started acting up. I had a guy look at it and he didn’t know if it was the water valves or the timer. It still worked so we put off that decision until we dealt with the car. Last Friday was the day to go to Ft. Worth and we found a car we liked and we bought it. Since it was an out of state car we needed to get it inspected and on the way to do that we almost got smashed by someone who ran a stop sign right in front of us. On the way home we came upon an accident that had the road closed and we had to detour around it. Through all of this we give credit to God for protecting us.

We went to bed that night pleased with our “new” car and looking forward to a nice Saturday. About 3:30 am I was awakened abruptly by Martha yelling something about the washer flooding the house. Sure enough that was the case and after a bit of chasing around we got the water off. She cleaned up what had gone on the floor and we went back to bed. It had just started and somehow Martha was awake at that hour and heard it so there was no real damage from the water. The problem turned out to be the hot water hose that connects to the wall. In the process of fixing that I found that the other problem was a bad valve so I was able to fix all of that at once. So again we praise God for waking Martha up and her hearing the water leak. We are blessed and we are grateful.

The Builder Chapter 5

Airplanes again


I think I mentioned airplanes in the second post of this series but this post will be about a few more airplanes that were prominent in our life in the 50’s. As I said, my dad was a prolific modeler and sometime in the early 50’s he got into flying control line airplanes. We had two acres and the back half or more was mostly open. We mowed a circle of about 140 foot diameter and that was where we flew. Mostly dad and I did the building and flying, I don’t remember my brother getting into it much. These planes used a glow plug engine and flew in a circle with 60 foot control lines that allowed the pilot to control up and down as the plane flew. The rudder was installed in such a way as to drive the airplane to the outside of the circle and keep tension on the control wires. Dad built many airplanes and flew them all on Sunday afternoons and occasionally at other times if someone wanted to see them. I remember 2 particular models that he built that were twins. He built them from scratch using plans from a magazine and he labored on them for months. Parts were cut from balsa wood and glued together and the plane was covered with a silkspan paper and then painted with airplane “Dope”. This was a special paint that would resist the alcohol, nitro and castor oil fuel mixture used in the engines.

These planes were finally finished and were perfect. Dad invited some folks to watch the maiden flight. My job was to mow the flying circle and viewing area. I did that and on Sunday afternoon all was ready. The engine was started, the controls were checked and all was ready. As the plane started the takeoff roll it encountered a weed about a foot high that I had missed in my mowing. The control wires caught on the weed and the aircraft swung around and headed straight for the pilot, who was Dad. Of course with no tension on the control wires, there was no control so the airplane was pretty much in free flight. Dad stayed out of the way but soon it began to climb and then from an altitude less than 50 feet it dove for the ground on the other side of the circle. I don’t know how fast it was going when it hit but it was totally destroyed. There was not much to identify the pile of balsa as an airplane. Dad was a bit upset to say the least and I was well scolded for leaving one weed in the circle.

We did remove the weed and were able to successfully fly the twin airplane and in fact it lasted several years and endured several crashes that were more violent than the first plane had encountered. I think I finally did it in by running into an asphalt parking lot at a fairly steep angle.

These were memorable times spent with dad around the model building table and learning to fly them. Dad flew these airplanes for only a few years but I kept at it and even owned a hobby shop for a while in Austin Texas.

There are a few more of these stories and I will get to them as time goes by. Thanks for reading.

Retirement busyness

Retirement was supposed to be slowing down but it seems that since I began this retirement thing life has been speeding up. I have wanted to go to the creek and work on the house for a while but there seems to be something that keeps me here. I am on the board of a local non profit and two committees at church so there are periodic meetings. The non profit held a fund raiser recently and that took time. I am working on a backdrop for the stage in the children's worship room at church and HPU will celebrate homecoming this weekend. A couple of weeks ago was the Brownwood reunion where I drove the train in the parade. So I am staying busy. The trike is mostly done and has a few miles on it but I really should be riding more. I need to make a couple of repairs on it but haven't taken the time to do so. Oh, and the house needs painting and the camper needs some repair on the roof and... I think the list goes on forever. I am sure it will slow down someday.

Fall is here and we are enjoying the cooler weather. Nights have been in the 40's and days around 80 or sometimes cooler. It is much better than the hundred degrees or so of a month ago.

I do hope to post another story from the series I started on The Builder. Maybe I will find time to write that soon.

Growing up?

What do you want to be when you grow up?

If you are reading this (not many do) please comment with your answer.

This is our big question on Sunday as we continue our study of Ephesians.
I'll post more on this subject next week

Have a great weekend and be sure to worship on Sunday

Living with power

Last week our bible study took us to Ephesians 3:14-21. This passage is a prayer by Paul for the Ephesian people. Paul prays for them to be strengthened in the power of the Spirit in the inner man, that is that Christ would indwell them (and us) with His spirit. He then prays that we would be able to comprehend the vastness of the Love of God and be filled up with the fulness of God. This causes him to break out in the following doxology of praise. 

20 Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us,

21 to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.

Most of the time we focus on the first part of verse 20, the exceedingly abundantly beyond what we ask or think part, but the second half of that verse is what is exciting. We have that same power dwelling in us and working in our lives. We are not weaklings in the faith, but we have the Power of God within us.

I finished a book this week, "Fearless" by Max Lucado, which I highly recommend. In this book he reminds us that we should not be afraid of life and what it brings nor even death that comes to all, because Christ has promised to walk with us and His grace is sufficient no matter what valley we are in. This passage in Ephesians reminds us also that the same power that can do exceedingly abundantly more than we ask or think, resides in us and is available to us in every situation. Here is the question,

Are you living in fear, or in Power?

In the eye of the storm

Last night the eye of tropical storm Hermine passed right over Brownwood. Even after 500 miles of crossing land it was still pretty impressive. The winds were gusting to around 30 mph and we had over 3 inches of rain. We may get more but not like the Austin - San Antonio area. Some parts of that area have received 10 or more inches and areas along some rivers have been evacuated. More rain is forecast for that area today and tonight. This storm was in the gulf only a short time but was very powerful as it swept across Texas. It is forecast to reach into Kansas before dying out.

We lost a peach tree and our garden was nearly flattened but that can be fixed easily. We are thankful for the rain. we hope some fell near the lake and replenished our water supply. We were desperately in need of rain in this part of Texas.

VBS in Uco Park

Have you ever tried to do VBS in a park? Believe me, it is an experience. Those of my readers (not many) who are from or know about Del Rio, TX will probably know where Uco park is but for the rest of you, it is located near downtown Del Rio, adjacent to the railroad track and directly in the landing approach for the airport. The trains are frequent and often have armed border patrol officers on top of the cars.

The folks at FBC Portland used to go to Del Rio each year for a Mission VBS and we did it in Uco Park. There was a small Hispanic Baptist Church about a block from the park and we lived in their facility while we were there. We always arrived on Saturday and the whole neighborhood would be there to greet us. The first time I went, I was amazed. The women of the church cooked the best Mexican food ever and we always ate way too much. Sunday we worshiped with them (in Spanish), usually one of our leaders preached in English and their pastor would translate. Sunday afternoon we got ready with last minute details and usually took our big blue bus around the neighborhood to advertise. It was a ton of fun.

I taught 2nd grade and we usually wound up with 20-30 of them and a few younger siblings that would not go in the preschool area. Most of them spoke English OK so we were able to communicate. Our problem was the heat at the end of July, and the noise from trains and airplanes. These were very distracting and made evrything more difficult. The first year that I went along (probably 1980), there was girl in our group named Esmerelda. She was one who had a brother who was 5 and was afraid to go on his own so he hung out with her in 2nd grade. Esmerelda could never pronounce my last name, I can't either sometimes. She finally named me Father Goose which was as close as she ever got. I had that name for quite a while after that particularly where VBS was concerned.

We went all week long and we would make gospel presentations in the big blue bus for those above 3rd grade. Many a youngster heard about Jesus for the first time in that old bus. Our opening assembly each day was in a ball stadium again with the accompanying trains and airplanes. Those were memorable days for me and I often wonder if anyone still ministers there in Uco park. I'm sure there are still plenty of kids who need to hear the word.

Oh, and there was always the raspa at refreshment time to cool us off.

Meeting needs

What do you do when you pass a beggar on the street? Suppose he was on the steps leading to your church, the place where you go to worship, what then?

We've all seen him, perhaps with a sign that says "will work for food". What do we do with him?

We might cross the street to avoid him, perhaps we can enter church by another door, avoid eye contact at all costs, or maybe you have a diferent answer.

Acts 3:1-10 relates a similar story.

Peter and John were approaching the Temple to pray. It was the usual time, about 3 in the afternoon. Suddenly Peter sees this lame man at the gate and he stops to observe the man. The lame man notices that someone had stopped and hopeful of a gift, he extends his hand with a rusty old cup. Peter and John have no money but Peter addresses the man, "Look at us" he says. "Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I will give you, Stand up and walk".

The lame man looked at Peter with amazement. He had never stood or walked, he had been lame from birth. How would he do what this man was commanding him to do? Suddenly Peter extended his right hand and grasping the lame man's hand, he helped him to his feet. The story tells us that as he was standing up, the bones in his feet and ankles were strengthened and he was healed. The man indeed stood, and he waked and even leapt for joy. He was able for the first time to enter the Temple and worship.

Peter and John had walked this way before many times. Had they seen this lame man those other times? I think they had and had found an excuse to ignore him. This time however, something clicked and they realized that they could meet his need, not just the physical need of the moment, but spiritual as well.

The lesson for us is that God wants us to be involved in meeting the needs of others. We do not have the option of just passing by and ignoring them. God is reaching down to pull them up, our role is to bring them together. We do that by being concious of the needs around us and doing our best to meet them. The resources that God gives us are not for us, but are to enable us to help others.

Worship again

Sunday in Bible study we focused on worship. We mainly talked about corporate worship. We used Acts 2:42-47 as a starting point and this verse stood out:

Acts 2:43

Everyone kept feeling a sense of awe; and many wonders and signs were taking place through the apostles.

There was a sense of awe, amazement, and expectation about what God was doing in their midst. They gathered daily for worship, we have trouble with once a week. Verse 46 tells us they came together with gladness and sincerity of heart. They were excited about every chance to worship God. When they came together they expected God to be present and do something. Too often I think we approach worship with a ho-hum attitude instead of being excited about what God is going to accomplish in us. We expect little and that is just what we get.

Only when we approach worship with awe, a deep sense of reverence and expectation of an encounter with God, will He be stirred to do signs and wonders among us. When that happens we will not be able to contain it in four walls. It will spill out into the streets and communities where we live and our world will be changed.

Are you ready for that?

Building at the creek

I know you probably thought this series had ended but just when you least expect it, here is another episode.

The Builder Chapter 4


In the early 1950’s my grandfather wanted to have a place on the coast so with input from my dad and my uncle he purchased a lot on Caney Creek. Once again the Builder was enlisted to build the house and my uncle was involved as well. From that time we spent every vacation and many weekends down there so they could work on the house. It was about 30 feet on each side and very primitive. There was no bathroom and the outhouse was about 25 feet from the house. In winter it was pretty uncomfortable. There was a screened porch around 2 sides with board shutters in case of storms. The mosquitoes were terrible and each evening we would spray the sleeping area with mosquito spray. It was effective but it was pretty stinky stuff and I didn’t like it at all.

My uncle had a boat and many mornings he and dad would go exploring in the bay and of course that involved fishing. I wanted to go along but for those trips it was men only, no children ever went with them. To make up for that my brother and I found an old flat bottomed pram kind of boat that had been abandoned. It leaked like a sieve but we didn’t care. We patched it up as best we could and used it to explore the creek banks in both directions, bailing as we went. We had no motor of any sort so poles and oars were the accepted form of power. This boat provided hours of fun exploring our new surroundings and it lasted a couple of years before it finally rotted to the point that we could not use it. By that time the house was finished. Dad had purchased a used boat with a very old outboard motor and quite often our whole family would go fishing, in those days there was no license required for salt water. All five of us would be up at about 4 AM and by daylight we would be sitting over a favorite reef with lines in the water. In later years dad seemed to think that 8 or 9 AM was early enough but that was after us kids were grownups. These fishing trips usually resulted in a war of sorts because the fish were always biting on one end of the boat but not the other. In other words one of us kids, usually my sister, would catch fish and I would not. It was totally unfair and happened pretty regular.

Sometime around 1956 or 57, my dad decided that this house with 3 families most of the weekends was too crowded so he bought another lot about a mile and a half further down the creek. Dad moved an old house that we had in Houston and set it up on the new lot. That lot is the same one that we own today and spend a lot of time working on. The house we have now is different though since that original house that was moved from Houston was destroyed in Hurricane Carla in 1961.

By this time my brother and I had an aluminum boat with an old outboard motor and we were able to expand our range for exploring. The intracoastal canal which runs from Brownsville, TX all the way to Florida was less than a mile away and we could see large tugboats with barge loads of stuff traveling along this route. Matagorda Bay was huge in our eyes and now we were able to see and explore some of the same places that dad and my uncle had explored. It was fascinating to say the least.

Mom used to take us kids down there for a week at a time in the summer while dad had to work. He would join us on weekends. My best friend, Jimmy would sometimes join us and on one such occasion we three had taken the aluminum boat and were out in the bay fishing. The trip came to an end abruptly when a fish hook got lodged in the back of my brother’s neck. We were unable to get it out so we returned to the house. Mom was pretty upset about it and she also could not dislodge the hook. So she loaded us all in the car and we went to Bay City for the emergency room. Fortunately they were able to remove it and other than the pain, my brother was none the worse for wear. He may not agree about that but that is my side of the story.

I think this is getting too long, I have at least one more story from the fifties but I will share it in the next episode.

First Ride

The trike isn't finished in a true sense of the word but it is rideable. Here is a picture of it moving on the road. There are still a few details to cleanup but it is coming along nicely. I do think I want a head rest or maybe neck rest and I still need handlebar grips, lights, a mirror, and a new derailleur for the front chainring shifting. The one I have is for dual rings and I have triple rings so it doesn't quite have the reach to catch all 3 gears. There are 7 speeds on the rear and that shifter works fine. I also need an adapter to connect the bike computer to the machine so I can track the miles ridden and see how fast it is moving.

Plumbing Woes

Well, I have been to the creek house for a week. We had a lot of rain down there and the creek was overflowing but not too bad. The flooding was caused by Hurricane Alex and tropical depression 2. The water was fresh though so fishing wasn't good. Mostly it was hot and humid and the mosquitoes were plentiful. I returned home Saturday after our annual lot owners meeting which was mostly uneventful.

Last night Martha called me home from church with the announcement of "water, water everywhere" and she couldn't turn it off. By the time I got here she had figured out how and had it under control. It turned out that a compression fitting had rusted through on one of the bathroom sinks but that was no easy task to replace. The fitting had broken off right at the faucet connection and I could not get it out. These faucets are very old and no one had a new one. A plumbing supply store that I went to was able to remove the fitting and replace it and it's companion with new ones so the water is back and I think it will be good. We also had a leak in the kitchen sink drain and I was able to fix that as well.

I have also eaten well today. First there was a men's Bible Study and breakfast at a cafe in town and then HPU hosted a retirees luncheon and meeting of our retired employees assn.

All in all a very sucessful day.

The Christ filled life

Yesterday our study took us to Colossians 3:1-17 as we looked at the discipline of the Christ filled life. Here are a few of the things that I want to remember and focus on,

We must focus our mind and being on Christ. What we fill our mind with defines who we are.

We must put off Christ-less things that we once walked in before we came to Christ.

We must put on:

• The character of Christ. A sympathetic spirit, generosity of mind, non-aggressive reaction, patience in the face of injury or insult, forbearance, the willingness to put up with people for the sake of fellowship. These are simple things but difficult to do.
• The example of Christ. Fellowship will depend entirely on our capacity to forgive.
• Above all else, put on the law of Christ which is love. Jesus gave a great commandment that we love one another.They will know we are Christians by our love.
• The peace of Christ. His peace is to rule the Christian heart.
• The word of Christ. The indwelling word is both individual and social. Paul’s words would indicate that he may be thinking about worship. He speaks of teaching, admonition, singing, one of the ways we can put on the word is through personal and corporate worship.

Only then can we claim the name of Christ and call ourselves Christians.

On Freedom

This definition came to me by way of a preacher friend who wrote it in the fly leaf of a New Testament that I carried at the time. I can't improve on it.

"Freedom is not the right to do what you want to do, but it is the power to do what you ought to do."

On this day in which we celebrate freedom, I hope we have remembered to thank God for what we have, it is Him that has empowered us to do what is right.

The Builder - Chapter 3

Growing up

Dad was literally a jack of all trades, well probably not all but quite a few. He was a great mechanic and was always able to fix our cars and lawnmowers and other mechanical devices. He had a lawnmower sharpener that would automatically sharpen the blades of a reel type mower. He took in that kind of work and often would have several waiting to be sharpened. He also owned a metal lathe and could make all sorts of screws. He was an avid photographer and had his own darkroom where he developed negatives and made pictures. He mixed his own chemicals for that purpose and a good many of his pictures have survived. Occasionally I will attach one or more to these posts. The one here was taken in about 1937. The car is dads and is a 1936 Plymouth, I think.

Growing up in that era of the 1940’s is hard to describe. We lived at the end of a dead end road that was surfaced with crushed oyster shell. That substance was abundant at that time since we were close to the gulf and a source for oysters. Adjacent to our house was a pasture of about 100 acres with a small patch of woods about midway across one edge. We explored these woods and the pasture extensively spending many hours in the role of our favorite cowboy or cowgirl, riding stick horses made from the trunk of a small tree called a coffee bean tree. These were numerous in the pasture and offered an abundant supply of horses for us to use. There wasn’t much TV in those days and TV’s were small and difficult to view. There were a lot of cowboy shows with Roy Rogers and Dale Evans or Gene Autry and many others. They were as violent as TV got in those days. Howdy Doody and Kukla Fran and Ollie were a couple of shows we watched that were entertaining for us young ones. We had nothing like Sesame Street or any of the later shows. All was black and white since color TV wasn’t invented yet, All the programming was clean and there were no ratings, we didn’t need them.

We raised chickens for a few years and one of my tasks was to feed them and gather eggs. We also had a few rabbits and a horse. The horse was named Dan and had been a roping horse at one time but was quite old and gentle by the time we obtained him. We couldn’t saddle him ourselves, we were too small, so we had to wait for Dad to do that and he wanted to supervise our riding anyway. There was a small ditch that ran across the pasture and one day I was riding Dan at a full gallop when we approached the ditch. He jumped the ditch and in the process I became dislodged from the saddle and landed on the ground. Dan sensed that I had gotten off and he stopped in one jump. I was shaken but unhurt except for my pride because a real cowboy never falls off his horse when it is jumping the creek. Another incident with the horse occurred on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. We had just returned from Sunday morning worship and I decided I would rope Dan so we could ride later that afternoon. I made the mistake of trying to sneak up behind him to do the roping. He was startled and as he began to run he kicked his back legs out and a hoof got me in the forehead. I think Dad cleared the fence in one jump and needless to say we spent the rest of the afternoon in the emergency room.

I know this chapter didn’t have much about building but we will get back to that. There are more stories about growing up too but I will share them later. This one has gotten a bit long.

Forgiveness

Sunday morning our topic in Bible study was Relationships and it centered around the subject of forgiveness. Here are two things that I came away with.

God wants us to be a forgiving people. It is clear from scripture (Matthew 6:12, 14-15, Matthew 18:35 and others) that in order to receive forgiveness we must forgive others. That is hard to do because we still want to retain the law of revenge, we want to get even, not forgive, but God didn't give us an option, he made it a command.

Second, forgiveness is unlimited. Peter asks the question "How many times must I forgive my brother if he sins against me?" Peter was being generous and suggested 7 times but Jesus replies with a huge number that basically says there is no limit. It isn't 77 or 70 times 7 but it is limitless.

Failure to forgive separates us from fellowship with the Father. Jesus told us that the greatest commandment was to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and the second was to love our neighbor as ourself. Love always forgives.

Project Sweat

Each Summer the youth from several churches in our area give up a week to help folks in our town. They work on houses and yards doing work that the homeowner can't afford to do. These tasks, such as painting, roofing, yard work, and sometimes minor repairs are often carried out in the sweltering Texas heat. This year there are close to 100 young people with leaders from 4 different churches and the weather has given them a break. Yesterday it rained but the temperatures are only around 90 this whole week. Today our adult class provided lunch for our team. Since I am retired and free I was able to help. Here are a few of them enjoying their lunch break.

The Builder - Chapter 2

Church & Home


The year 1946 brought several things into our life. The end of the war made it easier to buy things and the economy was improved, also due to the war, so more was available. It also brought a move. Mom & Dad bought a home in northwest Houston with about 2 acres of land. The house wasn’t very big but the plan was to enlarge it. The family joined White Oak Baptist church that year and attended regularly. They needed space for education and before long decided to build a 2 story building. The builder volunteered of course and for several Saturdays a large group of men gathered to raise the walls and put the roof on. Not long after the building was dry, the building crowd dwindled to the point where it was the pastor, the builder and occasionally 1 or 2 others. The work was slow and as I remember the building was never completely finished out. We used it for quite a few years in pretty rough condition. A few months after the church building started, dad decided to start on our house. He about doubled the size and added 3 bedrooms, a new bath, a large kitchen expansion and a big walk-in closet. The preacher and dad would work on the church in the morning and our house in the afternoon. Eventually it was finished. There were windows everywhere and an attic fan drew air in the windows and exhausted it out a vent on the front porch, we had no air conditioner. The house was heated by floor furnaces which hung beneath the house and extended down below the ground surface into small brick lined holes. It never failed that when it was coldest and we needed heat the most it would also rain and the holes would flood and put out the pilot light. That meant someone had to man the manual pump and keep the water pumped out. That pumper was usually me. We eventually solved the problem by stopping the water from flowing under the house. We also built a garage and workshop behind the house. Once the house was finished dad moved his railroad inside in one of the front rooms for a while and we could once again watch the trains run. We lived in this house until 1965, almost 20 years and there are many memories. I probably won’t share them all but in a future chapter I will try to give you a glimpse of growing up in the late 1940’s and early 1950’s.

Worship

Worship at it's simplest definition is to "give worth to something or someone". In Christian circles it is defined as the central act of Christian identity, the purpose of which is to ascribe honor and worth to God. I liked a post that I read on another blog that said;

God is creative and relational. Because he is creative, we are unique. No two of us are the same. Because he is relational, we are desperate to hear from him for our next step.

If we are His, we are related to Him through spiritual birth and because of that we worship Him. We desire to draw near and hear His voice. When we hear, we must respond, there is no other option. That response can be positive as in the case of Isaiah in chapter 6, or it can be negative as in the case of Jonah chapter 1. How will we respond?

I encourage you to spend time in worship, both private and public, this next week.

The Garden

The garden is doing great in spite of the heat. Temperatures are in the 90's most days and we have hit 100 a couple of days. Some of the corn is now over 6 ft tall and is putting on ears. The tassels are out and I can see silk around the new ears of corn. The green beans are producing a bowl a day and we will eat the first of them tonight. We have already cleaned out the radishes but they are kind of hot so Martha is not fond of them. The tomatoes and peppers have lots of blooms and a few actual tomatoes and peppers. they are coming along. The squash is starting to produce and I expect to see a watermelon any day. So we are happy with the garden, it will be good to be able to eat fresh produce from our own garden.

The Builder - Chapter 1

Airplanes and Railroads


I don’t really remember doing this but mom told me that I would sit on dads lap or at least where I could see him and he would build models. Dad was always a model builder and my earliest recollections are of some of those models. Model airplanes played a part in both our lives even many years later. The early ones in the first years of my life were balsa and paper creations that were powered by a rubber band and propeller. He had made many of them and they hung from the ceiling of the house where we lived. Some were even in the room where I slept. I could see them flying through the air, they were hung that way so that they appeared to be flying.

One day, I am not sure when or how but I was told about it later, I got my hands on one without his supervision and promptly broke some part of it. Mom rescued the remains and when dad came home he was very angry to say the least. He put a lot of effort into those and didn’t want them broken needlessly. They all actually flew and the best times were when we went out to the yard and he wound up the propeller and let them fly.

Another thing he built in those early days was kites. He built box kites and his favorite, (and mine), the upside down buzzer kite. This was a 3 stick conventional looking kite but it flew upside down and had a bow like structure that buzzed when it flew. I have one hanging in my room today at home.

The thing I liked best was that my dad ran a railroad. Not only did he run it, but he built it. It was on a table about 5 feet wide and 10 feet long. It hung from ropes in the garage and at his touch it would glide down out of the ceiling or go back up into it. It was fascinating. There were 2 oval tracks and some switch yards and a couple of towns. He would spend hours building the locomotives with all their wheels and parts. They were mostly the old steam type engines and they were very detailed. They were HO gauge which defines the size or scale that they were built to. He also built the houses in the villages and laid the track rail by rail. He had a control panel that enabled him to control several trains at the same time. The real fun was watching him make up a train with certain cars and then run it from place to place even though it just went around the oval track and stopped in the same place it started. I loved those trains and I have some of his trains in a box still and someday I will set them up so they will remind me of him. He also had a Lionel electric train that went under the Christmas tree. It was there from my first Christmas and I don’t remember when he quit doing it, but many years later after he retired he had another one that he setup for the grandkids and I have that put away as well.

The other thing he built during those years was me. Of course I didn’t know it at the time but now I see how many of these experiences shaped me into who I am. His faith and belief system was instilled in me during these years. As you will see in future chapters the lessons were not always learned the first time.

The Builder – an introduction

It was December, the year was 1940. War raged in Europe and the US would be forced to enter that fray. No one knew that a scant year in the future we would be plunged headlong into war with Japan after the attack on Pearl Harbor, or that 4 days later on December 11, 1941 Hitler would declare war on the United States. Even with this uncertainty, the builder and his wife Thelma brought their new son home from the hospital and laid him under the Christmas tree. Life was good for the moment, even if they didn’t know what the future held. The total bill at the hospital was $38.

The builder worked at repairing typewriters and adding machines and was considered to be in a critical defense role so as it turned out he was exempt from the draft. He had held this job for 15 years and was considered to be very good at it. The builder was my dad and this story is about him, and about how his life as a builder. Life in the early 1940’s was not easy. The country was not fully out of the depression years yet and the war and the restrictions on everything from food to gasoline to tires, made life difficult. Even color movie film was rationed and could not be bought. It was into just such a world that the builder brought four children, the last coming in January 1946. The second, a girl named Abigail, lived only a short 4 hours and we never knew her.

These stories are about the builder and the things he built. They are true to the best of my memory and recollection. They will cover over 60 years and I cannot say with certainty how many there will be nor how often. I only know that I must write down the legacy that he left me and I think this will be a meaningful way to do it. If you choose to tag along, I can assure you that there will be tears because they are there now as I write this introduction.

Trike progress

The trike is coming along. There is still much to do but it is all detail work. Installing the transmission and brakes, adding elbow guards and a few attachment points for accessories are the next steps. The handle bars will also be raised from where they are in the picture. Hopefully I will have it to the riding stage for testing in a few weeks. Then it all comes apart for painting and the finishing touches.

Home again

We are home again, arriving about 7:30 PM last night. We traveled nearly 2800 miles and had no flats, accidents or other problems and for that we are thankful. There is a lot of road construction between here and there and plenty of opportunities for some kind of problem.

Our garden did well while we were gone except that the radishes were ready to pick and we will lose some of them. The weeds grew well and I will have a lot to do to get them all out. The grass went wild too and the yard needs mowing again.

Otherwise all is well and we will get caught up as soon as we can. It is good to be home.

North to Michigan

We are spending this week in Michigan, yesterday we had the funeral for my father-in-law who passed away last Sunday. He is walking the golden streets of heaven as I write this, possibly along side my dad who went home in 2002. I cherish every moment we had together as he was quite a friend to me. We spent many hours together when I was laid off in 1989 and was out of work for a while. He was a Winter Texan at the time and spent his winters in the Rio Grande Valley with his wife. He would come over to our house and work in the yard with me as we cleared the oleanders and palm trees and some other brush. We had great times and I appreciated his time with me very much. Those were trying times as I looked for a new job to continue my career and he helped me through it. He loved to stop at Dairy Queen for ice cream on Sunday night going home from church. We had many great times sitting around the table at DQ eating the ice cream and talking.

We were fortunate to have them in our home for two winters in 2007 and 2008. Those days were very enjoyable with evenings of games and conversation. I will never forget them.  

Build memories with your loved ones, spend the time it takes and then write them down for the future. Some day you will be glad you did.

Retirement fun

Have I mentioned how much fun it is to be retired. I stay as busy as I want to be around the house but have opportunities to do other things as well. So far I have no real deadlines of stuff that just has to be done by a certain time so I can relax and enjoy the time. For instance, on Friday I watched the space shuttle Atlantis launch into space and no matter how many times I watch it, there is still a sense of amazement that we can build something that will lift four and a half million pounds and accelerate it to 17,000 mph plus in about 8 minutes leaving it in orbit about the earth. Then it will rendevoux with another orbiting environment and dock for a few days before returning to earth. Folks, when I was born this stuff was science fiction. Dick Tracy had a wrist watch radio and a base on the moon and Flash Gordon rocketed through space to nab the bad  guys, but that was in the comics. No one really believed it!

But here we are, 1 flight away from the end of an era, and after that, years before more manned space flight can occur from American soil. We will be forced to rely on foreign entities to ferry our astronauts to the International Space Station and bring them safely home. We as a nation are likely to fall far behind in science and space exploration because of this delay.

Enough of that, I was talking about the joys of being retired, and I do thoroughly enjoy it. I will return later with more of this nonsense.

Singing with the Saints

In just an hour I will go to help host the Singing with the Saints program at Howard Payne University. This is the 7th annual program and this year we have 2 outstanding nationally known quartets. The Kingsmen and The Melody Boys will be the featured groups as well as a local group called The Solid Rock quartet. This program of Southern Gospel Music attracts fans from all over central Texas. This year it returns to Mims Auditorium on the campus of HPU. Mims has been in a long restoration process and is a beautiful place to hold this concert. We look forward to hearing some of the best gospel music anywhere.

Rattlesnake vs the Weed Eater

I have been away all week at our creek house. I spent the week on small tasks that I could do alone and enjoyed some time of fishing even though I didn't catch much. On Wednesday afternoon this little? incident occurred.


We have a lawn service that takes care of the lawn since we don't get down very often and it needs at least monthly care. The lawn was due for a trimming when I arrived and on Wednesday the crew showed up to do it. I was downstairs under the house and had just put some chicken on the grill when they showed up. They make quick work of it with a big lawnmower and weed eaters. The weed eater guy had gone around most of the house and was right in front of me when he hit a rattlesnake with the weed eater. The snake was in the surface roots of a tree that grows next to the house, he obviously blended right in and we didn't see him until the weed eater made contact. The snake was about 18 inches long. The weed eater guy kept the snake airborne for a few seconds and by the time he fell to the ground he was severely wounded. A hoe finished him off and the snake scare was over but it made me realize how careless I had been in an area where snakes abound. In the minutes preceeding the snake / weed eater confrontation, I had walked through the area where the snake was hit several times picking up stuff to make the lawn care easier. I had disconnected a water hose and dragged it across the very spot where the snake was hit even reaching down to dislodge the nozzle when it snagged on a tree root. I do not know if the snake was moving and wasn't there a few minutes before or how it got there. Needless to say but for the rest of the trip I was extremely cautious when I walked about or reached for anything, especially at night.

In the 1950's when I started going to the creek snakes were common and we learned quickly to watch for them. The area was sparseley populated then and we were invading what had always been their territory. Now there are a lot more people and few areas that will support them so they stay across the creek in the salt marshes where people rarely go. In the 8 years that we have owned the house, we have not seen a rattler and only one other snake at all. That one is another story that I will post here some time. The lawn crew said they see them frequently but this was a close encounter that they can do without. I agree wholeheartedly. I am not a fan of snakes and especially not those which are deadly poisonous.

So in the future I will be more alert and careful where I walk and what I reach for. The nearest medical facility to us down there is at least 30-35 miles away. We do have an ambulance at the fire station about 9 miles away but it is staffed by volunteers and would take some time to respond. Amazing as it is I only remember 1 house fire down there and I have not heard of anyone getting snake bit.

Catching up

Well it has been a month since I last posted and I suppose I am long overdue. I have been working on the garden a lot and it is growing well. We have tomatoes, peppers, beans, corn, radishes and brussell sprouts. Some are doing better than others. My other project which I have mentioned is my recumbent tricycle called a Delta Wolf because it is a delta style long wheel base trike having two rear wheels as opposed to a tadpole style trike which has two front wheels. I have posted some pictures at picasaweb and there is a link at the bottom right of this page. The picture at the left shows the 'rolling frame stage' which is a major milestone in the construction process.

We did go camping one time this month at Lake Brownwood and enjoyed it a lot. I want to go at least one more time next month before our Texas parks pass expires. We have a pop up trailer that needs a lot of roof repair and I will tackle that this summer. It still works OK but the repairs really need to be done.

I attended the annual employee recognition luncheon at HPU today and it was good to see everyone. One of the guys I worked with received the "Outstanding Staff Member" award and it was well deserved. The food wasn't bad and it was free which is always good.

Our church, after being without a pastor for 16 months, has appointed a pastor search team to begin the process of looking for a new pastor. I was selected to be a non-voting alternate member of that team. Since we have changed to an Elder based system of governance in the interim time, we will have to find one who is comfortable in this environment. I am sure that will not be a problem but it will present challenges. As you have opportunity please pray that we will be able to discern God's will in this matter. 

Next week I will travel to Caney Creek to spend a week on odd jobs there and doing some fishing. At least I plan to do some fishing. I am not sure what other tasks I can do but I am sure there are plenty. Martha cannot go since next week is the end of semester and she needs to be here for final grades to be posted and to help with graduation. Her father is in poor health and we anticipate a quick trip to Michigan based on what we are told about his condition. Hopefully it will not be this coming week.

I will leave you with this quote from Lamentations 3:22-23a.

The LORD'S lovingkindnesses indeed never cease,

For His compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;

God is good... all the time and, All the time... God is good.

The things I do!

I am in the process of building a new trike. It is a recumbent tricycle and if I am successful it should look similar to the one at the left. That one actually belongs to someone else. I am making progress for a change and actually completed the two rear wheels this week. Perhaps I will be able to finish by early summer. There is still a lot of welding and metal cutting to do and that moves pretty slowly sometimes. I still have a few parts to order. I have another tricycle but it is a tadpole style with two wheels in front and one in back. This one is the opposite and is called a delta style. I will try to post some pictures of my progress later in the week.

Another project that is on tap right now is our garden. I haven't been in a hurry because we still have frost almost every morning and we spend far too much time trying to protect the tender young plants if we plant too early. We plan for tomatos, peppers, corn, green beans, radishes, watermelon, squash, and whatever else shows up. We had a garden last year and we really enjoyed eating the produce from it. This years will be a little bigger but I have to figure a way to get it watered automatically. I moved it farther away from the faucet so it is a little more of a problem. Martha has thinned her Canna Lilies down to about 12 plants from maybe 150 that were there. They multiply like wildfire. As soon as we have blooms I will post a picture.

The last topic is the guitar. I have set my mind to learn how to play this instrument correctly. This involves the fingers on each hand working independently and on command, which they are not willing to do. In addition they must form into un-natural patterns while holding down the strings on the frets. Meanwhile the other hand is picking the wrong notes. I would like to see (I expect) results faster than they come and practice is not the fun part. But practice I must and so that occupies an hour or so each day. Progress will be slow, but I am determined so from time to time I will update the blog with my progress.

Spring Break trip

We went to the creek as planned but as usual our list of projects was delayed by more important stuff. The pipes are all exposed under the house and over the winter we have had several periods of sub freezing temperatures. Some of them lasted days and they did a number on the pipes. All the hot water pipes were damaged and had to be replaced, at least the joints where the pipes joined. This was a project planned for much later but when necessity calls we must answer. We spent almost 3 days on this and had to make several trips to the store. Some of the breaks were behind a wall so we had to remove paneling to get to it. We did finally get to finish the new bathroom and install a couple of light fixtures. The first few days were very cool and foggy. One day the fog lasted all day and another it came and went with short periods of sun. I had wanted to fish some but didn't ever get to it. I will go again in May by myself and may get some fishing in on that trip. I have several one person projects that I can work on and hopefully no surprises await me. I have posted a few pictures on Picasa Web and the link to the right will get you there. The pictures are in the Creek pictures 2010 album.

This and That

This is the day which the LORD hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.

Psalms 118:24
 
Well I have now had 3 commenters on this blog and I am sure that is some sort of record. We did get home safely from the trip to the basketball tournament and we did stop and visit the grand grandkids for a couple of hours. They are a lot of fun to visit and we should go more often, I don't really know why we don't. The rest of the week has been routine except that Martha had jury duty. She survived that ordeal and now is ready for spring break. So why do we need spring break? Is it for the students or is it for the faculty and staff? I think it is the latter. They need the break to preserve their sanity... We never had spring break when I was growing up and we survived just fine, well mostly.

We are going to the creek to work on our house and see if we can get some more projects done. This is a 6 year + project and I am sure that by the time we finish we will need to start over. That being our plan, I will not post anything for the next week. We have no internet there and barely have cell phone service. The cell phone I have now is not nearly as sophisticated as the ones I had at the university so I will not be able to get email, or post to the blog. I am sure life will go on and we will all do fine. What did we do before email and cell phones?

The verse at the beginning of this post is / was today's "Verse of the day". I have a program that I wrote that displays a different verse each day. It is amazing how appropriate they are for the day in which they appear. So today I must rejoice. God is still good and He answers prayer. Today I have received news of 2 different people who had prayers answered in significant ways. So as you go through the coming week, spend time with Him, rejoicing and thanking Him for everything.

See you after spring break,

Headed home

Well the ASC conference championship slipped away this year as the lady Jackets were defeated today by the Louisiana College team. Our ladies played well but were outgunned. Tomorrow at 2 the deciding game will be played and then the NCAA tournament begins. It would have been fun to follow them there but alas it cannot be this year, maybe a future year they will return.

We will head home in the morning and try to stop at my son's house to visit the grandkids. We can't stay but a couple of hours and then it is on to home where Martha has jury duty starting Monday. The coming week will be a week of preparation for our spring break trip to the creek.

See you on the other side
Posted from Alexandria, Louisiana

A Snow cat.

Well I couldn't resist the temptation so here is another picture of the snow and a bit of creative art by Martha. Yesterday the snow came but today was sunny and the snow rapidly melted. Tomorrow will be even warmer before a new cold front arrives on Friday. Surely winter won't last much longer and it will be spring. The peach trees will blossom and I can plant our garden. It won't be long...

Snow again

We woke up to snow today. We had some a couple of weeks ago but this was a lot more. As of right now there is about 4" and it is still coming down. It is just the Texas weather, tomorrow it will be sunny and about 50 degrees. The university where I used to work and Martha still does, tried to have classes and work today but about 9 AM they gave up and shut down for the day. I had taken her to work today so she would not have to drive in this and then I had to go back and get her early due to the closing.

Friday we head for the Pineville LA. area for the ASC Womens Basketball tournament. We are ready for that no matter how it turns out but we would like to come back as champions one more time. It will be about an 8 hour drive but it should be fun.

Stay tuned

Golf and the news

Today was the first time I have tried to play golf in a long time and it showed. I hope to be able to play more often now and perhaps gain some amount of skill in the game. Not to be "Good" you understand, but to just not be terrible.

Two weeks of retirement have passed and I don't think I am bored yet. I haven't started looking for a job or tried to monitor whether those "new guys" are doing my old job well or not. I still have plenty to do that I haven't even started yet. Yesterday I watched and was amazed at the news media reports about the plane crash in Austin. It was quckly apparent that it was an isolated incident of an angry citizen who took his anger to extremes but they spent hours trying to make it more than it was.

Today it was Tiger and his apology. Ho-Hum, this too will pass.

I guess that is all I have to say today.

Longhorns and Basketball

I went back to school today so we could get pictures of the president presenting me with the certificate of appreciation on the occasion of my retirement. Imagine my surprise to arrive and find the president and his wife on matching Texas Longhorns. Well as it turned out they (the longhorns) were passing through and anyone who wanted to could have their picture taken on a real live Texas Longhorn. I didn't but Martha did. I won't publish her picture here but this is a picture of the longhorn she was on. We did eventually get the picture of the presentation and it will probably be published in the school paper, they like to do those things.

Elsewhere we have two more home games in basketball to wind up the regular season.  After that is the ASC championship tournament. Our women are a solid 2nd in the west and we are planning to follow them to Louisiana to watch the games. It should be an exciting time.

The weather this week is much nicer than last week so I am finally able to get outside and do some things. We are starting to prepare for spring break and a trip to the Caney Creek house to work on projects. That will be the 2nd week in March and I am ready...

So long for now...

It was (is) a snowy day...

The snow is gently falling outside but it isn't quite cold enough to stick so it melts. We are expecting an inch or so. Yesterday we drove up to Fort Worth to see some friends that are about to go to India as missionaries. Today the metroplex is having a lot of snow and they are expected to get up to 5 inches or more. I am glad we could go yesterday and not today. Tomorrow this should all move east and we should have a sunny afternoon with the temperature near 50. That will be good.

Day one (of retirement)

Today was the first official day of retirement. I woke up at 3 AM to watch the Space Shuttle launch. They departed on schedule at 3:14 AM CST and no matter how many times you watch that spectacle, it never gets old. Nasa will retire the Shuttles later this year and the US will be without a manned space vehicle for some years until the Lunar vehicles are ready in 2015 or so. I did go back to bed but was up at my regular time.

I didn't really do a lot other than replace a light bulb and try to put away some of the stuff from my office. It rained off and on through the morning and was cold and dreary. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny but then we have an arctic front coming through that will drop temperatures and may produce some snow or other winter precipitation. This has been the wettest and coldest winter I can remember since we have lived here.

Both of our basketball teams won twice on the road this past weekend and that is good. We have 4 more regular season games and then the ASC tournament. Our girls have won the ASC 3 years in a row and we are looking for #4. The tournament will be played on the campus of the east champion so we will have to travel. We aren't sure where yet but I am ready to go.

The retirement celebration last Thursday was great. I didn't really know what to expect but they did a good job of keeping the secret and I was surprised. Martha had printed several pictures and they had a couple of boards with those displayed. I had asked her to do some of the creek house and she did so we had those as well. There was a bunch of food and drink so everyone enjoyed it I think. There were several cards and a bunch of little gifts, some of which were intended to embarass, but I made it through without getting emotional. They presented me with a certificate of appreciation as well. When I arrived at the office there was a basket of goodies that had come during the party. After I got it home I discovered that it was from a former employee who left earlier in January. That was really special.

Well I guess that's all for now, stay tuned for more as the saga develops.

Celebration

Tomorrow I retire, today we celebrate. This is the day chosen for a reception so folks can come by and wish me well. I have expected it for some time and knew it was coming but I am not really ready. Oh I am ready to get on with retirement, (I think) but this will be an emotional time of goodbyes and farewells and those are difficult and I doubt that we are ever really ready for those moments. So even though it will be emotional, and I am not sure I am 'ready', today I will celebrate. Celebrate life, for God has allowed me 69 years and they have been good ones in spite of what I have done with them. Celebrate failure, for it is only through attempting and failing that we learn the hard lessons of life, God simply smiles and asks if we would like to try again. He always forgives. Celebrate success, because I have had a bit of that in my chosen career. Celebrate the future, I have no idea what it holds but I do know that it is completely in God's hands. As I open myself to His plan, He will provide all I need for the future.

Retirement is not an end in itself, but a beginning of change in ones life. Most of us are afraid of change and especially one so drastic, but I for one am excited about this change and what God may do in my future.

Stay tuned...

One more time

Well last week came, and went, and I still have one to go. They decided that they wanted me to stay one more week to ease the transition. That is OK with me but I am hoping to work in an advisory mode only. There is still a lot of information to pass on and not much time to do it. I have looked forward to this for so long that it is a little disappointing to not end it when I expected to.

I am enjoying the basketball season though and our womens team won two more this week. They are no longer ranked in the top 25 but they have the capability of returning there with consistent play. NCAA Division 3 is a tough place to compete and the ASC is one of the toughest conferences. I think we will be in the conference tournament but winning the conference for a fourth straight year may be a big stretch. We will be there rooting for them all the way for another shot at the national tournament. They won the national championship 2 years ago and it would be great to snag another one.

I don't know who originally coined this definition of freedom but it was passed to me nearly 3 decades ago and has stuck with me. "Freedom is not the right to do what you want to do, but it is the power to do what you ought to do". In this country we enjoy freedom and often we talk about the freedoms we have, that are guaranteed by our constitution. But are we really free, or are we enslaved to our lifestyle, attempting to keep up with the people we know? Many are so far in debt that they see no way to get out. Our government is also in debt and goes deeper each day. I, for one, believe that debt will be the thing that ruins the United States. The enemy may not be "over there" but may be right here with us, masquerading as our friend. Deficit spending has become a way of life in this country and the problem will not go away by itself, it will take hard work, and even harder choices in our lives and the life of our country if we are ever to see the economy of our nation recover and our people prosper again.  It can happen, but it will be a long road. Be thankful for the freedom we have, it isn't free.

Until next time...

Five more days

Next Friday I retire from the full time workforce. In case you didn't notice, that makes room for one new worker. In the summer of 1959 someone, somewhere, retired and made space for me. I was the new worker then and had a lot to learn. After a summer job, I entered the military for a while and the older I get the more I appreciate the things the military taught me. Two that come to mind are "Being on time" and "Respect for authority".

My dad always said if you were not 5 minutes early, you were late. That has stuck with me through the years and even today I would rather be early than late to anything. I tend to be at work a half hour early, if for no other reason it gives me time to collect my thoughts and plan my day, although often my day is planned by the incidents that naturally occur in a university IT department. Many of today's young workers do not share that committment to punctuality. I see more and more a casualness about being on time or being where you said you would be when you said you would be there. It boils down to a lack of respect for ones employer, fellow workers, clients, customers, etc.

Respect for authority is waning in these latter days whether it is government, employer, parental, teacher, or some other authority. We all have many forms of authority over us and whether we like it or not, it is there to help us. God places us in various situations like this where people or organizations have authority over us. We are reminded by scripture that we must respect that power and obey. This is sometimes a hard lesson but it must be learned if we are to be all that God intends for us to be. Our jails are full and overflowing with people who have rejected the idea of someone having authority over them.

Sometime this week I expect there will be some sort of reception to allow everyone to say goodbye and wish me well. In the meantime I need to share as much of my knowledge as possible with the person who replaces me and who starts tomorrow. I will also clean out my office, removing all the "stuff" that has made it uniquely mine for these years. Some of it will be easy and some of it will be hard, not physically but emotionally. Ones office and workspace become an extension of oneself and giving that space up will be difficult.

I am told that I may need to work the first week of February but that will be considered part time hourly so Friday will be the last official full time work day. It has arrived faster that I thought it would when I told them I was retiring. As it approaches I am both frightened and excited. I am ready and I await what the next phase of my life holds.

Counting the days - and Contentment

Well another week is done and it was a busy one. I did get my day off on Friday and it rained most of the day. It was still productive though so I will try again this week to get my last 2 days off on Thursday and Friday. You have to practice for this retirement thing so I am practicing. At this point I have 8 official days left to work and they want me to stay an extra week to ease the transition to a new employee. So I guess it will be 13 days more but that is OK.

This coming week should be a little slower since we now have the first week of school behind us. The first week is always busy. We have a couple of home basketball games this week so that will be fun.

People ask me if I am going to be busy enough or content when I retire. I am reminded of Philippians 4 where Paul tells us that contentment is a learned behaviour. We are not content by nature... we are always scurrying to improve or reach some new goal. That is how I have been for my entire career, but Paul tells us that he "has learned to be content in whatever circumstance he finds himself in". I too am learning, there will be a reduction in income because I don't have enough savings to provide income at the same level. I think we can deal with that but the big thing is that after 50 years of working and having that regimen of getting up and going to work each day and having stuff that I had to do, I will no longer have that schedule. Finding productive use for my time will not be hard at first because there is so much to do around this house and the creek house but later, say a year from now, it may be more difficult. We will see what the future brings. I plan to do a little work part time for the business of the person that is replacing me but I am not sure how much. I may free lance a little at other companies if I can. I know that the time is right for me to retire and that God is in control, so I will try my best to practice these verses, also in Philippians 4.

6 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
7And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

So I will leave you with this thought, God is good, all the time...even when we don't deserve it.
 
Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say, Rejoice. Phil. 4:4

Pictures posted

I posted a link on the right to pictures at picasaweb. Right now they are all related to the creek house and birds we see while we are there.

Week 1 - Make a Difference

Week 1 was up and down.
It started on Monday when our lowest ranked tech did not show up after break for a project we had planned. I discovered that he was to be released the next day anyway so that meant we had to scramble for a worker to help with the project. We already had one student and were able to secure 2 more so the project went on. I wound up working on it for a couple of days myself which I really did not have time to do.

The maintenance department was moving people and computers all this time and we were trying to keep up with that as well. The new Asst. VP for IT started on Monday and filling him in on various aspects of what we do and several meetings consumed more of my time. We are bringing a remodeled building back on line and it is far from ready so we needed to terminate cables and connect phones and computers for that.

To top it all off, a wonderful young lady who has worked for me for the last 5 years plus, had chosen to leave us and pursue her career at another school. I needed to host a reception to honor and thank her for all her hard work. We pulled that off very well with lots of homemade cookies and punch. Today was her last day and it was sad to see her leave but I know it was the right choice for her, so from that aspect it is fine.

It has been a very busy week and next week will be no different. Students arrive Sunday, classes start Tuesday, and we will be very busy taking care of connectivity issues in the dorms and adding users to the network. I hope to grab a day off toward the end of the week but may not be able to, we will see.

I have a personal motto that I have posted in my office and other places. It is "Make a Difference". We are here not just to do a job or earn a salary so we can afford to live, but to invest ourselves in others to help them to grow. At a university, especially one like this one, we have so many opportunities to do just that. One thing we did this week was take most of the leftover cookies and punch from the reception and send it to a group of dorm resident assistants who were here early for training. They enjoyed it and we had the opportunity to "Make a Difference" in their lives. Only time will tell what that difference may be.

Opportunity is all around us but only those who are looking for it will recognize it as a chance to make a difference in someones life. Even in the face of difficulty or dicouragement we can still find time or resources to impact someones life. I encourage you to find a way to "Make a Difference" in someone's life tomorrow.

Home again

We are home again from the Creek and have accomplished a lot. I posted a picture of the finished bath, well not really finished but close enough that it appears so. That was our major project for the trip. The two weeks went by quickly, it was cold, windy and rainy most of the time but we enjoyed the work and made good progress. We had a few days where outside work could be done and Martha used them to paint the front of the house and burn the rest of the old boat and some other burnable trash.

The area we are in has many birds and we were able to spot a few that are here on our Texas coast. One was a Roseate Spoonbill, a large bird with pink feathers on the wings and a large spoon shaped bill. Another was the Great Blue Heron. There were a pair of these that frequent the area of our house. They and the Brown pelican have wingspans of almost 6 feet and are neat to watch. We have many Brown pelicans so they are pretty common. I'll try to post some pictures of the birds later.

Last night we went to a neighbors and had a seafood buffet. he had cooked fish, shrimp and oysters as well as potatoes, fried pickles, etc. We all ate more than we should have except Martha who is not a seafood lover like me, although she did try some of the seafood. It was all very good.

Well tomorrow we go back to work and I begin the last month of employment. My replacement has been hired and will start tomorrow as well. It should make for an interesting month, I am looking forward to it.