I Thirst

SOOC... I am perhaps tickled with this all out of proportion to the uniqueness of the shot but I usually don't fart around with the "manual" setting... my MOD has been based on the philosophy that "even if a complete idiot takes 1000 pictures... he'll get a few good ones" and that has worked for me. LOL. The manual settings thing is a result of my desire to get the hang of HDR imaging. Hey, it might help me grow, huh? I gotta back off till the Christmas break, though. I'm really WAY too busy this quarter. The photo obsession thing has run away with me before..

I am alive. School is extremely demanding, lately, or perhaps it is simply my ability to perform... I made straight A's last quarter... WHOOO HOOO!!!, and seem to have broken the blogging addiction...oops... i just piddled around for an hour trying to find a link.

Disclaimer: This is not my work, either in the original photo or the postprossesing. As near as I can figure it was done by Jill Greenberg, who, along with Dave Hill have achieved fame/notoriety with their photo processing style. It is something I myself have never tried (yet!) but seems to involve multiple light sources, and of course, a masterful hand with processing software. This style makes the photoartist in me grin in jealous admiration :)

Well, it's been a while since I posted a picure I took. My perspective and sense of accomplishment changes, and the first insect macros that thrilled me so much, didn't seem all that great after surfing through some of the content on the web, especially some of the amatuer photos uploaded on flickr. This recent shot, taken a few days at the campus pond, I am really pleased with. :)
she looks great on black

Do they always give you more antibiotics than they do pain pills? I have a tooth that has been killing me since thursday night, and I took the last two Darvosets about twenty hours ago. I actually had to take my GMC 100 final slightly stoned on opiates... I'll post my score when I get it.

The Tooth Thing, and anything like it, makes me aware (painfuly, lol) that I am one of the uninsured. When this comes up, It's always with mixed feelings.

At 41, I am just beginning to experience medical conditions that would benefit from ongoing management by an actual doctor. So, hand in hand with my self-pity (just a little) I keep the background awareness of millions of people with immediate life-and-death health issues that make my own pale in comparison. But my tooth still hurts. affecting my eating, sleeping, and performance. I wonder how much awareness, on a national level is shunted aside, how much action is not taken, because my "tooth still hurts", because I'm "limping away from the wreckage of my divorce", because the "grief over the unexpected passing of my Father still colors my life"... 

I try to concentrate on my life. There is always something that needs attention, and for another four weeks, my highest priority is school. Politics disgust me. They stir up my cynicism like nothing else. I feel like the system is so twisted, that a man unwilling to make compromises to his integrity stands little chance of victory in a presidential election. For much of my adult life, I have heard people talk of voting for the "lesser of two evils" . This is sad. I have received, from the pulpit of a small baptist church, the message that God stood with the party that was unequivocally against gay marriage. Time and again I have gotten the subtle, or not so subtle sentiment that Christians and Republicans had shared, and overlapping interests, that GOP really stood for "God's Own Party". I don't believe that. I have (shamefully) first hand knowledge of such things as the love of money, and the abuse of power. I have a definite opinion about the electoral process, and the long -overdue, radical reforms that would be so easily accomplished with our current technology. The self-seeking issues that seem so important bring to mind treating Dysentery with pepto-bismol. I think I am spoiled. I am by this country's standards perhaps upper-lower class, or extreme lower-middle class. I struggle to pay my bills, but if I want, right now, I can go outside and spew drinking water all over my grass. I live in the lap of a prosperous luxury inconcievable to millions of people, Who will die without hearing the Gospel. We as a nation have the concerns of rich spoiled children. Every once in awhile, I get a bad feeling. I know that I am politically naive. I know that I am in a crisis that can only happen to a blessed individuals. I call them Cadillac problems. I am too busy to take the time to become politically literate. Malcolm Gladwell talks of "thin slicing", the amazing ability of our God-Given minds to "blink" and process information at a subconscious level much more quickly, and with greater reliability than conscious reasoning. I am apolitical, and intend to remain so. But I will not vote for John Mcain. He scares me. and if he dies in office... well, that scares me too.

Racism is a funny thing. Sadly enough, the deepest, most accurate understanding of it's nature is facilitated in the individual who has been both victimizer and victim. (of course, this only applies to those who are spiritually awake... the ones who understand they are/were double agents - like Paul after his momentous road trip) Furthermore, if and when repentance comes, when the innermost self acknowledges racism, that it is there, and abominable, a fascinating clarity is achieved. A man begins to see shades, and degrees. He realizes, from the double perspective, how pettiness and pride can contribute to poor prioritization, in dealing with multiple racism issues and how the subtle ones can be as dangerous as the high profile. There is also the understanding that much ( not all) of the progress is superficial in nature, treating the symptom rather than disease.

I noticed early in my experience of community (It began with support groups, and moved into Bible studies, and now has become something more authentic- I have a few intimate friends, and am blessed to be able to engage more deeply as time goes by...) That I was better at talking about my feelings than I was at feeling them. Talking about my emotions in detail became for me, a way of actually escaping the raw emotional turmoil of trajedy, burying it so that It haunted me rather than dealing with it and moving on. It seems to me, that God calls me to a deeper more personal walk alongside him, and lately, I am  alone more than I have been in years. Studies take up a great deal of my time, and though I feel somewhat disconnected, I know that this is only for a season. (It should actually improve in about 4 more weeks.) Grief in the past has been something to run from, cover, or deny in busyness, and though I am busy, It seems that many of the tools I used to avoid the process have been removed. Flitting to and fro in the blogosphere and obsessively photographing nearly anything, has had to take a back seat to matters of greater import, and as a result, I find myself moving through emotions, and seeing a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel. My good friend Kemp lost his father a few days ago, and stopping by to express my condolences evidently stirred up a little emotion. I later found myself at home alone, and came across the cache of old photographs that my Father left behind when He moved on from this world.  It occurs to me that me, and possibly my sister  are the only ones who know the story behind these old black and white photographs. My Father was a photo enthusiast, back in the day when that meant nailing plywood over the guestroom windows so you could develop your own prints. Electronics were huge, filled with vacuum tubes. My Dad's first calculator was 75 dollars and the size of a brick. this was back when when he made less than $275 a month. I can remember that these pictures were already around, before the Casio miracle. If I had to guess, these were taken around 1969. it was a wonderful surprise to stumble across them after He died. These pics are, I think of a place called Niko (not sure about the spelling) it was an area of Japan that was thick with shrines. Like most pictures, it looks better on an uncluttered black background

 the indispensable prerequisite to all personal growth. Ya just can't have too much of it, and if it is lacking, it will sooner or later be felt. "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" but Christ must have something to strengthen. Andy Stanley tells us that yesterday we "wrote a chapter" in our story, the saga that chronicles the unavoidable change in our character. The question is which way did we go? Did we progress, or regress? Is our path in a consistent direction? All to often, I go forward and backward In great loops, content to trudge upward ever so slowly, satisfied that I am better than I used to be. 

I photoshopped this one, just barely. Adjusted the saturation on the bird herself, only (I guess she's female. Aren't the males the colorful ones?... strange.). I didn't touch the sharpness, I've never been happy with the results when I do that. Even though she's a little blurry, I've posted her because she is in a TREE, not sucking juice out of a FEEDER. Kinda like the difference between hunting with a bow versus hunting with a gun... We know who is the more accomplished huntsman :D . I have seen pictures of hummers tamed to the point of being hand fed, which I'll not post, because they make me jealous. But the hummers in MY backyard don't play that... to get close enough for this shot, and to raise up the ol' finepix S8100fd without spooking her made me feel quite the wildlife photographer... ala Ilia Shalamaev (I wish!)

She Looks a Lot Better On An Uncluttered Black Background!

 Is that morbid? If you send an undeliverable message, at least on Yahoo!, you will get a reply from the "Mailer Daemon". I half-expected that to happen, but evidently the account is still taking incoming mail. I missed my Dad so much, and needed so badly to talk to him about the emotional and logistical cataracts and white water that my life has become. It was pretty raw,  I wanted to engage and at some point, in my mind's eye the intended recipient grew blurry, and it was unclear if I was writing an FYI/lamentation to my deceased father, or a prayer of supplication to my Father In Heaven.  it did me a lot of good, get get some things out onto paper, if only the virtual kind. I cannot over-endorse the benefits of writing down thoughts for the severely attention deficit. Hopefully, Dad's widow, Rosemary doesn't check the account, or she may feel the need to send the Men in White Coats, but I figure the probability of that is low. CyberSpace has never had any attraction for her. 

Jenny is my good friend Ryan's wife (Gotta get a pic of Ryan, I don't have any) .I have really plugged my blog, in hopes that Jenny will drop by. She is so creative, I am hoping this humble little thing will inspire her to join the blogging community. She's got a helluva story. Anyway, I blogged her picture hoping it would be a pleasant surprise if she shows up :D

said donkey is a computer algorithm that ranks every photo uploaded to Flickr . Naturally, the specifics are a closely guarded secret. Flickrphiles speculate as to what makes the Magic Donkey neigh. amount of traffic to a photo is surely a factor, but other than that, none of the general public seems to know, which keeps it honest. The algorithm determines interestingness, and seems to work really well. 500 pictures a day are put up on explore and they are for the most part, interesting, really. Check it out. The explore page will give you a fresh picture every time you reload, as well as a few other browsing options.
 Go figure. 

I may have bitten off more than I can chew ( I hope not.) My fourth class is "how to study for idiots 101" it's only 2 credit hours, crammed into 4 Saturdays from 8:30 to 1:30. It is a prerequisite for any student whose placement test lands him in a remedial subject. Now, since I already had to give up one of my precious slots to math 99 I was reluctant to take Idiots 101 and only have one class left to work toward my degree (I am FORTY-ONE. Times-a-wastin'). So, over twenty years after being asked to leave high school - early, by the way, I have taken a fourth class. I am overwhelmed. The pitiful excuse I have for a daily routine needs to be tightened up drastically, and fine tuned. I must somehow make it through the next eight weeks, I have too much invested, and need a sucess or two under my belt. 

My biology professor is a hoot... this is our 4th class and we have yet to be given a syllabus. He has lectured on sailing, given a brief review of the movie "wind", and today, we watched an interview with Dr. Christian Du Duve, a Nobel Lauriate who won (with 2 others) the prize in medicine in1974. as I write this now, he is discoursing on harpsichord music and Handel's Messiah
he said we won't be tested on any of this...

There is a huge (flock?) of geese that hang out at the campus pond. I got out of math about an hour early, yesterday, and strolled around waiting to go to my CIS class, and took a few pictures.

Riddle: Often, when you look up and see a "V" of migrating birds in the sky, one arm of the "V" is slightly longer than the other. Why is this?

Answer

Ya Really Gotta View It On A Black Background, Here.

I no longer believe that Satan's every action is taken with Divine permission. Satan may quite possibly be a free agent, acting on his own agenda beneath Divine soveriegnity, like most of us humans. The Idea that Satan does only what is permitted comes from passages in Job1;12, and Job2:6 where the God sets boundaries for the Satanic Torment of Job, and in Luke 22;31 where Jesus Informs Peter that Satan has asked for the right to "sift" him. Now, the Job thing looks to us, like a very civil discussion/debate. A wager. ("Job holds you in reverence and respect, but only because you take care of him. I'll bet if you let me kick his ass for a while, he will become bitter enough toward you to lose his temper") now the content here is so interesting, perhaps the greatest challenge is not to get off the subject, but anytime two parties with differing opinions agree to an experiment to see who is right, it is common to lay out some boundaries.

Mother says to Dad, "I'll bet junior will eat up the Haagen Daz Macadamia Brittle you have been hoarding within 2 days if you move it from the garage freezer and put in in the kitchen, next to the Mayfield vanilla.

Dad replies " You're on! but you must not remove the Mayfield nor withhold meals from junior."

What we see here is agreement on boundaries, not Mother being incapable of moving ice cream. To be sure, the average dad has the physical power to prevent mom from moving the Mayfield, but saying that is not the same thing as saying Mom takes no action without permission.

I am thinking that Satan has at least as much autonomy as we do. Choice is a prerequisite for evil, as well as love.

I was told early in my Christian Walk( I've always thought that term was cheesy, wish we would get a new one.), that Satan did only what he was permitted to. A baptist pastor told me this, and I was reminded of it last Tuesday.

My Current Pastor has been showing up bi-monthly for a Q&A, though, to be sure very few questions are answered (we just get more and better ones!), However, He actually did allow me to pin him down- (He was possibly thrown off balance by my lightning-fast change of subject.) When I asked him if he believed in Satanic Autonomy. He answered No. This is not a rare stance, and I one that I held myself until recently... I don't know if he has taken that opinion out of his doctrinal library and placed it on the table for reexamination or not, but I certainly have.

I think constantly. Most of us do. Occaisionally, when reading, or just being aware of the stream of conciousness flowing through my brain, a thought/concept kinda "jumps" up a little... pops into bas-relief and I will either give it closer consideration or slam my open mind shut in discomfort. (There's a post there, I think.), But I think that these instances, and any thought, for that matter, have three possibly origins: Divine, Demonic, Or ME.

Anyway to get off the rabbit trail, I jumped to this common conclusion as well, after reading the Bible. The Passage in Job where Satan is told what he can do to ruin Job's life, a " you can go this far, but no farther" sort of thing is perhaps the most noted scriptural instance where a first read would let a man think that Satan is a puppet... another little blurb is when Simon Peter has blustered about how tight he is with Jesus, but the Light of the World responds by informing Rocky, that the shallowness of his loyalty will be exposed before the rooster crows. I think this is in Luke. Just prior to this, Jesus tells Peter that Satan asked to sift him "like wheat".

To me, this is deep stuff. I ponder this from the intellectual shallows of my 9th grade education, and I wonder if this/these passage are sufficient to support the doctrine of Satanic Dis-Autonomy (is that a word?). I don't think so. For reasons I will detail in my next post, I will explain why I no longer believe this is Chiseled in Stone, and that Satan may quite possibly be a free agent, acting on his own agenda. :D  

The first week of school, A little behind on my reading, but I feel, prepared for my first test monday. I have have some feelings of trepidation, over finance, and time management, the pressure of juggling a couple of days a week of work, my studies, the obligations of my guardianship over my invalid aunt, and relationships: romance with Debbie, building bridges with my family, and establishing/maintaining intimacy with members of my small group, and church community. I  believe relationships are the most important thing, and that we most closely resemble the image of the Living God when we interact in loving community, and that are power to do good is multiplied exponentially when we cooperate, The whole being greater than the sum of its parts. The question is, how to do the next right thing? Is it a question of seasons, and should some things simply be sacrificed, or curtailed for the next four years? These are hard decisions. And what of my love of photography, and my need to escape to the mountains, to recharge, and reach the quiet, lonely places to better hear the voice of my Father in Heaven?

after jumping through many hoops, I am once again enrolled in an accredited institution in the university system of the Great state of Georgia! I am hungry for a little blog action, and a night of browsing, lurking, and commenting would be wonderful, but my studies call, and its getting late. :D

that to divorce is a bad thing... in one paraphrase, however, he specifies an exception for an unfaithful spouse. This gets complicated, the verses are many, the applicable contexts that must be considered, are convoluted, and the modern denominational prejudice against divorcees, especially here in the south-  do nothing to promote clear thinking. I have a dear friend, respected and wise, who was probably a virgin on her wedding night (the lady is a proper christian widow approaching 80... I am not going to ask her to confirm this) Who expressed concern at where Debbie, my  girlfriend had spent the weekend. The conversation left me feeling embarrassed,  defensive, and uncomfortable, as well as mildly aggravated with gossip, though in this particular instance, gossip was not the source of my friend's information. My point, Is that it seems kinda silly, sometimes to be overly concerned with a biblical view on sexual purity, if your take is that, according to Jesus, all post-divorce sex is adultery. There is just not a little voice in my head saying "Don't have sex... keep the biblical boundaries of sexual purity" Unfortunately, I need some kind of hope other than a life of sexual abstinence until death (you can make a scriptural argument that this is God's Will for the divorcee, at least the baptists can, as well as Andy Stanley, one of my favorite communicators.) to motivate me. I really need to take some time and delve into this. Looking at my past, and the reality around me, I realize the enormous power God chose place in human sex. The Fire... it's ability for nurture or destruction is something I have a healthy respect for. I cannot find the willingness to seriously contemplate a lifetime without warmth, and if I shall be disobedient,  Why not now, after I have lost hope of Sex with Gods approval, than later, after having committed to remarriage against his will, though with the approval of the judgemental ?

"Faith may be described as an attitude of trust adopted in the face of our ignorance of God."- Jeremy Young.

this little guy just showed up and posed 1st thing this mornin' I would love to know what it is... I don't think he's a dragonfly.

I have to go to Atlanta. Now. Because of some strange policies in place at the georgia military college, that I have been trying to get into because this makes my life more simple,(you dont have to buy books) in the long run... I will pick up a piece of paper that would take 4 weeks to get here.

He's not gonna take no for an answer. 

Dog toys are funny things. Jack is pretty good about keeping up with them, but over time they do get lost, only to reappear a little time down the road. He  LOVES this thing... and it seems, in the last few days to have gone away.

the inevitable invitation to view him on a black background

an attempt to get artsy, to step beyond my usual Great Big Bug Picture and photograph something with a broader appeal... It really should be viewed on a black background to be appreciated

This too, I like...

I am pretty pleased with this pic... I feel like I am approaching the limits of what I can do without upgrading my camera, or moving much more slowly

Happy but not satisfied... it's a good thing I'm broke - I would blow the power bill on feeders and bright red annuals.
I know I haven't been posting consistently. I know, I am letting down my loyal readers - both of you... Hang in there.