Specialness

Enlightenment.

My short blogging hiatus can be blamed on self-loathing and lots of learning. As anyone in America is vividly aware, the Christmas season has now been upon us for a little over 9 weeks. It's not even December and I've heard every Christmas song ever recorded at least 12 times. I would be frustrated at the overkill but for those entertaining little nuggets of sales information we affectionately call commercials.

I started to feel bad when I saw an intriguing spot about a guy getting a slew of white elephant gifts for Christmas. (I'm not in the habit of memorizing television spots if they don't have a catchy jingle, so I'm taking the liberty of summarizing here.) The guy got a wicked looking clock, some little trinkets and it was evident he simply wasn't enjoying a fruitful Christmas season. I mean, really, how could you? The man had probably been a good boy (40 years old or so) the whole entire year and then...what?! No good toys? Aw, nothing but a bunch of junk he'd have to return in long lines. But, just when you think his holiday is a bust, the jolly voiceover reminds us that we have it within our power to rectify others' shopping follies. We can get what we really, really want. Cut to serene and snowy picture of 3 brand new Lexus' perfectly gift-wrapped. And just as I was getting bummed with the guy for all the crappy stuff he got for gifts, my hopes were renewed when I realized that if I visit a Twin Cities Lexus dealer and give them $35,000 of my own money, I can have a good Christmas, too. Brought to you by the car company who engineered a self-parallel-parking series. Life would be easier if someone else did the parallel parking, you'd have to admit.

And then I learned something from Dodge. I guess they have figured out how to bring the family together. Again, a wonderful service brought to us by those kindly generous higher ups in the executive community. They have actually done their research and found, first of all, that the family nucleus in America has suffered. Perhaps a result of the video games or internet or headphones or constant DVD's playing as babysitters...I mean, who truly knows why the family in America has suffered? It would take at least ten minutes to figure that out. And I don't have that kind of time. Regardless, Dodge is making some headway in this area of familial reconciliation. The voiceover tells us that "Dodge is bringing the family together again..." And guess what they found brings the family together, no kidding? A minivan (that looks exactly as past models without increased safety features) that has, get this-headphones and DVD's playing and video games! Dodge actually found that those same distractions that have caused a healthy family nucleus to become less interactive actually reunites the American family. That is so cool. I can't wait to have kids so we can pop in a DVD, crank up the tunes and never talk to our children in the backseat. And then kick my feet up and watch the reuniting take place. Thank you, Dodge.

This holiday season, if you want your dignity questioned and your intelligence insulted, watch lots of commercials.

(The author does indeed, for research purposes, recommend taking one 15-minute span of television watching time with your family or friends to critically analyze the advertising genius of American capitalism--then come to your own conclusions.)

The Wistfully Whacked Out World of Disney

Saturday mornings I don't usually watch cartoons. But I turned on the TV Saturday morning (another thing I don't normally do) and found myself watching the Disney cartoon The Replacements. I'm not familiar with the show, but it was a scene about baseball, so I indulged for a few minutes and found myself critiquing everything I saw, which I usually DO do.

Here's the setup. The family: mom is Agent K, a beautiful blonde cartoon with a slim figure and British accent who "insists on trying to adapt her super-spy skills to parenting, with little success." Dad is Dick, an overstuffed stuntman and "Like Special Agent K, he has no experience parenting, but a total lack of knowledge has never stopped him from doing anything." Todd and Riley are the two stereotypical kids.

The situation: down by a run (or maybe they are tied), the kids have to score a run to win the game. I think Todd was at bat and I found myself intrigued by point 1.) The kids used a satellite contraption to steal the signs from the catcher as an advantage in hitting. The scene passed by so quickly without so much as a nod to the cheating, Disney must assume all teams have access to such technology and that they were in fact, playing by the rules.

With Todd cheating his way to first base, the plot thickened. Shelton, the potential winning run, a scrawny nerdy kid, made his way to the plate, terrified and knock-kneed. A couple of pitches went by and 'blam!' he was beaned by a fastball. The crowd went nuts as Shelton's beaning forced home the winning run. Ah yes! The little nerd wins it by taking one for the team.

The entire scene was less than 3 minutes but notice what I got from that short segment: 1.) Dad and Mom are less than adequate to parent (but look good), 2.) kids cheat to win and are celebrated and 3.) the little stick of a scapegoat kid gets nailed for the good of the team. I'm not a parent yet, but I'd have to worry about my kids watching this seemingly innocent little show that depicts parents who are inept but attractive, kids cheating and pre-pubescent boys getting hit by fastballs so the cool kids can win a game. Hmm...

Call me over-the-top analytical, but this miniscule act on the stage of unprecedented media intake should warn us that we need to question the value of what we watch. Are we ingesting TV, movies, games, etc that align with our values, beliefs and faith? Or are we settling for a digital babysitting box to breathe our society's flawed systems into us?

Ah, words.

These beautiful little building blocks of conversation. They hold the power to beat down, lift up, honor, discourage, confuse, portray and tell a story. Words are such a creative and wonderful gift with which to communicate. We can use them lazily or efficiently.

We think them, throw them at people (or in expletive cases, at inanimate objects), dream them, ponder them, learn from them, ignore them. We dissect them, analyze them, worry about them and, at times, receive our lifeblood from them.

And throw in the tone in which they're given or received, the attitude to which they're attached, and you've got a virtual smorgasbord of material to critique.

Words have changed nations, history, lives and self-esteems. And an individual letter can alter a meaning.

I just started reading Brendan by Frederick Buechner and found this nugget this morning...

Beg not, refuse not, she said. One step forward each day was the way to the Land of the Blessed. Don't eat till your stomach cries out. Don't sleep till you can't stay awake. Don't open your mouth till it's the truth opens it.

As we make our way through the days, my hope is that I will consider every
dotted 'i' and crossed 't' to mine the truth from the untruth.

Picture this...

So really this entry is more of a daily update. You need to see the picture to appreciate it, but I've got these industrial strength (studio-looking) headphones on to drown out the conference call Mary is on here in the Fig T home office. I'm having to crank up the volume because they are hitting the call pretty (loud) figuring out the group presentation for her Organizational Development class. (Did I mention she aced her first grad school class?)

Just as some people can only fall asleep while listening to music or with the TV on or can study with a movie and iPod blaring...I cannot listen to music with words (though Don Henley is now playing on my awesome 80's iTunes station) while writing. So, if this is an all-over-blog tonight, you'll know why. Blame it on Henley.

The real news (ala the Onion) is what's been going on with the Green Gronseth's. We have replaced some bulbs around the house with the mega-efficient, money-saving version. I replaced a ceiling light with one that uses 1 bulb rather than two. We're trying to drive smarter. But here's the (perhaps 'dumb' as one called it) kicker: we're competing (now within our household) to see how far into the cold weather we can go before turning on the furnace. We've seen lows of 23 a few nights in the last week. And we have thus far beaten old man winter.

In fact, both of us love the colder weather. Save for the cracked skin and 4 hours of daylight, we'd much rather freeze than boil. Truly we are both Minnesotans.

The lowest the temp has dipped inside is 61. Really not that bad when you light a few candles, cook with the oven (then leave the door open when finished) and wear layers.

Friendship

There's a lot to blog about these days and I'd be remiss if any more time passed without mentioning some special people in our lives. Lee and Davis Mitchell and their two beautiful children (Lewis pictured on right with Lee and Davis) and (Bo pictured on left with my wife Mary) are the kind of people you want to be associated with. Friendships are funny. There are people in my life who have come and gone during certain seasons of life (as I've come and gone from others' lives) and there are people who, as time passes, rise to the top as unique people on the journey I need in my life, those with whom I cherish the painstaking efforts of long-term friendship-building. Lee and I met 13 years ago when we were both on our first Young Life camp trip as adult volunteer leaders. Wide-eyed and terrified, we endured, nay, thrived, during the week with kids and following became pen pals. There, I said it, we were pen pals. This was before e-mail came onto the scene and cell phones were consumer priced. We had an excuse. Over the last 13 years our lives have in many ways mirrored each other with similar life experiences, shared experiences and now the great joy of having our wives begin a friendship.

Last month we had the privilege of joining them at the Mitchell family "cottage" on Sea Island. Before we got there, Davis asked us what our favorite color was. "Blue" was our reply and when we got there, we were greeted by blue balloons and got to stay in the blue colored master suite (they're all master suites, let it be known. There was truly nothing 'cottagey' about it). It was a relaxing 5 days of beach walks, food, sweet laughing kids, southern caviar (thanks Davis!) and rich conversation. I mean, hey, if you're going to build deep friendships, why not at the beach? We're so grateful to have had this time to be together.

To me it is a picture of perseverance and consistency. We've put the building blocks of faith, grace and honesty at the forefront and have seen, even through 'slow' periods of life and friendship, the harvest reaped from such a commitment. Thank God for friends and family we get to share life with. This is really what it all boils down to for me-my and Mary's life intertwined with family and friends whose arms we hold up and who hold our arms through the highest highs and the lowest lows.

Davis recently started a blog (got me blogging again) and you'll have to check it out here. Beautiful stories and pics of their family...

Anybody home?

Last night Mary and I took our dog Tabby for a walk. We're pretty good about getting Tab exercise everyday (weather pending), so it is really part of our routine. We have a little regiment that involves me getting Tabby ready (harness and leash on) and Mary getting the house ready (locking the front door and turning on the front light if it's dark). It was already dark, so we turned the light on and took off down the road.

It was only six o'clock, but in our neighborhood we don't typically have many trick or treaters, and last night was, obviously, Halloween.

The walk was fine: Tabby sniffing at and peeing on things, letting the world know she owns Evergreen Drive. When we turned back onto our road, however, we ran into a dilemma. As we approached our place, two tiny trick or treaters accompanied by adults were slowly walking up our drive. Oh no! We left our light on-and on Halloween, in a neighborhood like ours, an outside light signals candy. The scene turned slow motion. We looked at each other.

"Go up to them and aplogize that we left our light on and that we don't have any candy," I whispered to Mary.

"Run up ahead of them and find some candy in the house," she whispered back.

It was dark, but Mary was sure that the candy collectors recognized us and our dog and that we lived in the lit place they were approaching.

We snapped looks back and forth to each other. Walking. Whispered 'what should we do's?' back and forth. Still walking. Approaching...

And at that moment we made the decision. We did what any sorry hosts without candy would have done. Maybe. We kept right on walking. Past our house, down the street and out of sight.

So, our apologies go out to the little princess and Yoda who took tiny little steps, with high hopes that they would hit the sugar jackpot. We're still wondering how the parents broke the news when nobody answered our door.

We'll be sure to turn our lights OFF next year.