The discussion, The dream, and The black hole

I had a dream this morning- a dream that was likely brought on because of a discussion last night about someone very dear to me bent on following a road to apparent self-destruction. In this dream, our protagonist had all the traditional 'reasons to live'- friends trying to help her, support her, and prop her up; a reason to live beyond herself in the form of a baby still in the womb; and a hero ready to give his life for her. Throughout the dream, she-and they- faced the menace of a terrible tiger, always stalking them. The tiger, though, wasn't the Destroyer that everyone imagined. The destroyer was inside her, the "black hole" that constantly told her only death was an escape from the pain of life.
Much of the dream she wasn't activily trying to kill herself; she just constantly put herself in a position for the tiger to finish her off. It was a constant cycle of her drifting towards destruction, the support group or the hero saving her fom the tiger with no effort (or appreciation) on her part, and her re-drifting into danger.
Finally, the baby's birth became there and real. The friend-group sought her desperately, but in vain. And the hero was finally killed trying to hold off the tiger. And none of it meant anything to her, and she tried to end it all by flinging herself down a steep slope. The friends who cared, the hero's sacrifice, the baby crying for life, none of it meant anything.
But then, as she hung from the cliff, she realized at last she wanted to live. Not for the friends, the hero, the baby, but at last for herself. She finally did the things that allowed her support group to help her. She had saved herself, but not before all the destruction her choices had caused. And the tiger? He stood by and watched her rescue.
The dream reminded me that some people- myself once included- have this black hole generator inside them. You can fill their hole with your whole life and being and never fill it up. Because it is not a physical hole. And every excuse a person gives you for its existance, though real to them, is an illusion. The truth is, there is only one way to get rid of the hole. And that is you, yourself, must turn it off. You cannot turn it off with mothers, lovers, or babies. A person has to see the hole for what it is- a desire to death- look it in the face, and say, "No. This is garbage, and I reject it." This isn't a moment, it is a process. It involves re-learning your whole outlook, and many people are unwilling to try until they look death in the face and see their own reflection. Some don't even then. And the only thing that the hero, the Baby, the support group does, is prevent them from getting to that moment sooner. They can give all the reasons to live they want and it will always, as Thomas Aquinas said, "seem as straw to me." The hole doesn't start going away until you say, "I - I have a reason to live. A reason inside of me, that's just mine."
In the dream, the battle wasn't won when the hero died, the baby was born , or when the friends found her and hoisted her up from the cliff. The cliff, and the tiger, ceased to be a danger when she finally decided she wanted to live. In fact, the dream actually jumped from the girl being found at the edge of the cliff crying for help to the hero's funeral. The rest, it seems, was not important.
In the waking world, I thank God that I have been reminded of what to pray for in the real-life situation. I had forgotten what the black hole was like- which is scary, because it's always just a moment away.

Job, part III

So after several chapters of Job's self-righteous stubbornness ("Bear with me that I may speak; and after I have spoken, keep mocking," 21:3) and his friends' inability to figure out that they are saying,' on one hand no one can be righteous before God, and on the other if Job was really righteous he wouldn't be in this mess', we finally get to Elihu. He cuts to the core of the problem ("His wrath was aroused because ((Job)) justified himself rather than God. Also against his three friends his wrath was aroused, because they had found no answer and yet condemned Job." 32:2-3) But the smartest thing Elihu says at the start applies to us, when things go wrong and we complain to God and He doesn't answer. We say, God, how can you do this to me? and demand an answer, and get pissed when we get silence in return. But Elihu knew why that was.

"And now, because He has not punished in His anger, nor taken much notice of folly, Therefore Job opens his mouth in vain; he multiplies words without knowledge." 35:15-16

What is he saying? 1. As Forest Gump taught us, shit happens. Not because God's punishing us, or is mad at us, or is being unfair as Job implied. It just happens. 2. Since none of those things is happening to us, except in our minds, God doesn't reply to such comments. 3. Arguing such a case is foolishness, and God doesn't pay attention to foolishness. Thus, 4. Job, and ourselves, won't get answered when we whine. As we find out a few chapters later, to get answered, we need to acknowledge who is God and who isn't; realize that God, being smarter than us, has reasons for things that we don't understand; and accept that God has more important things to do than pick on us- and is doing them.

My ultrasound checkup

I have to have an ultrasound on my vein graft every three months, and today was the first one. Let me tell you how that went.
9:04- left work.
9:49- arrive at 1819 Carew.
9:51- get paperwork started at first floor reception.
9:58- sent to second floor lab. Ask about slip for work, she' says they'll take care of it up there.
10:00- report to second floor lab desk. "Okay, we'll let them know you're here."
10:15- scheduled appointment time.
10:25- old lady sitting next to me begins to moan in her sleep.
10:38-taken back to ultrasound room.
10:39-"Take off shoes, socks, and pants, lie on the bed and cover up."
10:40- exam begins. Asked three times what exactly they did to me, as the paperwork isn't matching what she sees.
10:40-11:05- almost fall asleep 6 times.
11:05- the tech decides that the description on the paperwork doesn't match what she's seeing; calls somebody to send up the surgical report.
11:05-11:25 lay there alone waiting for report. Almost fall asleep 7th time.
11:25- surgical report arrives; exam begins again.
11:35- the tech decides to call in her boss to see if she can figure it out. Apparently the surgical report was about as good as the work order.
11:37- lab boss comes in; they look over the situation trying to figure out what got grafted to what.
11:40- lab boss decides tech is doing it right after all; tells her basically to take a lot of pictures and let Dr. Sowden figure it out.
11:41-12:05- tech takes a lot of pictures. Too busy deciding whether to stop off for lunch after the exam to almost fall asleep again.
12:05- exam done. Towel off excess gel and get dressed.
12:10- the tech points out second floor reception desk, has me go ther to get checked out.
12:11- get checked out. Ask about work slip, she tells me to go back in lab room and ask them.
12:12- ask lab desk; they call back to the tech and tell me to wait for her.
12:16- Greg Shoup tries to do the weather with a dead microphone. Stumbles across the screen to get new one, jokes about the 'sounds of silence'.
12:19- tech brings out work slip.
12:21- leave 1819 Carew.
1:05- arrive at work.
4:30- end of work day. HR lady still hasn't looked at work slip.

A variety of Undisturbing thoughts for today

1. The Conference championship week for the Commissioners cup is done, and with 2 weeks (since I decided to add the Pro Bowl) remaining, here's how we line up: KCAs still hanging on to first with 104 despite a scoreless weekend; Beagles close to within 7, scoring 9 to reach 97; SVA exploded this week, scoring 23 to leap 3 notches to #3 with 95; the Ducks hold onto 4th with 87; Rhinos keep pace with 85; the player-less B2s still with 83 slide to 6th; Angels climb to 7th with 82; Buzz drops that spot into 8th with 78; the Rangers outscored the Clock BBQs 18-16 this week to pull into 9th with 77, whilst the BBQs fall to 10th with 75. Neither the Elks nor the player-less T-Cubs scored this week; they remain at 55 and 52 respectively. The KCAs, SVA, and Buzz join B2s and T-Cubs with no more players for the super bowl, but everybody's got someone next week.
2. Off the sports for a moment: when I got out of the car after work tonight, I saw two of our friendly neighborhood deer cross the street (in front of a car probably 20 ft away) and zip off down the trail behind the apartment. I thought it might be neat to keep track of the menangerie we see out back this year; the count now is 2 deer, a bunny, a squirrel (which, due to their commonness I might not be real dilligent in keeping track of) and a fox.
3. Back on sports, my loveable Oakland A's (no, not another player defecting to become a priest) were proud to announce that they had signed former Milwaukee Brewer pitcher Ben Sheets. Ben was out recovering from surgery all last year, which means that the Athletics' top two starters for this season pitched the exact same amount of innings in 2009 that I did (Justin Duscherer also took a year off with surgery and clinical depression).
4. Finally, after a website called rockyou was hacked of all of its 32 million customer passwords, a firm doing security on the breach found that a lot of the problem wa the idiot-accessible passwords people use. Here is the top 10 according to Imperva:
The top 10 most common passwords

1. 123456
2. 12345
3. 123456789
4. Password
5. iloveyou
6. princess
7. rockyou *
8. 1234567
9. 12345678
10. abc123

* Note: this list was sourced from the RockYou website
Is it just me, or do some people deserve identity theft?

More lessons from Job

I've started in on the debates between Job and his three friends. What I have learned applies both to Job and the three, and I will explain it in a minute. First, let's look at Job. I know I see a lot of myself- especially earlier 'myself' - in his attitude. He starts out wishing he was never born, because despite his innocence (he likes to think he deserves no worse treatment in the next life that a stillborn babe) he is now worse off than everyone else. Never mind that a few days before he was one of the most prosperous men in the world, that doesn't count. His second response claims that suddenly God, his friends, and everything in life is against Him. Note that he never turns to God sincerely for help, just accuses Him of being the enemy. Thirdly, he justifies that attitude by claiming God can't be talked to- 'even if I'm right, I'm wrong.' Then he basically accuses God of being a bully, that he picks on people even though He is the one that made them the way they are. I can recall accusing God of these things a time or two, can you?
Then we look at the three friends. They actually make some good points. First, no matter how righteous we think we are, we can't out-righteous God. If we have a dispute with God, we are wrong, period. Second, God sees from a different perspective and can see in our motives what we do not. Third, Job seemed to them to be connecting his previous blessings with his righteousness ( he even says as much in 16:12- "I was at ease, but He has shattered me.") They point out that that is a false connection. And then, one of them tells Job the first thing we should be told when we take his attitude- the world isn't going to come to an end because of what's happening to you, and you are foolish to think it should.
But for all they got right, they were still coming at it from a wrong angle. They thought that everything that happened to Job was because he had some sin, whether he realized that sin or not. And this is the mistake they both made- they had the idea that bad things cannot happen to good people. For Job, that meant that God had to be wronging him, yet he had no means to protest it because God is God. He felt that he still was trusting in God, but God was in the wrong. "Though He slay me, yet I shall trust Him. Even so, I will defend my ways before Him" ( 13:15). Because of Job's concept of God, he could not see the contradiction in this. If you think God's in the wrong, you aren't trusting Him.
And the boys were no better- this same concept told them 1) if bad things happened to you, you were guilty of something; 2) diaster only comes to those who"forget God"; 3) if you were innocent, you could "lift your face" before God. What they failed to see is that, as Paul said, God uses everything for the good- whether good times or bad,- and is not afraid to let things happen to the children that He loves. And as we saw last time, sometimes these things do happen to correct, or to renew, or to show God's mercy.
If you trust God, you have to trust that He's right even when it feels like He's wrong. It doesn't mean we're bad when things go wrong, either. It may just mean we have something to learn.

You know how the year will go when...

OAKLAND, Calif. -- Oakland Athletics prospect Grant Desme is retiring from baseball to enter the priesthood.






Desme was selected the 2009 Arizona Fall League MVP and was considered one of the top prospects in Oakland's system.

The 23-year-old outfielder batted .288 with 31 homers, 89 RBI and 40 stolen bases in 131 games at Class-A Kane County and Stockton last season. He then hit .315 with a league-leading 11 home runs and 27 RBI in 27 games in the fall league.

Desme said he'd been thinking about the priesthood for a year and a half. "It took me a while to get to," he said on a conference call Friday.

Desme plans to enter a seminary in August and hopes eventually to become a Catholic priest.

"It's about a 10-year process," he said. In a way, he added, it's like "re-entering the minor leagues."

Desme told Oakland general manager Billy Beane about his decision on Thursday. Desme said he had no regrets about walking away from baseball.

"I love the game, but I aspire to higher things," he said.

Desme was a second-round pick in the 2007 amateur draft after being selected Big West Player of the Year at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. He was ranked as Oakland's No. 8 prospect by Baseball America.
I wish all the blessings in the world to Grant, and applaud him for his moral character in giving up a likely 7-figure bank account to serve God.
On the other hand, this kind of thing can only happen to teams I root for. I will expect to hear any day that our new third baseman, Kevin Kouzmanoff, is suffering from the same spinal disk injury that's crippled Eric Chavez for four years, or some player will be hit by lightning while adjusting the antenna like Bo Diaz was years ago. Or like the Dolphins, where we've assembled a Big Ten all-star team that takes turns alternating between highlight reel plays and blowing a game's crucial play due to utter incompetance ( Ayodele, Fields, Vonte, Ginn, Hartline, Henne, Long, and Cam Wake, you know who I'm talking about).

The lessons of Job

This morning my Bible study was the first two chapters of Job, and I learned something I hadn't seen before- trust.
First of all we need to keep in mind that disasters happen to every one. Later on, we are told that they happen for three reasons: for correction (literally, as a beating rod); for the renewal of the land (as in how the forest is rejuvenated after a fire); and as a means for God to show His mercy.
But Job and his suffering were a special case. Regard: he is described as blameless, upright, fearing God and hating sin, humble for all the great wealth he had, careful to pray for all he had, incuding each as an individual, and involving them in his faith. He not only walked the walk, but evangelized his own family.
But God allowed his sufferings. Satan first told God, it's easy for a man so blessed to have faith. What would happen if you removed those blessings? And God trusted him enough to let that happen. And when God's trust was proved, Satan said possessions are not personal pain. And God allowed that as well, because He trusted Job's faith that much.
God allowed Job to face loss of wealth, unexplainable happenings, overwhelming odds, and natural disasters, one on top of the other. He allowed Job to be tested both physically by disease and emotionally by the turning of his wife against him. Surely it could be said that God allowed the man he trusted the most in all the world to be hit by every ill we can conceive of- and all at once, at that!
And how did he respond? When he lost everything, he replied,
"Naked came I from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there..." (1:21)
and when his own person, his own heart, was attacked, he said,
"Shall we indeed accept good from God, and not accept adversity?" (2:10)
Point being, there's a reson for everything. So when suffering comes we need to ask, "Did I do something wrong; or is this to change things for the better; or is this to bring me to God for help; or is it a sign that He trusts me?"