I Knew the Day Would Come

OK. So, I had this dream where I get to class and the students pull out their textbooks and none of them have my textbook. Or it is in Russian and I can't read Russian. Or something down this road.

Well, it happened yesterday. I got to class early and noticed students pulling out a book that I have never seen before. When the previous class ended, I went in and asked the teacher if the book for my course had changed. She told me it had, and, with a disgusted expression, she commented: "No one bothered to tell you, did they?" I told her no one had. It is kind of funny because I had just taught the course in the Summer session that ended only a couple of weeks ago and we used the textbook I had used all year long. I will get over it, but I had to hustle to find enough information to get me through until the book company sends me a copy of the book and all the listening materials to go with it. I ended up buying an online subscription to the text so I can at least be prepared for Wednesday's class meeting. It is not the worst thing ever. I have used an older edition of the book when I was teaching in Texas, so at the very least I am somewhat familiar with the format. Oh well, it made for an interesting first day of class.

I completed the book Post-Charismatic? and I think I may have to write Rob McAlpine and tell him that he wrote this book especially for me. I am more determined now than ever to embrace my heritage and continue to seek the Holy Spirit in a way that I was afraid to attempt just a few months ago. I am thankful that as I begin to feel a change in how I feel about my past, and how it pertains to my present (one might call this a mellowing out period), God brings something into my life that seals the deal so to speak. I am grateful. McAlpine talks a lot about Detoxing from Church, this need to step away and allow God to work through some of the believer's hurts and inner turmoils that come from the Church herself. Some, like me, have decided to detox in a non-charismatic church. Though I now have no desire to abandon my heritage, it is highly unlikely that I will return to the Pentecostal fold any time ever. My feeling is, and has been for some time, the charismatic folks ought to be a seasoning to the church in general rather than congregating all together.

So, here's to salt and light. Gloria a Dios!

Disappointed

So, this past week was a roller coaster of emotions. Emma went back to school. Elizabeth started Kindergarten down the hall from her mom. This is devastating. I am not ready for her to be at real school yet. Elizabeth's teacher is a church member and she told us Liz was a good little student and well-behaved. Madeline starts preschool tomorrow. She spent the week farmed out to friends and church members. She is a funny girl and has everyone completely fooled.

This weekend was supposed to be my third annual Fall Choir Kick-Off and music reading session. We were going to look at our Christmas music and a nice dinner was planned. However, as the week progressed it appeared that we would get the brunt of Tropical Storm Fay. So, we first decided to cancel the dinner. Then, Friday, we decided to cancel the rest. We had several events planned at the church this weekend and all of them went to the dogs. All around us, cities had buckets of rain and high winds. It barely rained here. Saturday, supposedly the "worst" day, we spent at home wondering when the storm would finally get here. It never came. Granted, if we had decided to keep things business as usual, there would have been a major storm. But for some reason, Panama City was spared. I think it is my mother's fault. We have had the quietest hurricane seasons these past three years and I attribute it to my mother's intercession. I just never get to have any fun.


Tomorrow I start my fall class at the community college. Let me tell you, it is a full class. It is interesting for me to have big classes because I never had classes this large when I was teaching in Texas. Even when I taught a semester at Tarrant County College in Arlington, my classroom only held like 24 students and none of my classes at Southwestern were ever bigger than about a dozen (with the exception of my ensemble). It is a much different dynamic having a larger class. It is harder to get to know students and easier for them to blend in.


Several months ago I mentioned reading about a book called Post-Charismatic by Randy McAlpine, an emergent blogger who used to be involved in the Vineyard. Well, I finally got ahold of a copy of the book, harder than usual since it has not been published in the United States. I have read most of it and it has been pretty good. It outlines several of the major reasons people leave the charismatic movement, and for the book's purposes, charismatic includes traditional Pentecostals, charismatics, and Third Wavers. You can look back at what I thought originally about the issues addressed in this book here. One thing I really appreciated about this book was how well McAlpine documented the history of some of the kookiest "doctrines" of charismania, especially his discussion of the Word of Faith, Shepherding, and Latter Rain movements. Some of these things filtered down to me back in the day, but in a VERY distilled manner. One of the funniest things, and also one of the scariest, was the realization that many of the things that are equated with heresy are some Latter Rain teachings that are being proffered by a church not too far from mine.


One thing that I am hugely grateful for, after reading this book, is that I missed a lot of the worst abuses of the charismatic movement by being a part of the Assemblies of God. Despite the things that drove me bonkers about Pentecostalism, at least I was involved in a movement that would stand up to ideas that were heretical and McAlpine mentions this often, citing position papers that the General Council published to combat heretical teachings or spurious thinking. It is odd that as much as I do not miss some of the nuttiness of charismania, sometimes I still miss that old feeling. One thing that has been a significant milestone for me is that, though I still do not come out to everyone I know about being a Pentecostal in recovery, I am beginning to embrace that part of my life again. This has come back to me in a wash all of a sudden. This past week our senior minister's son-in-law was in a horrible motorcycle accident, and I have rarely felt the compulsion to pray, really spiritually pray for anyone in the good ol' fashioned way, since I ventured into this new life.

I am disappointed with myself. Granted, I have really been in a legitimate crisis of faith over these last several years. I have struggled with a spiritual identity crisis and discussed the frustrations of it often on this blog. But is this an excuse to not practice the spiritual disciplines that I know I need to practice? You know: truly spiritual prayer, exercising the gifts of the Spirit, reading the Bible, and meditating on holy things. Sure, I am busy serving in vocational ministry, but I feel like it is not a very spiritual endeavour at times. We do good things, but I worry that I do these things because it is my job and not because they are the things Christians should do. And, as I continue on this path to ordained ministry, I worry that if I do not stem the tide now, there will be no opportunity later. And, since this week I began the application process to go to seminary, I want to make sure I am in the best place spiritually as possible before I start down another academic rabbit hole, another thing to fight for my time.

The likelihood that I will be where I think I need to be soon is not very likely, but at least I am more acutely aware of where I think God wants me to go/be. I want to be right here, but I also want to be me. And I guess that makes me a post-charismatic United Methodist.



That's my Kindergartner there. God love her.

Equal Opportunity Mocking

Here are a couple of videos showing the presidential candidates in their best light. I don't know which one is worse, the one that was made up to be mean or the one that actually happened. No comments are necessary.

Betty Butterfield on Methodists Revisited

One of my favorite videos ever. Hopefully I will be able to pass the test.

Olympic-Style Discipline

So, I have been exhausted the last couple of days. Granted, I have been staying up later watching the Olympics lately, but that really does not seem to account for my fit of fatigue. I am not going to obsess about it, but I am sure that part of my need for sleep has been due to some extra stressors that I have been dealing with lately. Nothing big, just the regular stuff that gets me uptight about the rest of the year. Planning for Christmas, using new worship software and converting our existing files, gearing myself up for children's music, and so on. It could also be that I have had something every night for the last three weeks straight (maybe not really, but it feels like that). Thankfully, I only have a wedding this weekend (and possibly a funeral, hurray!) and no more on the schedule for more than a month.

Speaking of the Olympics. There has been some talk this time around about how the process for training gymnasts has really changed over the years, especially in the former or current communist nations. Back in the day, they would find children who were possibly gifted and take them away from their parents and train them to be champions. They did this in the Soviet Union and still do so in China. One comment I heard was that this system may not be in place anywhere when the next Olympics takes place in 2012.

OK, so what is the point. This very disciplined system of training produced results. Think about how often the Soviets won. They were a power house in most events. The only time the Americans had a chance in gymnastics was the one year the Soviets boycotted the Olympics. And this year, the Chinese have been dominant in most areas, but especially in gymnastics, because their honor is on the line and they have an innate drive to win. You can see it in their eyes. Determination to see it through to the end.

I, like all children who grew up during the Cold War, had a distinct fear of the Soviets because they might nuke us. And this fear filtered down to Olympic events as well. They always seemed so prepared, and that frightened me for my country because I hoped we would be as prepared if the time came to meet them head on. But besides this fear, I had a sense of awe at their level of discipline. What they were doing meant something to these people. It was all they had.

But this is rarely the case in America. Nobody takes children away to train to be Olympic athletes, thank God. And, after the Olympics, the athletes go back to their normal lives. Granted, their normal lives include intense training, but it is never all that they do. Even Michael Phelps and his coach have stated they will be taking several months off from training. I think we live such multi-faceted lives in this country that very few of us ever commit so much to one thing. "I have a life" people say in order to excuse their inability to excel or their unwillingness to commit to what it will take to be the very best.

Now how does this "I have a life" mentality affect the way we serve God? Doesn't it have a way of excusing our inability to commit all we have to God? Is it not a way of excusing us from making disciples and living out the Great Commission? Well, I have a life and I cannot stop everything and do that. I guess I am wondering if we the Church could learn to be disciplined would there be more disciples? Should we consider the possibility that the ascetics of long ago were right in their willingness to die to self and surrender all they had and spend all their time with God? Granted, I do not want to sit atop a platform on a pole in the desert for years and have people come out to look at me and marvel at my spiritual discipline, or like St. Anthony, lock myself in a tomb and have people bring me food so I can stay away from the devil's torment. So then, how do we fully commit to the spiritual disciplines without becoming completely unaware of our culture?

I Like the Devil as Much as the Next Evangelical Poster Child

So I spent a good bit of the day waiting for the air conditioning folks to arrive at my house to take my money. They were nice about it and they were not here very long. They gave me a good education about heat pumps and we are back to a cool house once again.

Speaking of hot . . .

I read this interesting article by Mary Jacobs at the United Methodist Portal about how United Methodists view Satan and evil in the world. Now, I want to make it clear this is a general view and not one held by all members of the United Methodist Church. My church, for one, is more conservative and most of the folks tend to believe in old Lucifer. I thought it was funny that one of the reasons Methodists refrain from discussing the Devil and the personification of evil is that they do not want to sound too much like Baptists.

Here is a short excerpt from Ms. Jacobs' article:

Many United Methodists, for instance, gasped during the 2008 General Conference when an African delegate on the floor argued that homosexuality was "of the devil."

It wasn’t just his position on homosexuality that drew the offended gasps, says Jerry Walls, who taught philosophy of religion for 21 years at Asbury Theological Seminary. Adding the devil to the conversation made it a “double offense” in the minds of some delegates. “Bringing up the supernatural reality of Satan is enough to make a typical United Methodist go into conniptions,” he said.

Of course, the reality of Satan and the forces of evil tend to be much stronger in the third world, the next Christendom. My problem with most evangelical stances on Satan is that they use him as a whipping boy for everything that goes wrong in the world or in their lives. Truth is I don't think I need the devil to mess my life up and I need to take my share of the blame for the things I do of my own free will and not put them all on the great-horned beast.div>

So, what do you think about the Devil? Is he at work in your life?

Overly Judgmental

This is really creepy. But, I thought this was an interesting video dealing with our own misconceptions about people. You know, the whole "don't judge a book by its cover" idea.

Town Pariah

I have been wondering about this for some time, but today this thought came flooding back to me when I ran into a person I did not expect to see at church. "Do difficult people know they are difficult?" Or, add any other adjective: needy, obtuse, whatever. The question is do they know they cause this reaction in other people that makes one want to run the other way when they come a-callin'?

I always end up with these folks attaching themselves to me. Again, I do not think it is because I am all that approachable, I just have a gift (curse). And, truth be told, there are very few people in the world that make me want to go the other way or pretend to have diarrhea or typhus when they come to visit me. But one of them showed up today. I know we are supposed to love everyone, but in all honesty all I wanted to do was not get trapped in my office for an hour after church was over. It ended up being only a few minutes, thankfully. I feel bad that I feel this way, especially considering what line of work I am in. I feel compassion for this person, as I would for anyone who has done so many foolish, unthinking things to make them the town pariah. I just wonder if they know that's what they are? And, part of me has very little patience for someone who cannot take social cues, like body language, moving closer to the door, stepping into the hall, calling out in anguish . . . I guess sometimes when we become that needy, our ability to discern social cues goes out the window in deference to our need to be accepted and loved. Sad. The last conversation I had with this person was pretty blunt and I think it was appreciated. Speaking the truth in love is a slippery slope.

With that in mind, I wonder if I might not have the makings of a town pariah myself. I usually keep my political thoughts to myself, unless someone asks me directly (and even then, I will change the subject). My feeling is that religion and politics should not mix all that much in my public life, especially since I work at a church. But, from time to time, certain political comments are made at the church like everyone in the room agrees. There is this unwritten, unsaid something that makes us believe that because we are all believers in Jesus, we think the same about everything else. Sometimes, in my more paranoid times, I feel less than comfortable when these comments are made. We like to say that here in America everyone has the right to their own opinions, just as long as they coalesce with mine or those of the larger group. I think for the time being I will keep my mouth shut, I will avoid pariah country and I definitely won't put that "Bay Democrats" bumper sticker on my SUV. I have this fear of slashed tires in the Republican nest, uh, enclave. Just kidding. I love Republicans. I am married to one.

In other news:

As of last Wednesday my wife and I have been married fourteen years. I guess this makes us adolescent marrieds or something. We did almost nothing to celebrate this milestone. That day we both were back to our normal schedules of school and choir rehearsals and such. She gave me a card. I gave her a card that I had glued in a personal message. It must have been good because she told me I could work for Hallmark. Maybe this was not a compliment. Anyway, Friday evening I had a wedding rehearsal (for which I sang four songs) and the girls had a sleepover party so after my rehearsal ended, we went to Panama City Beach to Captain Anderson's restaurant. We had heard wonderful things about this restaurant since we moved to Panama City and so I kind of thought it would be nice. Turns out was just expensive. We had a gift card that we have been meaning to use for almost a year now but we never seemed to have the opportunity to go. I forget we live in a touristy place, and the restaurant was definitely touristy. But, to be fair, the food was very good and it was nice to be somewhere without three children in tow. The irony of it all is that we were seated at a nice table for two and then a family with a crying baby was seated next to us. Every time we go out by ourselves this happens.

Well, I have to go. It appears that our air conditioning is not working in our house. I am not ready to pass out yet, but I think Dick Cheney may be at my door.

UPDATE: I feel terrible. I saw this person again today and they told me how much they enjoyed talking to me and how easy it was to just be themselves. And, worst of all, that they always feel better after talking to me, even when I am brutally honest. I am the worst sinner ever. Maybe I should be thankful that God works through me when I really don't want Him to.

Church Fathers, Part 2

Here are a few more quotes from the Church Fathers on pertinent spiritual topics:

"Now what is a spiritual whole burnt offering? It is 'the sacrifice of praise.' In what place do we offer it? In the Holy Spirit. Where have we learned this? From the Lord Himself in the words, 'The true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth.' This place Jacob saw, and said: 'The Lord is in this place.' It follows that the Spirit is truly the place for all saints, and the saint is the proper place for the Spirit, offering himself as he does for the indwelling of God, and is called God's temple." Basil the Great (ca. 330-379 C. E.)

"What does the phrase mean, 'The word is near you'? It means, 'It is easy.' For in your heart and on your tongue is your salvation. There is no long journey to go on, no seas to sail over, no mountains to climb, to get saved. But if you be not minded to cross so much as the threshold, you may even be saved while you sit at home. For 'in your mouth and heart' is the source of salvation. On another score, Paul also makes the word of faith easy, and says, 'God raised Him from the dead.' For just reflect upon the worthiness of the Worker, and you will no longer see any difficulty in the thing." John Chrysostom (ca. 347-407 C. E.)

"Let us draw from the fountain of the garden [of Scripture] continual and pure waters springing up to eternal life. Here let us be in luxury, let us revel to the full, for the Scriptures possess inexhaustible grace. But if we are able to pluck anything profitable from outside sources, there is nothing to forbid that." John Damascene (ca. 676-749 C. E.)

"After this, we say: 'Hallowed be thy name,' not that we wish for God to be hallowed by our prayers, but to beseech Him that His name be hallowed in us. But by whom is God sanctified, since He Himself sanctifies? Well, because He says: 'Be ye holy, even as I am holy,' we ask and entreat, that we who were sanctified in baptism may continue in that which we have begun to be." St. Cyprian of Carthage (died 258 C. E.)

Third Grade Memories

This week marks Misty's re-entry into the workforce. She has already started getting her classroom ready for her students to come back officially in just under two weeks. This year Emma will be in the third grade. I am not ready to talk about the fact that Elizabeth will be going to Kindergarten this fall and will not be accompanying me to the church each morning anymore. At least I still have one baby to take with me, but I am afraid she will throw a fit everyday for months because she will no longer have a sister to play with in the afternoons.

I got to thinking about my experience as a third grader. Since I went to a Christian school, my experience was quite different than what Emma's will be like. Granted, she goes to a public school that acts like a private school, but it is really different than mine, especially third grade. Over the course of my life at Grace Christian Academy, all of my teachers were evangelicals, usually Baptist or Assemblies of God and we had Bible class as part of our curriculum in every grade. I think this was one of the most significant aspects of my education, and likely the most thorough part as well. I will leave that one alone.

Back to third grade. My class was small and, between the two third grade classes it seems like there were no new students in either class, until about halfway through the school year, a new boy named Charles Fitzpatrick joined our class. This was kind of a coup, we thought, to get the new kid. He was about eight feet tall in comparison to the rest of us, and since we all knew each other forever, he was much more interesting than any of us. I remember we had this classroom in the back of the church. It was like a maze trying to get back there. There have been times since that I have had recurring dreams of walking through the church at night. Frightening. Anyway, my teacher, Mrs. Welch, was a chariskook. I really liked her and she tried to teach me not to rely on myself but to trust in the Lord. I guess she thought I had too much anxiety and was overworking myself. Seems like some things never change. I will never forget some of the things we did that year. I had a big birthday party at Showbiz Pizza and Charles Fitzpatrick stayed way too long because his mom had given him $10 for tokens and he was going to spend every one of them. We "wrote" a book about George Washington. We wrote a play about the Pilgrims and presented it. We made a plaster relief map of the Holy Land.

I will never forget that Mrs. Welch was the first person to tell us that if we did not behave we would suffer the consequences. I was scared to find out what those were. She was a crier, and really seemed to think we just might end up in hell if she did not intervene on our behalf. When asked if President Carter was a Christian, she replied: "Well, I think he is a carnal Christian." The worst possible fate, carnal. But Mrs. Welch also helped me get the first full-length copy of the Bible I ever had. It was one of those cheap imitation leather award Bibles. And it was the King James Version, of course. Granted, the NIV had only been available for a couple of years at that time and nobody used it. I loved that Bible. I used the map in the back to help make my relief map of the Holy Land.

I no longer have either, the map or the Bible, but I have my weirdly skewed memories. When I think about my growing up, it is hard to explain some of the odd things that occurred that we all thought were just a part of normal life. Prayer in class, sometimes followed by a child vomiting in the classroom. Lots of Bible talk, even end times talk. Scared me to death. It is a wonder that I ended up sane at all.

Truth is I am grateful for most of it, even the wacky stuff, because it set me up to look at the world in a certain way. I may not completely agree with that way of thought anymore, but it grounded me to an extent that I don't think I would have had if I had been somewhere else. It may not have been the most well-rounded educational environment, and I wish I had had more opportunities for artistic development in school (including, God forbid, secular music) rather than having to seek these opportunities elsewhere, but at the very least I knew the Bible when I left school. It prepared me to want more of the Word and to want to read it. By the time I graduated from high school I had already read the Bible through in its entirety four times.

So, thank you, Mrs. Welch, for guiding me on the path that has led me to where I am now. Oh God, I hope that does not make me carnal. Well, maybe just a little bit will be okay.

Peace.

A Silver Foot in His Mouth?

I know this was about George Bush 41, but it kind of fits 43 if you ask me.

Satan is Everywhere

I think we should go back to backward masking. The devil has not had much to do since we stopped playing LPs. Maybe Paul really is dead?

Thoughts from the Church Fathers

One of the best things about my latest decision to read through the Bible is that the commentary is from an Orthodox perspective, meaning that most of the comments are from the Church Fathers.

John Cassian (ca. 360-435 C. E.) on Free Will:

"And by this testimony we can clearly see what we ought to ascribe to free will, and what to the design and daily assistance of the Lord, that it belongs to divine grace to give us opportunities of salvation and prosperous undertakings and victory; but that it is ours to follow up the blessings God gives us with either earnestness or indifference."

Athanasius the Great (ca. 293-373 C. E.) on our offerings to God:

"When we make a return we give nothing of our own, but those things which we have before received from Christ, this being especially of His grace, that He should require, as from us, His own gifts. He bears witness to this in Numbers when He says: 'My gifts, My presents, My burnt offerings, you shall take care to offer Me as a sweet aroma in my feasts.' That is, those things you give Me are yours, as having received them from Me, but they are the gifts of God. Let us offer to the Lord every virtue, and that true holiness which is in Him, and in piety let us keep the feast to Him with those things He hallowed for us."

John Chrysostom (ca. 347-407 C. E.) on loving God:

"God needs nothing we have to give Him, and this especially proves sincere love, when one who needs nothing and is not in any necessity, does everything for the sake of being loved by us. So when He bids you to love Him, He then most of all shows He loves you. For nothing secures our salvation more than loving Him."

Running the Gauntlet

This week has been a series of hurdles, although they have been amazingly positive.

After getting through the wedding last weekend, the first of three over four weeks, church went as usual. Truth is I have been feeling much better about our contemporary services lately. There have been more people in attendance and it seems like I am feeling more of that old feeling when I used to lead worship back in the day. Again, maybe it is just I am more aware of His presence in the services lately. Also, it could be I have been spending more time reading the Bible lately. It has a way of making us more acutely aware of our spiritual surroundings. I probably ought to be ashamed that I have not been as diligent as I should be in prayer and Scripture study, but I am not really. But, we do what we can, and I am feeling more compelled to do so as I continue in this journey toward ordination.

Speaking of ordination, I had two meetings this week that were significant to this process. The first was an impromptu meeting with my candidacy mentor on Monday morning. It had been several weeks since I had met with her and I had some questions and we needed to look over my psychological evaluation. She was very supportive and told me I likely would not need to take all the courses I thought I would have to take. I still have to confirm this, but it is looking like I will only need to take about 5 classes. This is a good thing. Although I like the book learning, I am still not convinced I want to spend several more years of my life in school. Who can say?

I also had to meet with our Staff Parish Relations Committee at the church to receive their approval. Truth is I kind of missed this step and needed to have it done before I could go much further in the process. I was not exactly thrilled about this Tuesday evening meeting, but it was a wonderfully affirming get together. Everybody seemed to be pleased with me and with my work and decision to pursue ordination. That was nice, especially when you consider that I basically work for them and if they had not been in favor of my entering ordained ministry, it might call into question what they think of my performance in my current churchly duties. Anyway, with that hurdle down, I now get to prepare to meet the District Committee on Ordained Ministry in early September to be certified as a candidate. Once I pass this process, I will begin taking classes, but here is the kicker, since I already have a Masters degree and some hours toward my basic graduate theological studies, I will already have all the requirements to become a probationary deacon. So, it is conceivable that in about three years, I can be completely finished with this process and be deaconing away.

The question was put to me: What will change in your ministry once you are ordained? And this is a good one and hard for me to answer, especially on this side of the equation. So, I will leave it for another day.

My class at the community college ended this week. I liked the class quite a bit. It was probably my favorite in a good while. Fun, no pressure, and nobody to be. It looks like my class for the fall has made, so I will be teaching a whole new slew of children, and they are mostly children, considering they were all born around 1990. People keep popping up from the past to remind me that I am only 2 years from my 20 year high school reunion.

Thursday I had what might be the worst experience of my life this week. A few weeks ago, Misty signed up for a $500 gift card at the Home Depot. What she did not know was that in order to qualify for the prize, you had to set up a time to let this nut from a water softening company come test the water at your house and present their system. Well, he said it would be about 45 minutes. It was like going through the time share spiel all over again. Both of us had to be there or he would have to come back another time. Not thrilled to say the least. Granted, we will get a whopping $20 gift card for our trouble. I make a good bit more than that an hour when I teach privately, so I was really not happy to sit there for over an hour and a half for a measly $20. We told the guy "no sale" and then he gave us a better deal and we said "no sale." One more time, and I told him to leave and respect our time. He left. I hate confrontations, especially in my own home. Later that night, we went to Hobby Lobby to get some things to help organize our new coin collection that Misty's dad gave us when the girls went back to Texas in June. We bought I nice trunk and some other coin organizers and got to work on the collection. It was kind of fun and reminded me of doing the same kinds of things with my father when I was a child. We would go to coin stores, flea markets, and other such places in pursuit of nerdy delight. It is funny that we would go to these flea markets that also sold bongs and other drug paraphernalia and I was blissfully ignorant of their presence. I probably would have tried to cast the devil out of them. Dear God I was uptight.

So, Friday we slept late and took a trip to Destin. We stopped for lunch at P F Chang's. Very happy. I got a coupon in the mail so we went to the Polo store and I bought a couple of things. The girls got some shoes. We went to Target and then to Angelo's Steak Pit (I love saying that) for dinner. It was a good way to spend a rainy Friday. Hopefully we will have some sunnier weather tomorrow so we can go to the beach. This is our last weekend before Misty starts back to work and I have weddings and other such events each weekend for the next month, so we want to make the most of it.

And last but not least, I started running again this week and I have been very diligent so far. I was needing to start back for some time. I think I gained a few pounds over the summer and I want to make sure that I do not allow myself to get to far gone. It is my best trick, getting fat. The good thing is that I can still wear all of my thinner clothes which is nice. And, even better, I have been able to stay pretty close to the same weight for over 18 months. Sadly, this is probably the longest I have had weight stability for that long. But, besides all this, within the next year I will need to have a real physical examination and I would rather be on the lower end of the scale than the higher end when I go to the doctor. I want my baseline to be as low as possible for me. My mental health is much better when I am running, I should remind myself of this when I fall off the wagon. Or maybe someone else should remind me . . .