Monthly Archives: March 2007

The human mind has to be one of the most powerful, and yet most fragile things known to man.  People have been known to stand up to incredible stress and duress, and come out on the other side empowered and strong.  Others have cracked under seemingly very little stress.  And each of us handles it in our own unique way.

There have been many cases in history of famous people who were insane.  So many of them were great artists, dreamers, poets.  Perhaps there is something different about the way their minds work.  Maybe that’s why they were able to leave us with such amazing legacies, while they quietly succumbed to the darkness inside them.

This month’s Rolling Stone Magazine features a cover story on the band Pink Floyd.  Most people today don’t know the tragic story behind this iconic band.  They just know they wrote odd lyrics, and had a killer light show.  And probably everyone has heard of their blockbuster album, "The Wall". 

But few people are aware of how they got their start, of who the band members are, and the pain they walked through on their way to the stars.  Syd Barrett should be a household name.  But it isn’t.  Syd died in quiet solitude last summer, his life almost like the passing of a forgotten dream.  The Piper finally reached the Gates of Dawn. Yet is was Syd who created Pink Floyd.  It was Syd who named the band.  It was Syd who was the driving force behind their avante garde psychadelic style of rock-n-roll back that rocketed them to the top in the 1960’s London Underground. 

It was Syd who wrote and sang the songs, who came up with the idea of their incredible light show, who played lead guitar in a way that nobody before had ever dared.  It was Syd that went insane.

Nobody knows what really happened. Syd was described as charismatic, outgoing.  He was friendly and always the life of the party.  He took the Pink Floyd to the very pinnacle of rock-n-roll stardom, then disappeared.

He not only physically dropped from sight, he mentally went away.  He was, without question, a genius. He was rich, famous, and beautiful. But apparently his mind couldn’t reconcile with his reality.  Perhaps he used the LSD to escape from the blinding glory of who he’d become, of what he’d created.  Perhaps the LSD opened up the escape hatch in his mind, and once he’d stepped through, he didn’t want to come back.  But was that all?  Roger Waters thought the LSD triggered some sort of dormant schizophrenia.  Maybe so. 

I think what haunts me most are the unanswered questions.  Was he really crazy, or did he just decide that the world inside his own mind was more interesting than ours?  Did he know who he was?  Did he choose his path, or did it choose him?  What sort of intuition drove him to appear at the recording studio in 1975 when the band was recording the song "Shine On You Crazy Diamond", written by Roger Waters for Syd?  Did he know it was about him?  Did he know why they were crying?  Did he care?

I have to wonder what it would have been like if Syd Barrett had not gone mad.  Would he still be with us today?  Would the direction of Pink Floyd have changed completely?  And are any of us all that different from Syd?  He was unrealized potential.  An unfulfilled fantasy.  Can we not all say that, at least to some degree, we too have not realized our potential to its fullest?  Have not dared to live our dreams?  Just a thought. . .

So often, out of great tragedy emerges great art.  I think that is the case with Pink Floyd.  The Rolling Stone Magazine article even goes so far as to use the term "hubris" in describing them.  I think this is accurate on many levels.  The band itself has always been both mystery and paradigm.  But they would have been neither, had Syd Barrett not birthed them.

Shine On You Crazy Diamond
by: Roger Waters

Remember when you were young,
You shone like the sun.
Shine on you crazy diamond.

Now there’s a look in your eyes,
Like black holes in the sky.
Shine on you crazy diamond.

You were caught in the crossfire
Of childhood and stardom,
Blown on the steel breeze.
Come on you target for faraway laughter,
Come on you stranger, you legend, you martyr, and shine!

You reached for the secret too soon,
You tried for the moon.
Shine on you crazy diamond.

Threatened by shadows at night,
And exposed in the light
Shine on you crazy diamond.

Well you wore out your welcome
With random precision,
Rode on the steel breeze.
Come on you raver, you seer of visions,
Come on you painter, you piper, you prisoner, and shine!

Remember when you were young
You shone like the sun.
Shine on you crazy diamond.

I like figs.  They are not something I ever give much thought to, and I honestly can’t say I’ve ever actually seen a fig tree.  But for the past couple of weeks, every time I turn around, I’m hearing or reading something about that poor, doomed fig tree that Jesus talked about in St. Luke’s Gospel. 

There are other references to fig trees in the Gospels, and one might even wonder if perhaps Jesus didn’t care for figs at all.  Apparently he saw one without fruit and cursed it on the spot, causing it to wither right then and there.  But Luke’s fig tree is given a second chance.  This sad little tree has a gardener who thinks he can help it out, even though it’s not borne any fruit for three years. That’s not just merciful, it’s downright optimistic!

Now, not being a fig tree, it’s hard for me to imagine that the sort of thing the gardener has in mind is actually ‘help’.  The gardener proposes to cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it.  This seems fairly innocuous on the surface.  However, cultivation requires breaking up the ground around the base of the tree, and fertilizer, well, is manure.  They just hadn’t mastered that really cool Miracle-Gro Spray stuff back in the first century (although the name would have worked. . . okay, bad pun!)

In context, the fig tree probably symbolized the Jewish people, who had, for the most part, been unresponsive to Jesus’ teachings.  The three years of barrenness would obviously represent the three years of Jesus’ public ministry.  So the message is obvious:  be responsive to the Word of God, or be cut out of the vineyard.

But I’m thinking there is more to it than that.  Perhaps the fig tree had never been properly cared for.  After all, it was in a vineyard, not a fig grove.  So, maybe it just got neglected.  Maybe that’s why the ground around it was too hard to allow life-giving waters to reach it’s roots.  Maybe it’s roots were rotten.  There just isn’t enough information given to make a final decision.  All we know for sure is that the tree was in danger of being cut down if it didn’t start bearing fruit, and that the gardener cared enough about it to try and save it. 

And the manure?  Well, I know I often have to be pretty covered up in it, figuratively speaking, of course, before I start growing and bearing any sort of fruit.  Sometimes it takes the gardener whacking up the ground all around me and covering me with fertilizer to get my attention, to inspire me to take any sort of action.  And, failing that, the threat of imminent destruction is a pretty powerful motivator for me.

Specifically, I can get very comfortable with situations that are life-threatening to me.  Not usually in a literal sense, but definitely in a spiritual and emotional sense.  I don’t even notice my peril a lot of the time, because I’m still covered up in pretty green leaves, and so you can’t tell I’m not bearing any fruit unless you get really close to me and look under the leaves!

And why a fig tree, anyway?  Why not a date tree, or an olive tree?  Those seem to be more plentiful in the Holy Land.  Perhaps it is because the fig tree is more rare, more unique.  That makes it all the more valuable.  So, if I, like the fig tree, have great value and rarity, then I need to take care of myself.  I need to keep my soil loose enough to absorb healing nutrients, and I need to accept life’s fertilizer as a means to something better to come.

So, if I am receptive and responsive to the ministrations of the Gardener, then I will bear beautiful fruit, which will in turn bear more fruit.  How can I resist?  Especially since he has been so patient, and given me so much extra time and effort.

“(God has) ordered it, and so it is, that every disordered mind should be its own punishment.”
(St. Augustine)

Today has been a really good day. Nice and peaceful, no stress. We are going to bar-b-que chicken here in a bit, and that is alway wonderful. It is just too gorgeous outside right now not to be sitting out on the deck enjoying God’s creation.

I have been reading “Confessions of St. Augustine”, and it is a really amazing book! The journey that he had was extraordinary. It is inspiring to me on so many levels. Augustine was not afraid to question God, and he was dogged in his pursuit of Truth. I think questioning God can be a really good thing, but one has to be ready to accept God’s answers! I have questioned Him many times, and He has always shown Himself to me. Even when I fear that I am too far gone for Him to hear me, He does, and He is still there for me.

Augustine talks about ‘trifles’ that he had tremendous difficulty letting go of. He very vividly paints a picture of how hard it can be to turn away from the things that lead us away from God and keep us from receiving His blessings and graces. That is one of the many reasons I have chosen him for my patron saint for Confirmation. We will be Confirmed at the Easter Vigil Mass in just a few short weeks, and we each had to choose a saint. Everyone was surprised that I chose Augustine. Apparently he is not a popular or common choice. Our DRE said he was often found to be too intellectual or too lofty for many people.

But that is precisely what I like about him! He was a thinking man, and he understood God not just on a visceral level, but on an intellectual level. He didn’t just accept that there was a God because it was the right thing to do, or because his mother wanted that for him. He chose to be a Christian very deliberately. He lived a fairly wild life before he chose God (hence the ‘trifles’), but after great thought and introspection, he gave it all up for God. He knew what he would be ‘missing’, and it paled in comparison to what he was gaining. And in doing so, he changed the world!

“It isn’t enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn’t enough to believe in it. One must work at it.” (Eleanor Roosevelt)

We got some new Gevalia in the mail the other day, so Mom and I are having fresh coffee this afternoon. That will surely keep me up ’til 3:00 a.m.! It is seemingly just a hot beverage, but apparently there is much more to it than that. It took the kids to Starbucks the other day, and was struck by the amount of political propaganda tastefully littered about the store. It was plain to me that I should not just sit in peace sipping my Mocha Frappacino, I must mnake somepledge to buy some CD or mug that would promote world peace and feed those starving amongst the coffee beans of Africa and Columbian. It would be selfish and somehow sinful of me to merely pay for my drink and then just. . . drink it. Action must be taken!! (Good thing coffee supplies me with caffeine, otherwise my quest for world liberation might be slowed by sluggish American thinking!)

Yes, coffee is an import. It comes mostly from impoverished 3rd World countries whose politics and living conditions are nothing short of abominable. Yet we import wine, and for some reason, when I walk into a wine cellar, all I see is, well, wine! I do not get the same feeling of “Quick! We must all join hands in worldwide harmony and help our brothers and sisters who are being enslaved and abused in some far off tropical jungle!” Do wine connoisseurs not feel the same obligation to their less fortunate brothers and sisters slaving away in some vineyard in the south of France? Or is it that those of us who can better afford coffee than wine are more likely to care about the issues of African coffee growers? And isn’t it the Coffee Crowd who gets so bent out of shape and starts putting anti-war bumperstickers on their cars when our government does exactly what the coffee house politicos propose, and sends troops over to some country to free those who are enslaved and bestow them with their inalienable rights of freedom and coffee?

Dont get me wrong. I am all about peace, love and happiness. But I think we need to be realistic. The brutal fact of the matter is that vicious sociopathic dictators who are willing to starve, rape and pillage their own people don’t speak ‘peace, love, and happiness’. They speak violence. And they have a nasty habit of expressing their violence toward those who try to meet the basic needs of their people with food and medical care. (ie: they kill them!) We cannot communicate with them by gently explaining that their methods are unacceptable, and that they should simply congregate in coffee houses and discuss things.

So, then we have quite the dilemma. Do we ignore the fact that millions of human beings are being brutally murdered and exploited, or do we do something? And if we agree that doing something is the correct thing, then what, exactly, do we do? And how do we manage to convince those evil dictators to let us do it?

It seems to me that whatever course of action is decided upon, it should be effective. And somehow, buying CDs or coffee mugs simply doesn’t seem like it will accomplish much. Unless some sort of collective American Guilt is the goal. We can all sit around sipping our Lattes and feeling guilty that we have the freedom to choose whether we need single, double or triple shots. We can wear funny hats and hiking pants with carelessly slung backpacks and earthy sandals, and at least look like we are politically concerned.

Or we can start in our own living rooms, and love one another. We can stop, just for a few moments each day, and really listen to what our family and friends are saying. We can choose to smile at the harried clerk in the grocery store checkout line, or let someone pull into traffic in front of us after a long day when we really just want to get home. We could stop spending all our money on Coffee House Cds, Birkenstocks and “Life Is Good” t-shirts, and send some of it directly to organizations that actually feed starving children or provide the dying with dignity.

And, if we want to get honest about it, we could admit that none of those things will be effective unless there is somebody to protect those who are there to help, to make a difference. We could make the ultimate sacrifice, and enlist. We could go to any length to share our way of life with those who didn’t even know they were in need of a coffee house. We could actually put a force behind our pithy ideals and agendas, by physically going over there and stopping the bad guys.

Or maybe we should all just switch to wine. I recommend a fruity merlot.

"What love we’ve given, we’ll have forever.  What love we fail to give, will be lost for all eternity." (Leo Buscaglia)

Years ago, in Ruidoso, New Mexico, I was bored and wanted something to read.  We had stopped at a little mini-mart sort of place, and I was browsing through their tiny selection of books.  Most of them were sappy Harlequin Romance type stuff, but one book caught my eye.  It was a gold shiny book, and the title, "Love" was simply embossed on the cover.  It was written by a man named Leo Buscaglia.  It was the mid 1970’s, and I was still into the whole hippie vibe about peace and love, so I bought the book.  It changed my life.

Recently a friend questioned where I got my ideas about relationships.  He thought that many of my ideas about friendship and love were very different than what he’d been taught growing up.  At first, I wasn’t really sure where my ideas came from.  I assumed I’d learned them from my parents.  And, to be sure, a great many of my ideas and beliefs were formed from my parents.  But not all of them.  And I realized, slowly, that although I grew up Christian, I cannot reallly credit the Bible for my ideas.  At least not directly.

It was then that I remembered my little gold book.  I went to Barnes & Noble, and lo and behold:  it is still in print!  It’s not gold anymore (things seemed to be much more glittery back in the ’70s!) but the book is the same.  I think Leo Buscaglia passed away several years back, but his wonderful ideas live on.

It was from that book that I learned that love is not something to be sought, but to be given.  I very rarely expect to be loved back.  And so I am very rarely disappointed.  But I do get a lot of joy out of giving to others.  And, yes, that is very much a Biblical principle, but I learned it from my little gold book.

I think that in our "me" society today so much is lost.  We forget that the most noble and rewarding thing we can do is serve others.  I have known so many people who so desperately want to be loved, and they go to such great extremes to get attention, to be loved.  But all they have to do is give it away!  That is one of the most amazing things about Twelve Step Programs; that’s why they work when everything else fails.  One of their basic precepts is "you’ve got to give it away to keep it".  It seems too simple to really work.  But that’s the beauty of it: it’s fool-proof!

One of my greatest mentors used to say that you could never be too stupid to understand it, but you could be too smart.  He was so right!  When we complicate things, we miss the obvious.  We get so caught up in figuring out how to get what we think we need.  The truth of it is that all we have to do to get what we need is to put others’ needs first.

Leo Buscaglia taught that loving was about giving, about living in the moment, because life was too short to get all worried about tomorrow.  He explained that we love, not to be loved, but simply to love.  The act of loving, in and of itself, is enough.  It is more than enough.

This is the season of Lent.  It is a time of inward reflection and repentance.  I think my biggest sins are sins of selfishness.  When I get so caught up in me, and my problems that I can’t see the needs of those around me.  When I am more worried about how we are going to pay the bills or meet a deadline than about picking flowers with my little girl, or listening to my son tell me about a joke he just heard.  Those are the memories that will matter and last.  The bills will get paid, deadlines will get met (or not).  But in the end, they will not be remembered.

I am reminded of the Prayer of St. Francis:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace, Where there is hatred let me sow your love; Where there is injury, pardon, Where there is doubt, faith; Where there is despair, hope; Where there is darkness, light; Where there is sadness, joy;

Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek To be consoled as to console; To be understood as to understand; To be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive; It is in pardoning that we are pardoned; And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

"Confession of errors is like a broom which sweeps away the dirt and leaves the surface brighter and clearer.  I feel stronger for confession." (Mohandas Gandhi)

Overall, this has been an amazing week!  On Monday we found out that Kendall has been accepted to Belmont Abbey College for the Fall Semester!  I know he is thrilled out of his mind, but I’m not sure who is more excited: me, or him! I was so worried about getting it all right with his transcript, and it is such a huge relief to know that it all worked out well.  I have actually homeschooled my son for 13 years, and now he is going to college!  WooHoo!  A homeschool success story!  Today we got a packet in the mail with more info, and this one informed him that he has received the Abbot Leo Haid Award, valued at $4,000.  I was blown away!  God is so good!

Also, today, after twenty-something years of being away from the Church, my mother ‘came home’!  She received the Sacrament of Reconciliation this afternoon and then went to Mass and received Holy Communion.  Wow.  I cannot express how much it means to me that Mom has actually gone back to the Church.  We both heard so many lies and misconceptions about Catholicism when we left the Church so many years ago, and sometimes it can be really hard to overcome.  But she took her time, she sought the Lord’s will, and made sure that this was the path He has for her.  I know that she will be a great blessing to her Parish Community, especially since she has studied the Bible so much over the past fifteen years or so.

Alex, Faith and I also went to Confession today.  I have to say that it is definitely NOT my favorite sacrament going into it, but once I’ve made the decision to go, and followed through with that, the feeling of hope and lightness that I have afterward are amazing.

I know that so many people take issue with the idea of confessing one’s sins to a priest.  I understand that.  There are certainly things I’d rather just keep between me and God, and honestly, some of those things I’d just as soon not talk to God about, either.  But the confessional provides so much healing that can never be experienced otherwise.  Just the act of actually saying, out loud, what my sins are is a healing thing.  In Twelve Step Programs they like to say "You’re only as sick as the secrets you keep."  I think that is so true.  For some reason, actually telling someone my sins takes all the power out of them.  Until I confess, the devil has a foothold he can use to convince me that I am not worthy of God’s love.  But the minute I share those things with a priest and hear him say the words of absolution, I am free!  And I no longer have to carry that burden around with me anymore.

This Sacrament also keeps me accountable.  If I know that I am going to have to confess something, I am a lot less likely to do something offensive to God.  It makes God more ‘real’ to me, makes Him more tangible, if you will.  If I don’t ever have to do any more than confess in my heart, then I don’t feel as obligated to do the good.  Accountability is a very healthy thing for me.

I’m not going to get into all the Scripture verses about why confessing your sins to a priest is the right thing to do.  But I did look those up when we decided to go back to the Catholic Church!  That was one of those things I really wanted to be sure about.

Moving on:  tonight Kendall had seven friends over after dinner.  They ranged from 15 years old to 20 years old.  All but the 15 year-old are in college.  They could have gone anywhere or done anything tonight, but they chose to come over here and hang out with us.  And play cards with Gaylon, and visit with me and Mom.  How cool is that?  They are great kids, and I’m proud to know every one of them.  (Faith wanted to know why all of her friends couldn’t come over at one time like that, LOL! I explained to her that was because I would have to go pick all of her friends up, whereas Kendall’s friends can all drive. *sigh* Her time will come!)

So anyway, tonight I am happy and peaceful.  There are so many things to be grateful for, and this is one of those wonderful times that I can recognize those things clearly.  So many times I get bogged down by the things that cause me stress that I don’t notice the things that bless me.

"We’ll try to cooperate fully with the IRS, because, as citizens, we feel a strong patriotic duty not to go to jail." (Dave Barry)

Okay, so we all hate the IRS, right?  But I’m beginning to seriously believe they hate me back!!!  That is quickly followed by the thought that I have some doubts that they are organized or intelligent enough (as an entity) to have any sort of focused feeling or response about anything.

Let me explain.  They audited us for 2003.  That was a royal pain, but we survived, and all was well.  The audit actually occurred in 2004, btw.  In IRSland, everything happens a year later.  So, fast forward to 2005.  We file our taxes, and are supposed to get a pretty healthy refund for our Earned Income Credit.  But no.  They notify us that we do not qualify for EIC.  Well, what that means in layman’s terms is that they do not believe we have children!  In 2004, our children ranged between 15 and 7 years of age.  These were not NEW children.  We have claimed each of them every year since they were born, and the IRS never questioned their existence.  Until now.

To complicate matters, we got the notice informing us that we didn’t have children right after our house burned down!  So, now we no longer have any proof that we have children, unless you count grocery, clothing, education, medical, dental and activity bills.  Never mind the children themselves!  But we didn’t have the important stuff: birth certificates, because, of course, those burned.

And since our house had just burned, we were ah, sort of distracted, and so we didn’t get right on it with the IRS.  So it took a few months, and then they started sending us nasty letters telling us we owed them the amount of our refund!  So we spent HOURS on the phone (most of it on "hold") trying to work this out with them.  On, not to worry, they told us.  Just send in form "X" and we’ll take care of it.  So we jumped through all the hoops.  I hunted down birth certificates from three states, got copies of Social Security cards, filled out the right forms, and sent them in. But the nasy letters kept coming, via certified mail, no less.

Okay, so then we file our taxes for 2005.  We claim our EIC again, just like we have been doing for 17 years now, and THIS year, they don’t question it at all.  What they did do was take our refund and apply it to the amount they think we owe them from 2004.  Clear as mud?  The only think I am perfectly clear on is that they now owe us almost $3000!!

So, we give up, and hire a Tax Consultant (a friend of a friend) who used to work for the IRS, and knows firsthand how absolutely insane and impossible they can be.  But she and her partner assure us that it shouldn’t be that big of a deal to get it all straightened out. Then she calls me yesterday to let me know that all is well, and the only thing the IRS needs from us now are transcripts from the children’s schools for 2004, to show that they lived at this address during that year.  But we home school, and all our records burned! (The IRS knows we had a fire, we sent the freaking fire report to them, along with pictures of the burned house!)  We have also provided them with Social Security card copies, birth certificate copies, even copies of Baptismal, Marriage and Communion records!

Now this MIGHT make some sense if Gaylon and I had ever been divorced or separated.  But we’ve been married for over 20 years!  To each other, no less.  Honestly, where the heck do they think our children lived in 2004?  Do they think the Mother Ship came and took them on a 52 week tour of a galaxy far, far away?  Then they mysteriously all reappeared for the 2005 tax year?

So, our wonderful tax consultant called them back and explained that we are home schoolers (that has probably flagged us for some other abuse yet to be endured) and would savings account records for that year be acceptable?  Well, yes, bank records will suffice.  So I had to go down to the bank today and ask our banker for records of the children’s savings accounts for 2004.  She was wonderful, and provided me with that, as well as documentation that those accounts have been open for over five years now.  And all of those years the children have lived at the same address!

I hate dealing with stupid people.  We all make mistakes, and we all have our "Here’s you sign" moments.  But this is, in my opinion, verging on harassment!  But maybe, just maybe, we really will eventually get all of our money, and we will be able to pay some bills, or go to the beach.  I would really just like for them to GO AWAY and leave our family alone!  But I am sure that’s probably just asking too much.