Five Minute Friday :: Brief

Dreams from Summer 2000
The days and the summer nights
Berries from the brambles and the vines
Yearning for a future still not yet
Recalling how to dream…

• Five Minute Friday :: Brief Linkup

Let's go with brief in the sense of short. A brief meeting. A brief scripture commentary. A quick conversation. Kate wrote about the passage of time—that's something all of us know related to both loss and anticipation.

What more can I say? I fully trusted it was a brief intermission between the life I'd known and a similar life that soon would come by way. If you'd asked me then as in my grandma's expression "way back when," how would I have defined brief? That's easy! I'll quote what I said to a friend who since has gone on to glory. After she expressed concern about my future and wondered how it might happen in the wake of a string of unanticipated events I replied, "I'm not worried at all. Before I turn around – no, before I blink – my life will be full again."

Wrong!

My header collage is Dreams from Summer 2000. Twenty-six years ago. Not a brief stretch of time in any human's life. Sometimes I ask myself what I'd tell someone else in a similar situation.

As I've told people in person and online, I go through most days with a combination of optimism, hope, and denial. A facebook friend observed there's a fine line between hope and denial. Ya think so? And though I keep observing no one can change what they don't acknowledge, I don't admit to much of any loss or pain for even a brief moment.

I'd tell someone else to get mad. Feel the pain. Let the anger hurt the way it's supposed to. Those were serious betrayals. Add up the months and the years and the decades. List all of the lost expectations. Yearn again for a future still not yet. Put yourself back then and start over again. Amen? Amen!

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Getty Center Gardens

Despite many recent visits to the Getty Center, I hadn't spent time in the gardens since Before Covid (BC). This past Tuesday that changed; here's some of the beauty.

Five Minute Friday :: Responsible

• Five Minute Friday :: Responsible Linkup

Somewhere I read, over-responsibility is neurosis; irresponsibility is character disorder. Most people can't avoid being some of both at one time or another.

I'll start by asking "Is neurosis still a concept?" Whether or not most contemporary clinicians use the word neurosis, most of us have an excellent idea of what it means. I'll admit I tend toward the over-responsible side, and I have a sneaking suspicion most women probably do. Only last week in our Approve FMF I admitted to being a people-pleaser—again, more women than not, I suspect. So why not make this yet another in my Life Stuff category? No, I don't think so. Not this time.

Let's look at responsible from the perspective of being responsive. Responding to the needs of others, especially those in our immediate circle. Responding to the needs of creation. On occasion being an (over)responsible steward of planet earth. I try to live as green and as minimally as my current living arrangement allows; I know several people who get very high marks for their level of creation care. I have one friend in particular whose stewardship of this planet is so extraordinary it's a case of "I have no words." I'm always in awe of the example she sets. And related to my opening statement, I'd say she occasionally gets excessive (over-responsible?) in some aspects of earth care.

Riffing on the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew's gospel, I designed the Salt, Leaven, LIght header illustration. As a creation lover and especially given my passion for cities and The City, I try to look around for situations than need a bit of seasoning in order to be appealing. A hint of yeast to grow into what they could be. A blaze of light to reveal goodness and possibility.

In what areas of life do you excel in being responsible? Is there one where you're overly so? How about a wonderfully balanced just right without going over or under? Do you have one? I wonder if I do!

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Five Minute Friday :: Approve

• Five Minute Friday :: Approve Linkup

This prompt fits a classic Pauline trope that directs us to the source of grace and the proper place to seek approval:

"Am I now seeking human approval or God's approval? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still pleasing people, I wouldn't be a servant of Christ." Galatians 1:10

Like many others, I can be quite a people pleaser. (And quite the iconoclast.) The reasons are complicated. Part of it is I've worked hard to achieve high levels of skill, and I don't want anyone to question my expertise, especially if they have no knowledge of that field of endeavor.

But doing something in public for the public like a piano performance, a design project, a Sunday sermon, are more distant and almost abstract than some other areas where a person seeks approval.

Consider when someone gives you a job or a task, whether or not it's part of your paid employment, whether or not it's for public consumption—and public approval. When someone tasks you, either you already have a relationship with them, or you may aspire to relate to them or their company. It could be a boss, a client (also a kind of boss because they'll be paying you if all turns out well), a job interviewer asking you to demonstrate your abilities in software X or solve sample problem Y. It could be a spouse or a sibling or another relative. In sum, any time you're doing anything that propels you into approval-seeking mode, it's not simply about you. It's about them, too. And my wanting approval is about a possible fracture in a current relationship, or maybe it's about a new relationship that won't happen if my performance isn't the best ever.

My scripture from Galatians directs us outside of and beyond all those humans whose approval we think we need. It sends us to the source of the gifts, to the Spirit that inspires our actions and our expertise. The Spirit that gathers the community and relates us to the people we believe are worth pleasing. The apostle Paul asks if we want "God's approval." And what does he tell us about pleasing people?

Think about that.

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June Wayne at LACMA

Looking at LACMA from Wilshire Blvd on Sunday, 29 January 2017

Intro

September 8th being the second Tuesday of the month might mean a visit to LACMA, the internationally renowned art museum whose name is an everyday noun in this town. But I'd already seen the current exhibitions and my two tries at viewing some of the Geffen Gallery that opened last spring had overwhelmed me.

Therefore? Because there were several new things to see at the Getty, that's where I headed. As usual, when my Metro bus got close to Wilshire and Westwood where I'd catch one to Brentwood and beyond (Van Nuys, Sylmar, generic San Fernando Valley), I went to the Getty website to book my arrival time. I always wait because by then I know my ETA within 20 minutes or so. But the Getty was closed for the day! My best guess is because Mondays usually are dark, this week they took Tuesday for maintenance and cleaning because Monday was Labor Day and a federal holiday. I'm excited about next week at the Getty, so stay tuned to this blog.

Therefore? I turned around and headed back to LACMA with a plan to find a wall of ocean-themed lithographs I'd loved my last time at the Geffen Galleries and that for an unknown reason I hadn't even written down the name of the artist. Strange, because I'd made a mental note of their location relative to the elevator and then I left for the day.

After getting off the eastbound Metro bus I booked my LACMA visit, crossed the street to check in, and headed upstairs in the new gallery. it took a while, but I found the ocean art.


June Wayne

What a discovery! June Wayne (1918-2011) is the artist's name, and she achieved near-legendary status in LA. She founded Tamarind Workshop, the first ever for fine art lithography; Citrus Editions, Gemini G.E.I., and Self Help Graphics followed in Tamarind's wake. Tamarind now belongs to the University of New Mexico with the tagline Where lithography lives. You can see some of June's art on Tamarind, and here's her website. You can learn more at her extensive wikipedia and she has an Instagram.

Demented Tidal Wave II, 1972
Lithograph printed by William Law III

Seventh Wave II, 1971
Lithograph printed by David Trowbridge

Tidal Wave, 1974
Lithograph printed by Edward Hamilton

Tidal Wave, 1972
Lithograph printed by William Law III

Black Tidal Wave, 1973
Lithograph printed by John Maggio

White Tidal Wave II, 1972
Lithograph printed by William Law III


Outro

Do you realize (of course you do) we don't try to sample every dish and flavor on any restaurant menu because our appetite and our budgets make it impossible? Whether it's a rock concert or a symphonic feast, linear time limits how much music we take in at once. So why did I imagine needing to sprint through the Geffen Galleries and see almost everything, when I could pick and choose a certain section or era or style or artist?

Five Minute Friday :: Boundary

• Five Minute Friday :: Boundary Linkup

Intro
Even when their basic polity or governance is local or congregational, mainline church bodies all have denominational judicatories with names like synod, conference, presbytery, district, diocese; one of their functions is to provide oversight and accountability to the local church. My recent experience has been when a judicatory offers boundaries training for pastors and other church leaders, they usually invite everyone with interest in the topic to attend because setting boundaries is a vital aspect of mental wellness.

In any organization or business, when they hear the word "boundaries" people often think sex and money, but those are areas a person knows they're violating if they cross a boundary or border. They're usually aware of even minor transgressions of those boundaries. Sometimes we need to spell out boundaries for other parts of our lives, especially if things have gotten to feel chaotic or unbalanced.


Boundaries
Did you notice Kate's illustration for today is a fence? The American poet Robert Frost told us "good fences make good neighbors" in his Mending Wall.

Everyone needs to be concerned about setting boundaries in relationships with other people, with hobbies and recreational activities, appetites of various kinds, time, social media, and everything else every day. The need for some boundaries can be subtle.

I'm considering essential boundaries for my basic physical well-being. Ideally that happens before exploring those outside myself, but like everyone, I need to begin where I already am. There may be some boundaries it would be wise to modify or change, new ones at least to experiment with. I might plan to:

• Not settle for less sleep than I need to get through the day.
• Do my best to enjoy more fruits and veggies every day. Typically I do that almost without thinking, but where I currently live it's a major challenge I need to get intentional about.
• Stay better hydrated with water.
• Since I don't go to a gym, walk at least one mile at least every other day for the exercise and for the sunlight. Preferably morning, but if it doesn't happen early in the day, don't use that as a reason not to do it at all.

It's not about getting and maintaining a compulsive, unbendable, micro-disciplined schedule. It's about establishing structure and boundaries in sleep, nutrition, and exercise that then can wiggle and bend some to accommodate friends, family, career, volunteer work, social obligations, recreation, and unexpected situations that all typically include other people who sometimes make their own demands I need to consider.

How are you thinking and acting about boundaries these days?

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Port of Los Angeles

The Port of Los Angeles was my destination for this week's Tuesday day off. More specifically, the area tourists and regular people can visit that's south of the nitty gritty of the 24/7 working container port. Did you know the Port of LA and the Port of Long Beach are twins? And by the way, passenger cruise ships also sail out of the Ports of LA and Long Beach. The eight day Mexican Riviera cruise I took in 2010 was out of Long Beach.

I sort of have a "thing" about container ports, shipping, hauling, and rail transport, and the part all of them play in the supply chain. I follow a dozen container ports on Twitter and I get the Port of Amsterdam's newsletters. One of my best ever long ago memories was trying to stay awake most of the night in a hostel right beside a working section of the Port of Hamburg. It was so exciting and glamorous!

Although I planned Tuesday knowing the battleship Iowa and the Maritime Museum both were closed on Mondays and Tuesdays (I trust this won't be my forever schedule), I'd hoped to take a harbor boat cruise. Advertised at $15 for close to an hour around the bay, it sounded like a don't miss it activity. It turned out they needed to have enough people sign up before they sailed, so I decided not to wait around this time.

I'd gone south to the city of San Pedro that's the skinny strip of land where the Port of LA resides because I believed there was a fancy commercial strip some distance away from the major port activity, but that's another "as it turned out" because it had been razed and they were in the process of building a new, improved, exciting mile long row of shops and restaurants.

Apparently I looked dazed, because a harbor police officer approached me in front of the closed museum and asked if I was lost. Yes, I was! She told me what was going on and said there was a brand new Starbucks about a mile away at the end of the currently empty new development. Close to the end of the promenade, it was a beautiful small store, with a lot of outside seating, so I got my favorite large hazelnut frappuccino with whipped cream.

And on the way – of course on the way back in the opposite direction, too – there were two schooners moored in the water. I looked closely and I knew one of them had to be American Pride, one of my favorites from the Labor Day weekend San Diego annual Festival of Sail. I don't know why seeing her there surprised me; probably because I hadn't remembered American Pride is the official tall ship of the city of Long Beach.

I had to search "two mast schooner beside American Pride in San Pedro" and it was the Swift of Ipswich. Yes! named after the north shore town of Ipswich Massachusetts of fried clams fame.

Despite no museum, cruise, or shopping strip, it was a wonderful day along the bay.

I'm ending with an American Pride trilogy from San Diego Festival of Sail 2013 and 2014. The one on the right is one of my best captures of American Pride in full red sail.