Caption Contest!

So I lied. This isn't a caption contest. It's a desperate attempt to find some healing for my back. It's been over one year and I can say it's the same: aching pain that resonates in my lower back. Yes, I've had an MRI and no abnormality was found. Yes, I"ve been to a chiropractor and still nothing. Yes, I've had X-rays and still nothing. I've stretched, exercised and refrained from riding. In fact, I have been away from the bike this long for some time. Ugh!

So in place of the caption contest - this week's contest offers a little twist. I'd chuckle at that literary quip but it hurts to laugh. The twist is to share the best remedy that will cure my pain and allow me to ride again.

An NHS Honor

On Monday, March 3, I had the distinct pleasure to address the newest inductees to Lutheran North's National Honor Society. It might be a paltry substitute for a blog entry, but here it is...

First of all, I’d like to thank the current members of NHS for asking me to speak this evening. It’s a pleasure to speak with such a fine group of young men and women. Secondly, Congratulations! To the newest members of National Honors Society. The privilege of being part of an elite group is extraordinary. I am honored to address you on a night where the gifts God has given to you are being commended, praised and acknowledged.

Growing up in Saginaw…I never understood why my mom would come home from work so tired. I mean she worked in a bank and did banking stuff. How hard could that be. Yet there would be days she would drag herself through the door, into the kitchen and begin cooking supper.

And I never understood why she would get so mad when I would ask her what’s for supper. She’d respond with “food” and I’d adolescently respond with “Is it good food?”. Man, I mean she’d snap and say any food we eat is good food. Man, lighten up.

And I also never understood why my mom used the board of education to “resolve” my disobedience. The Board of Education…ooh clever name. Simply put it was board with tape and across the tape was “Board of Education”. You know in case she had to use it to help teach me a “lesson”.

So one day… ( At this point I told an effusive anecdote about how my brother and I once took the Board of Education my mom used to “discipline” us, and glued it to the bottom of the drawer. Thinking it was funny, my mom did not laugh. Years later I understood why.)


I never understood any of that until one day, years later, I realized it was her job, her calling as a mother to raise her children so they knew right from wrong. It was her calling to be a dependable employee at the bank because people depended upon her. It was her calling as a mother to feed her family and it was this calling, this vocation that she took seriously and poured her life into. It’s this topic of vocation that I’d like to share some insights with you on this prestigious evening.

The term vocation comes from the Latin word for “calling”. The concept of vocation is that we have multiple vocations given to us by our Creator. My vocations include being a father, a husband, an educator. The narrow definition may lean towards our professional occupation, but it’s so much more than that. Our vocation is our calling. For me that certainly means my calling as an educator but it also means my calling as a father and a husband. We all have multiple vocations. As I look on the new inductees and the current inductees I see as many vocations as I do faces. The Lord has blessed you with so many talents – four of which are the reasons you are being inducted into National Honor Society. So what do we do with these vocations? What is our responsibility and how does that apply to the new inductees of NHS, but also to everyone gathered here tonight. Well, let’s turn to God’s Holy Word for guidance.

Ecclesiastes 2: 24 A man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, 25 for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment?

We can do nothing better than to find satisfaction in our work. Because of my adolescent immaturity, I never saw that in my mother’s various vocations. She was being the best employee she could be. That’s why she was working so hard, always showing up for work and one morning even walking to work in a snowstorm. That’s why, even though she was dog tired from working all day, she still fixed supper for her three children. She found great satisfaction in the work the Lord had given her.

Finding satisfaction in our work, no matter what that work may be is not always easy, but it’s a part of God’s plan for his people. This work, a gift from God, is the source of our satisfaction. Scripture is clear that man can do nothing better than find satisfaction in this gift of work

Even St. Paul alluded to the importance of our various vocations as he stated in I Corinthians 7:17: Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him.

The Lord has assigned you, called you, to this life. He has also blessed you with many gifts. Now stop. If you think I am about to venture into a tirade about how vital it is that you do something with these gifts, I’m not. Oh, I could. Oh, I could talk about being stewards of all that God has given to you, including the gifts of scholarship, service, leadership and character – I could, but I won’t.

My focus tonight is to take stock of those gifts just mentioned, and all the blessings the Lord bestowed upon you, and I encourage you to use them to the best of your ability in your calling as a son, a daughter, a student, an employee, an athlete, a musician, a friend. The Lord has assigned you this life. He has empowered you to live this life with various gifts. God has called you to this life, to these vocations, and has given you everything needed to sustain it. In fact, the gift of cleansing our sinfulness and granting us eternal life through Christ’s atoning sacrifice also equips us to carry out our vocations on this earth. We know our greatest need, the need for a sinless existence, has been completely and unconditionally granted, through our Savior. This doesn’t shame us into action. It encourages and empowers us knowing we are redeemed children of God and that we are granted the opportunity to find contentment in all the gifts and blessings given to us.

St. Paul also wrote in I Timothy: 6: “that godliness with contentment is great gain”. Finding contentment in what we have, in our vocation, in our calling, in the life that God has granted us is great gain.

Even Christ shared several vocations. He was a son, a carpenter and most importantly our Savior.

William Powers, a nuclear physicist at the national laboratory in Los Alamos, New Mexico, was asked how being a Christian affected his work. He explained how puzzling is his research into theoretical physics, how it consists mainly of working at a computer screen, analyzing thousands of calculations, tracking the behavior of obscure subatomic particles with infinitesimal half-lives. He said that while he finds this work fascinating and thought it is indeed useful in the field of nuclear energy research, he used to worry about the value of what he was doing. He wondered, what good is this really? He felt he should be spending his time doing something that was of more service to the Lord, such as evangelizing, instead. But ever since he learned about the doctrine of vocation, he feels a new satisfaction in his work. In his number-crunching and theory-testing, in exercising his abilities as a scientist, he knows he is leading “the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him” He is confident that in his office as a scientist, in his vocation, he is doing God’s work.

In your office as a student, a son, a daughter, a member of NHS be confident that you are doing God’s work by taking the talents he has blessed you with and finding contentment in the life the Lord has assigned you and to which God has called you into.

I close tonight by returning to Solomon’s words in Ecclesiastes 2: 24 A man can do nothing better than find satisfaction in his work. This too, I see, is from the hand of God. Solomon continues in verse 25 with “for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment?”

Congratulations on being inducted into Lutheran North’s National Honor Society. May you find great enjoyment in the hand of God as you find contentment in all the blessings he has given you.
Thank you.

I Will Fight No More Forever

I'm done with idyllic winter euphoria! Ugh. It's too cold. I'm too crabby. I'm tired of crunching cubes of sidewalk salt that have gathered on my steps.

The crystalline soldiers covertly attach themselves to my feet and once they advanced beyond the door and into enemy territory, they begin their assault. At first they seem harmless. Before I know it, they permeate everything from carpet to gaps in the tile-grout. Perhaps you scoff and, with the only Shakespearean quote you remember you sarcastically quip, "A little water clears us of this deed."

In your world perhaps, but in mine the salt keeps finding its way inside. Once again, I'm done with winter. I love each of our four seasons but I've seen enough winter and felt enough cold on the back of my neck and shivered enough in my cold car while staring at the heat button wondering when I will start to feel warmth.

To quote Chief Joseph:

"Hear me, my chiefs, I am tired.
My heart is sad and sick.
From where the sun now stands
I will fight no more forever. - - ."

GAME OVER: Lady 'Stangs End Season

The Lady 'Stangs completed the season in victorious fashion with a scrappy win over Pontiac Notre Dame Prep. It was not intended to be the last game of the season but with Winter Death Storm '08 imminently preparing to descend upon Macomb County, Lutheran North did not have school on Friday February 1. As a result our game with Rochester was cancelled so we finished the season with an 8-4 record. The girls set the "How-Quickly-Can-You-Score" record at 3 seconds.
After 8 years of not coaching high school basketball in any format, I couldn't think of a better team to usher me back into high school hoops.

Seasonal highlights included poor rapping skills on the bus ride to the games, besting Chippewa Valley High School, switching busses mid-route, losing shoes on the bus or the opponent's gym, or the locker room or lost and found or..., scoring at the wrong basket without many knowing about it, an intense running game and a just-as-intense full-court press.

Thanks to all those who submitted names for plays. Mo was a favorite go to play but as the season wore on, what was supposed to be a quick hitter from inside the paint, turned into a three point attempt. Hmmmm, considering the source of the name, I guess I should not have been surprised. Flea never looked good in practice so we never ran it once during the season. Sorry, Ballor. Philly looked mediocre in practice and I wasn't sure we could pull it off so I also shelved that play. Perhaps next year. Of course, Merckx was a tenacious favorite. In fact we added some options and I think Eddie would have appreciated that. We were prepared to battle the mountain stages or the flats with both options out of Merckx.

A Great Team Effort = One Small Stone

Last Friday the 9th grade Lady 'Stangs defeated Chippewa Valley High School. Some doubted the girls could fell such a Goliathesque opponent, but not the Lady 'Stangs. They took command early and played with confidence, speed, adjustments and poise to walk off the floor with a 33-32 victory. The Mustangs jumped out to a 10-4 lead by the close of quarter one and were hanging on to a two-point lead at the close of the first half.

In our previous battle with Chandler Park Academy, the girls proved they could run a play they had never seen or practiced before. After some quick sketchings that looked more like a plate of spaghetti than an offensive strategy, the Lady 'Stangs executed it perfectly and scored. Well, we didn't practice the "spaghetti play" but during a key point of the game we took a timeout and the coach reminded them of the play and once again illustrated it with his dry-erase marker. Not only did it work again but the drawing was also better. Instead of resembling spaghetti, it was an obvious serving of manicotti. Pick any Italian pasta dish you want. All I know is the girls played so hard, so well and so smart. They cheered from the bench, dove on the floor and screamed with giddy glee at the end.

To God Alone Be The Glory for giving these girls the talent, the drive and the passion to play basketball.

A Literary Mulligan?

We do so many things over in our lives. We retrace our steps when we lose our car keys. Athletes strive to repeat flawless performances. Many make the annual entertainment trek to Disney World. Well, this blog idea is part Groundhog Day (the Bill Murray cinematic classic) and part Moby Dick.

What book have you read in the past that you want to read again. Why?

I remember rereading To Kill a Mockingbird for the second time. What a difference. The first time I read the Lee's novel I was in middle school. I cared more about not losing every basketball game, like we did in football, than Scout, Jem and the rest of that crew. Years later I perused the novel during the summer and it was an entirely different read. The racist attitudes bothered me. The conclusion that I initially read only so I would do well if quizzed, now disturbed me. The novel shouldn't have ended that way. People should not allow this to happen. Oh....I see what Harper Lee was getting at....now I get it.

So what novel have you reread or would you like to reread?

Your NEXT read

I feel kind of sheepish about recommending this book on my blog but you have to get to the library and read this book…now!
Go on!
Stop reading, start the car, brave the arctic winds and get the book.
Well, if you are going to stubbornly read on, I’ll explain. We just finished Fast Food Nation in my AP Language class and I was looking for another read. While perusing the latest in the non-fiction aisle at Mt. Clemens Public Library, I came upon this title and thought it looked interesting. By the time I reached the bottom of the first page of the introduction, I was hooked. Keen, the author, had me at “steroids”.
In the introduction Keen crafts a conversation with a friend who was creating new software:
“It’s MySpace meets YouTube meets Wikipedia meets Google,” he said. “On steroids.”

I immediately appreciated the syntactical placement of “steroids.” I smiled and thought, “Now that was a well-placed intensifier.”

I read the next paragraph and new I stumbled upon a great read that I could apply to my English classes, life and even my next chapel.

“In reply, I explained I was working on a polemic about he destructive impact of the digital revolution on our culture, economy, and values.
‘It’s ignorance meets egoism meets bad taste meets mob rule,’ I said, unable to resist a smile. “On steroids.”

It’s the classic use of parallelism sprinkled with just enough sarcasm to push the point into his friend’s face and the reader’s literary pallet.

Keen immediately moves into an analogy using T.H. Huxley’s theory that if you provided an infinite number of monkeys with an infinite number of typewriters (computers for you youngsters) some monkey, somewhere will eventually craft a Shakespearean masterpiece. I’ve often used this theory and not just because I teach writing to high school students :)
The coupe de gra was Keen’s allusion to Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation to introduce the book’s assertion:
“On Wikipedia, everyone with an agenda can rewrite an entry to their liking – and contributors frequently do . Forbes recently reported, for example, a story of anonymous McDonald and Wal-Mart employees furtively using Wikipedia entries as a medium for deceptively spreading corporate propaganda. On the McDonald’s entry, a link to Eric Scholsser’s Fast Food Nation conveniently disappeared; on Wal-Mart’s somebody eliminated a line about underpaid employees making less than 20 percent of the competition” (Keen 4).

Still uncertain as to the book’s critical and informative scope? Keen’s title is The Cult of the amateur: How Today’s Internet is Killing our Culture. It’s an enlightening, affirming and quick read that won’t disappoint.

Now, quit blogging and read the book.

Ode to Expos: The Words

You can say anything you want, yessir, but it's the words that sing, they soar and descend . . . I love them, I cling to then, I run them down, I bite into then, I melt them down . . . I love words so much . . . The unexpected ones . . . The ones I wait for greedily or stalk until, suddenly, they drop . . . Vowels I love . . . They glitter like colored stones, they leap like silver fish, they are foam, thread, metal, dew . . . I run after certain words . . . They are so beautiful that I want to fit them all into my poem . . . I catch them in mid-flight, as they buzz past, I trap them, clean them, peel them, I set myself in front of the dish, they have a crystalline texture to me, vibrant, ivory, vegetable, oily, like fruit, like algae, like agates, like olives . . . And then I stir them, I shake them, I drink them, I gulp them down, I mash them, I garnish them, I let them go . . . I leave them in my poem like stalactites, like slivers of polished wood, like coals, pickings from a shipwreck, gifts from the waves . . . Everything exists in the word . . . An idea goes through a complete change because one word shifted its place, or because another settled down like a spoiled little thing inside a phrase that was not expecting her but obeys her . . . They have shadow, transparence, weight, feathers, hair, and everything they gathered from so much rolling down the river, from so much wandering from country to country, from being roots so long . . . They are very ancient and very new . . . They live in the bier, hidden away, and in the budding flower . . . What a great language I have, it's a fine language we inherited from the fierce conquistadors . . . They strode over the giant cordilleras, over the rugged Americas, hunting for potatoes, sausages, beans, black tobacco, gold, corn, fried eggs, with a voracious appetite not found in the world since then . . . They swallowed up everything, religions, pyramids, tribes, idolatries just like the ones they brought along in their huge sacks . . . Wherever they went, they razed the land . . . But words fell like pebbles out of the boots of the barbarians, out of their beards, their helmets, their horseshoes, luminous words that were left glittering here . . . our language. We came up losers . . . We came up winners . . . They carried off the gold and left us the gold . . . They carried everything off and left us everything . . . They left us the words.
-by Pablo Neruda