CHOPIN OR CAFFEINE

This morning I postponed my morning coffee long enough to be stimulated by listening to Chopin. The trick for me is to be fully present with the music, especially the time-tested classical kind. Any music that is literal takes me away from the music itself. Questions such as, what is the name of that tune? Or when was it written? Or what does this remind me of? This distracts me from being completely into the music. I can’t become too fascinated with the musician's style, or chord progressions, or how they make the instrument swell or diminish, etc. I say I want to get into the music as totally as I can. Or is it my goal to let the music get into me as deeply as it can. Some music feeds my soul while other music just moves my body. I don’t need to swing and sway, stomp, rock and roll or wave my hands or hips. Since I love almost all music, there will be plenty of opportunities for this action. To be fully open to the music to do its thing within me, everything around me needs to be as quiet as possible, peaceful and serene. The life energy I find within me is far more stimulating than even coffee--at least for today.

FAR OUT

I am excited about this coming Sunday’s theme, the cosmos. Our pastor has invited us to imagine the ramifications of Colossians where Christ is praised as the supreme power over the cosmos. For the Apostle Paul, Christ is the image of the invisible God and is supreme over all created things. The whole universe has been created through him and for him. All things are held together in him. Through him God chose to reconcile the whole universe to himself.” (Col:1:15-20) Here is where my imagination has to kick in. In the face of the immense universe, Charlie has to start wondering. The whole unfathomable scene is a divine mystery. Only God’s amazing grace through Christ baffles me more. I hear the figures describing the immensity of the cosmos, but it is beyond me (so to speak) and I can’t get my mind around it. One problem I have in imagining the infinite is that I have to acknowledge how tiny I and my world are. From our earthly perspective it is all so confusing. I said I saw the sunset this evening, but, of course, I didn’t because it didn’t. Another challenging imaginary picture coming from the truth that in Christ all things are held together is that all of us as created beings are intimately related to each other. No room here for our traditional us versus them dichotomy. Talk about inclusion!

Why Does Charlie Wonder?

Why does Charlie wonder? Doesn’t he KNOW? Hasn’t he lived by Paul’s affirmation: “I couldn’t be more sure of my ground--the One I’ve trusted in right to the end”? Hasn’t Charlie even sung this message since he was a teenager beginning with: “I know not why God’s wondrous grace to me He has made known. . . .” That assurance of God’s love and care has never wavered, but the more I trust and know God, the more I wonder at God’s work throughout the cosmos. The divine mystery grows and fascinates me in multiple ways. Where would Christianity be--where would any religion be--without wonder, awe, amazement and mystery? Thank God I do not know it all.

WHO AM I NOW?

WHEN I ASK WHO AM I NOW? I’m wondering who “I am” really as opposed to who I think I am (ego) and “now” as opposed to who I once was or who I may be in the future. When I work through this little process I find I am in a very delightful, more loving, peaceful place. I experience God in places I never thought to look before. I see interconnectedness instead of separation and division. What a break!
It helps to also ask myself: “What matters to me now that did not matter so much in previous stages of life?” Here the emphasis is on presence as opposed to living in the past or the future. Again there is great relief in being myself in the only time I have or need to have.
Here and now in this quiet, peaceful space I breathe deeply and experience spirit, I imagine God is doing it--again filling me with the life-giving breath
given to every living being. Being aware of this common spiritual bond I am enabled and directed toward a more loving relationship as I connect with others who are being themselves in their present moment. I am more likely to treat them as I would want to be treated. And that, it seems to me is the essence of the Jesus ethic.

CHARLIE WONDERS ABOUT HIS PLACE

CHARLIE WONDERS ABOUT HIS PLACE in the world’s turmoil of the last few years. He wonders how it is that we can send several hundred of our most “successful” leaders to Washington where, instead of solving conflicts they choose up sides and fight among themselves. This “American way” guarantees that no creative, collaborative solutions will emerge. On second thought maybe they do just reflect the collective unconscious (mostly negative and sometimes hostile) of the rest of us.
It is probably just as well that I no longer have a lectern from which to try to support peace and love. In today’s hostile climate I could inadvertently become a part of the above divisions instead of encouraging the needed consensus. At my age-affected body/mind/spirit I should probably not even be roaming around on this page without adult supervision. On my better days I am able to take an R&R from the conflict and live in the blessed presence God has provided all of us. All it takes is the awareness of God’s grace. Then I can relax and better discern what I can do to promote togetherness.

WHO AM I NOW?

WHEN I ASK WHO AM I NOW? I’m wondering who “I am” really as opposed to who I think I am (ego) and “now” as opposed to who I once was or who I may be in the future. When I work through this little process I find I am in a very delightful, more loving, peaceful place. I experience God in places I never thought to look before. I see interconnectedness instead of separation and division. What a break!
It helps to also ask myself: “What matters to me now that did not matter so much in previous stages of life?” Here the emphasis is on presence as opposed to living in the past or the future. Again there is great relief in being myself in the only time I have or need to have.
Here and now in this quiet, peaceful space I breathe deeply and experience spirit, I imagine God is doing it--again filling me with the life-giving breath
given to every living being. Being aware of this common spiritual bond I am enabled and directed toward a more loving relationship as I connect with others who are being themselves in their present moment. I am more likely to treat them as I would want to be treated. And that, it seems to me is the essence of the Jesus ethic.

Charlie Wonders: CAJUN SURPRISE!

Charlie Wonders: CAJUN SURPRISE!: "CAJUN SURPRISE! file:///Users/charlesprewitt/Pictures/iPhoto%20Library/Originals/2008/Jan%208,%202008/100_0736.JPG We had hardly begun ou..."

CAJUN SURPRISE!

CAJUN SURPRISE!

file:///Users/charlesprewitt/Pictures/iPhoto%20Library/Originals/2008/Jan%208,%202008/100_0736.JPG

We had hardly begun our 58th anniversary/Martha’s birthday trip to New Orleans when we experienced a serendipity in Lafayette, Louisiana.  Spending the night there and well-rested, we found the Jean Lafitte National Park museum and movie documentary that introduced us to the spirit and history of the Acadian people. All we had known of them before this  trip was the Cajun dances and food exhibited each year in San Antonio’s folk life festival and the reading in high school of Evangeline.  Now we discovered a highly spiritual, courageous, adaptive and determined people whose life had never been very comfortable for long.  Yet they were in a few short hours highly inspirational for us.  It left us desiring to learn much more and will someday be worth another trip. Charlie wonders how many more of God’s people could provide such inspiration if he could just get to know them.  All of them I suspect. 

WHY BLOG?

WHY BLOG?

     AT MY AGE, I’M TOLD, IT IS IMPORTANT  FOR MY HEALTH TO KEEP USING MY BRAIN. EVEN THOUGH MY THINKING IS SLOWER, MY MEMORY IS WEAKENING, MY CONCENTRATION IS SHORT AND MY CREATIVITY IS CHALLENGED, I MUST FIND  WAYS TO KEEP MY MIND ACTIVE AND FLEXIBLE SO I’M LEARNING NEW WAYS TO USE A NEW COMPUTER AND I BLOG.  While it is easier to just keep on rehashing the same old thoughts, repeating what I have always heard, and believing what I was told to believe, my inner spirit (not concerned with age) wants to awaken, so I blog.  I have been conditioned to read, pray, learn, and grow so I can preach, teach, counsel, and consult with others more effectively.  Now without a pulpit, lectern or couch, I still have to share something. So I excerse my faith and imagine someone out there is reading this and I blog.  

Using that same imagination, I can fancy myself a writer. A well-known author said, “A writer is distinguished by the fact that he writes.”  So I blog.  Specificallly, I write the blog “Charlie Wonders,” because I am curious. I try putting into words some experiences and things thast intrigue me.  So I blog on.

ACCEPTING THE STRANGER

     When the weather outside is frightful, Martha and I get some of our exersize the way old folk often do. We walk the mall. Last week with both of us havving separate commitments, I wound up at the mall by myself.  Not to be cheated out of my walk, I took off alone.  Soon I realized I was not alone at all.  There were hundreds of people of all ages, sizes. colors. and physical condition walking the mall, shopping, hanging out.  To entertain myself I wondered what it would be like to meet with accepting eyes each person that passed me.  Key word: accepting.  By definition this means to me I would try to see them without judgement.  I allowed myself no descriptions such as cute, ugly, stylish, gross, stupid, intelligent, fat, thin, etc.  This little experiment of course was to serve no great purpose. It was just to take people the way they are.  So far as I could tell it had no effect on them at all. If they even looked at me (which was rare) they would not read much in my expression.  This was a serious study and I had to remain focussed! It was my own game of solitaire.  While nothing was happening in them, to be this intentionally accepting of that many of God's creations for forty-five minutes, had a profound effect on me.  I found as I walked an inner peace, joy,and love for all humans far beyond those hundreds of my traveling pilgrims.

CONNECTING THE DOTS

When asked, “How are you?” these days, I use the line, “I’m doing great! -- But I do have some parts that are not functioning properly.”  In order to communicate more seriously with my primary physician and others who want a more precise answer, I listed the parts that needed repair.  They include as of this writing at almost seventy-eight years: hearing, balance, shortness of breath, skin problems, shakiness, restless leg syndrome/periodic multiple limb disorder, lower back pain, difficulty concentration, memory loss, gastro esophageal reflux/Barrett’s disease including voice problems (singing and speaking), insomnia, fatigue/weakness, controlled hypertension, sleep apnea, and frequent cough. After listing these I am tempted to add one more—hypochondriac. (This short list does not include parts affected by prostrate cancer 12 years ago. I have learned to live with those handicaps. The operative word is live since I thought I was through living when first diagnosed with cancer.)

The quick diagnosis of all this is “aging", but as a long-time believer in wholeness, I am curious about how these symptoms interrelate and feed off each other.  Can I connect the dots and get the big picture?  If so, will that give me a clearer understanding of “how I am.” Is there a root cause of these symptoms and perhaps something I can do about it?

I am learning that the eye bone is connected to the head bone, the leg bone is connected to the head bone and the ear bone is connected to the head bone; now hear the word of the Lord. I can never be well balanced without my senses and the brain communicating and cooperating with each other.  

Checking out my ears started the ball rolling and the wall moving by showing me that I was not only losing my hearing, but the silly cilia in my middle ear might be connected to loss of balance. My ENT doctor referred me to physical therapy to learn how to walk again and prepared me for walking a strait line should the patrolman request that I do so. Physical therapy also showed me just how inflexible and weak I really had become. My slow walking gait was not just laziness. It partially explained some of my “falls without grace” on the tennis court and doing yard work. The dot connecting mystery must be continued in all my other systems.  

Speaking of tennis, my doubles partner/wife often noticed long before I did that I was “out of it” and should get off the court. This is not to be confused with all the times she just wished I were off of her side of the court.  Now my stare and slower-than-usual reaction time mean my concentration and strength are depleted. These dots remain to be put in place in the puzzle, but we have a psychiatrist friend who thinks I may be dealing with “minimum cognitive impairment.”  Perhaps too minimum to show up on my recent brain scan. My ENT doctor reported the MRI indicated my brain was good for life (but failed to mention how long that would be.)  Close friends have already indicated that I am overusing my “minimum cognitive impairment” excuse for mistakes I make at cards and conversation. You use what you got.

With seventeen sessions of physical therapy, my strength, flexibility and reaction time in off-balance situations improved a bit.  My shortness of breath (air hunger) and frequent cough remained as isolated dots.  

I did very well with the lung test in the pulmonary clinic. Inhaling and exhaling in the machine showed that I was both a sucker and a blowhard. 

My restless leg syndrome may be connected to my insomnia that is connected to daytime sleepiness and fatigue.  Spending a restless night at the sleep lab was a waste. I was sent there because I couldn’t sleep.  I failed the sleep test in the lab three times because I didn’t sleep enough. Catch 22. I finally got the bad news: I stop breathing forty times every hour. The good news: I also start breathing 40 times every hour.  I now sleep with a contraption on my face that forces me to breathe clean air and won’t let me stop breathing. When I am not thinking about or fiddling with that foreign appendage clamped on my nose, I get some uninterrupted sleep.  

I would like to understand more about the dots that need to be better connected in my brain and how that affects all the above. Those neurotransmitters, synapses, etc. are another story. I was never good at chemistry or electronics. 

Maybe my gastrointestinal doctor could help with some of this puzzle. He picked up on the possibility that the medicine he had me on might have run its course and changed that.  He also recommended another endoscope exam to see what is going on in my esophagus that may be connected to my coughing, hoarseness and difficulty in talking. (Not to be confused with saying the right things.) 

So step right up folks.  Get your tickets for the amazing Deep Throat show! Move right into the tent.  The show is about to start. Here he is: the death-defying sword swallower. He’s daring. He is fearless.  He’s fast asleep!  Oh well. The show must go on.  They ram the tube down my throat and later the biopsy shows nothing changed in last 2 and a half years. My gurds is no better, but no worse. Keep taking the meds. Just to be sure, he ordered an examination of my colon. These pipes were a little rusty, but functioning.  Whatever bumps there are in there are benign.

I saw a neurologist who basically relieved my fears of Parkinson’s disease and worse neurological terrors, I’m not on that track, just getting older and some foot and leg nerves are wearing thin. We do still need to buy some new cups, saucers and plates.  The ones we have make my hands shake.

The older I get the more I see not only my dots getting connected, but all my experiences, coming together to form a whole.  I now believe Jesus is just as interested in saving wholes as souls. That being the case, with the help of the Great Physician and many of his colleagues, I hope to keep patching up my whole body, mind and soul for as many years or days as I have left. Then after the Great Transition, I look forward to having whatever parts I need in perfect working order.  Thanks to God I will still be doing just great!

Charlie Prewitt

Ramadan Visit

      Last night Martha and I with eight of our church friends attended a Ramadan Iftar dinner at the Raindrop Turkish House in San Antonio. The dinner prepared for non-Islamic guests was an excellent interfaith opportunity to meet and have fellowship with Islamic citizens as they broke their day-long fast. We learned from and experienced with them some of their cultural and religious traditions and rituals. We saw first-hand how helpful it can be to commune across the barriers that have created misunderstanding among those of us raised in the West.

     In a recent blog I spoke of my Baptist identity and especially treasured the part of my background and training that values cultural and religious diversity.  It goes back for me at least to four years old with my very Baptist mother teaching me to sing: "Jesus loves the little children; all the children of the world' red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight."  So the Baptist heritage I treasure and try to practice is not the narrow kind that operate on the belief that all the other people of the world are not precious to him.

     For the last eighteen years we have enjoyed associating with a neighborhood Lutheran  Church that practices radical hospitality.  Hence the outreach to this Islamic group.