12/31/14

Caged Bird
By Maya Angelou

A free bird leaps
on the back of the wind
and floats downstream
till the current ends
and dips his wing
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky.

But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.

The free bird thinks of another breeze
and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn bright lawn
and he names the sky his own

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.

Gabrielle Aplin - Home

12/28/14

Fast.
A period of such abstention or self-denial.
Wait.
stay where one is or delay action until a particular time or until something else happens.
Long.
a yearning desire.

Why fast? Why wait? Why long?

What is it about the journey? Why is it more important than the destination?

The question has always been proposed:
Do the ends justify the means?

I would say the means are the ends. Or rather that the ends only hold any sort of value what so ever because of the means.

What is it about the taste of a meal after having taken so long to prepare it?
Why does it taste so much better?

Without fasting, without waiting, longing, what do we have in this life?

Why does the shower after living in my car for a week feel better than any other shower I've ever had?

Every morning before work I wake up and shower almost as an annoying part of my morning routine. Yet when I fast from it after the waiting period I find new joy, new appreciation for the shower and each drop of water feels better than all the months of drops prior.

Why?

Why does the first bite after we break fast taste better than limitless food whenever we want?

What is it about waiting for that wedding night?
What is it about waiting for Christmas morning to exchange gifts?
What is it about the sunrise after a cold dark night?
What is it about the drink of water after a day in the garden?

What would happen if life was boiled down to merely ends and destinations?

whatever, whenever.

Travis just came downstairs I've lost my train of thought, and we are talking now.

Relient K - I Celebrate The Day

12/20/14

Religion is a breeding ground
Where the Devil's work is deeply found,
With teeth as sharp as cathedral spires,
Slowly sinking in.

God knows that I've been naive
But I think it makes him proud of me.
Now it's so hard to separate
My disappointments from his name.

Because shadows stretch behind the truth,
Where stained glass offers broken clues
And fear ties knots and pulls them tight.
It leaves us paralyzed.

But in the end such tired words will rest.
The truth will reroute the narrow things they've said.
The marionette strings will lower and untie
And out of the ashes, love will be realized.

God knows that we've been naive
And a bit nearsighted to say the least.
It's broken glass at children's feet
That gets swept aside unexpectedly

Sleeping At Last - Naive

12/17/14

Cosmology
Cambrian explosion
Uniformitarianism
Catastrophism
Gradualism
List of flood myths
Actualism
Modal realism
Paleoecology
Anthropology
Ontology
Theology
Truth
Faith
Science
Evidence
Perspective
Agenda
Cognitive dissonance
Survival
Surrender
Love

A man could get lost in Wikipedia forever. Research and searching. What is this?

Glen Hansard - Love Don't Leave Me Waiting

12/13/14

MANIFESTO: THE MAD FARMER LIBERATION FRONT
by Wendell Berry

Love the quick profit, the annual raise, vacation with pay.
Want more of everything ready-made.
Be afraid to know your neighbors and to die.
And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery any more.
Your mind will be punched in a card and shut away in a little drawer.
When they want you to buy something they will call you.
When they want you to die for profit they will let you know.
So, friends, every day do something that won't compute.
Love the Lord. Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace the flag.
Hope to live in that free republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot understand.
Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.
Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millennium.
Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.
Put your faith in the two inches of humus that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion--put your ear close,
and hear the faint chattering of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world.
Laugh. Laughter is immeasurable.
Be joyful though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep of a woman near to giving birth?
Go with your love to the fields.
Lie easy in the shade. Rest your head in her lap.
Swear allegiance to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos can predict the motions
of your mind, lose it.
Leave it as a sign to mark a false trail, the way you didn't go.
Be like the fox who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

Sometimes
It's like you grew up down the street
It's such a mystery
The way you know me

Walk The Moon - Come Under The Covers

12/10/14

Wade Davis: Dreams from endangered cultures


This tribe, the Cofan, has 17 varieties of ayahuasca, all of which they distinguish a great distance in the forest, all of which are referable to our eye as one species. And then you ask them how they establish their taxonomy and they say, "I thought you knew something about plants. I mean, don't you know anything?" And I said, "No." Well, it turns out you take each of the 17 varieties in the night of a full moon, and it sings to you in a different key.

When science meets aboriginal oral history

“Scientists are sitting around and academically discussing different theories about peopling of Americas, and you have all these different views on how many migrations, and who is related to, Then when we actually undertake the most sophisticated genetic analysis we can do today, and this is state of the art, genetically — we could have just have listened to them in the first place.”
-Eske Willerslev

chronological snobbery - the uncritical acceptance of the intellectual climate common to our own age and the assumption that whatever has gone out of date is on that account discredited. You must find why it went out of date. Was it ever refuted (and if so by whom, where, and how conclusively) or did it merely die away as fashions do? If the latter, this tells us nothing about its truth or falsehood. From seeing this, one passes to the realization that our own age is also "a period," and certainly has, like all periods, its own characteristic illusions. They are likeliest to lurk in those widespread assumptions which are so ingrained in the age that no one dares to attack or feels it necessary to defend them.
-C.S.Lewis

We’re all a product of our time. We each think we live in the wisest, smartest era of history. What if our modern science is far too narrow minded? What if the lens and perspective it takes isn't the full story? What if there is more? More that won't ever be explored or discovered because it cannot fit anywhere in the narrow views and minds of those we have given all authority and power known as scientists.

The scientific method can it solve all of our problems? Can it seek out absolute truth?
Or is it merely another faith system generations from now people will shake their heads at embarrassingly?

What is reality? What is it to look through different lenses, to speak with humility confessing there is so much we don't know and possibly can't?

I find it difficult to truth authority and I'm not exactly convinced I should put my faith in the scientific communities laws, facts, and truths they seem to change with each new updated edition of the publication. Perhaps I'll wait until the dust settles to see where I stand.

Will the dust ever settle?

The Last Bison - Setting Our Tables

12/06/14

Last night was beautiful and I want to remember it. I want to bottle the moment the night and hold it dearly. The best I can do is hope my memory serves me correctly and these words revive such moments hold them in suspension.

Last night Alan dropped by before he went to hang out with Bailey. Brian came home after spending time with Lauren and Travis after spending time with Melissa. These nights I suppose will become more and more scarce as we grow older. Here I am the first of this group to reach 27 though Travis is only 2 months behind me it feels strange we are entering into our late 20's.

The night was rare and unique. We aren't in college anymore but we aren't yet husbands. This strange place between our childhood and adulthood. The self awareness of it all is what makes this time so interesting.

Our conversations orbit around such things as careers, women, buying houses, retirement plans, beliefs. Yet in the same breath we joke, we laugh, we act like we are 19 again. Its interesting to me how I've known these guys since I was a kid. We've grown together. We've gone separate ways and yet still come back to this friendship.

We play the same board games we did as kids but the conversation has grown with us. The drinks turned from mountain dew to bourbon. The competitive edge has rounded to a smooth bend of friendship.

What are we right now? We are in this place where we can spend time hanging out with 40 year old friend and yet at the same time go to the bars like we are 21.

I have no problem going to sleep around 10 on a Friday night or staying out until 2.

I want to live in my car and travel around the country, yet I want to put some away for retirement.

Alan talked about protesting in Ferguson. How he can up in leave to go and not worry about leaving his wife, his kids, his job just go and protest and not worry about if he gets arrested. Yet talking with older friends he learned the perspective of how temporary this place we are in truly is. We won't always be able to go wherever risking our lives because our lives will mean more to others. They depend on us. What a selfish act to get arrested stranding my wife to care for our kids solo. Yet we need people there showing the numbers of those who won't settle for injustice.

I told him about how I want to climb Mt Whitney, I want to hike the PCT and the appalachian, and hike around Machu Picchu. Yes right now I feel as good if not better than I did when I was in high school but someday and I'm not sure when that day will come, hiking around for days and days will not seem fun...even still it won't be possible someday. Its strange how temporary everything is. I think that is what makes youth so beautiful and rare.

in my 20's each year has been better than the last but the scales will tip. They must and I wonder what that will feel like. What will it be like to look at my life and admit my best days are behind me? When will that day come?

But now, these days, this time, we are young, we are single, we are friends who's roots have been growing deeper and deeper into each others lives. Brian Travis and I sat together talking about Travis buying a home and us living there helping him pay the mortgage. I use to vomit at the thought of friends spending there time talking like adults now I see the beauty and value in friends growing together helping each other on deeper levels than simply spending time together for entertainment. Friends are valuable.

Friends help make life's weight lighter. Friends help make life's pain easier. Friends help life's pressures, worries, and also life's celebrations more joyous.

How beautiful it is to attend a friends wedding and share in that day with them.

I have always been told how love makes the world go round but the more I live the more I see the truth in such statements.

Without love life is only existence.
Life is merely survival.
God is love.
God breathed the breath of life into us.
God breathed His Spirit, His image into us.
God breathed love into this reality and through it life and life to the fullest is now possible.
That thirst for something is satisfied in love.

God is love.
Love is home.
Home is where the heart is.
Home is where I am understood.
God is home.

Brady Toops - Come On Home

12/02/14

Dear 28 year old Adam,

I've just turned 27. 2014 was the year I backpacked around Europe with Freado, his wife, and her cousin. I saw the freaking pope. I met a wild horse on a mountain. I saw the sistine chapel ceiling. I tasted a family meal in Rome. I watched God's faithfulness create food from dirt at the Arawak garden. This is also the #yearofthebeard14 in fact as I am writing this I still have the thing on my face. This was also the year I did the Parish Farming Internship in Norwood with Erin and Robert. 26 has been a very good year and I'm excited to enter into my late 20's.

Things I'm doing now:
I live in Clintonville with Travis, Brian, and Ellen. I'm still working at the VECC I've been there about a year and a half now. I'm still trying to learn how to play guitar but finding time to practice hasn't been easy but I do find that when I can it is very rewarding. I finished my first season at the Arawak Garden and I can't begin to put into words how that small patch of land makes me feel. I have confidence that you will always remember the way it felt to work that land even if you forget what crops God grew.

Things I hope you're doing:
I think this year I finally decided what I want to be when I grow up. I think I want to be a Kindergarten teacher but I don't want to go back to school. I'm not ready for homework and school debt just yet. I'm not sure when I will go back to school but at least I have the vision and the path I'd like to take. I love the preschoolers I work with now. They teach me so much about how to be a human and how to live life. I want to keep learning from children for the rest of my life and I want to hopefully teach them some things in return. I hope you are enjoying a beardless face. Remember how difficult eating was. Remember the pain when a kid would pull on it. Remember how your friends would laugh as things would get stuck in it or you would act like a caveman. I hope you are still working at the Arawak garden or you've bought land of your own in the city and started working it. I hope you went to Egypt. I hope you climbed Mt. Whitney. I hope you still have this amazing long hair. I hope you never worry about money. I hope you keep fighting for freedom for others and yourself. I hope you are still hanging out at Fruit of the Vine and I hope you never stop. I hope you're still learning at Franklinton Gardens.

Things I've learned since turning 26:
I learned what I want to be when I grow up. I learned more about who God is. I learned about community in Norwood. I learned how important it is to be hospitable. I learned how difficult and yet how rewarding it is to need other people. I learned how we, the living, depend on the sacrifices of the dead in order to continue in life. I learned how none of us are self sufficient and how thankful I am that we aren't. How strange it is that men can grow beards. What is a beard? Hair pushing out of my jaw and cheek. How does this much hair fit behind my skin? Why is it that long hair on our heads is feminine yet hair on the rest of our bodies is masculine? What is it that if I let go and allow hair to grow it completely changes my appearance. I look older, I look different. I look scary. I look crazy. How does letting a beard grow naturally do all of those things? Why did God allow some men to grow beards? After growing this beard for 11 months I think I have realized like most things in our lives God doesn't want us to simply let nature take over. I first started growing the beard as an act of letting go and it has become a test of my word. But as the year has gone I've realized that we humans are called to constantly be shaping Creation, with respect, shaping. Eucharist is not simply wheat and grapes. There is a rendering that takes place first. We are not simply naked. God rendered the first clothing from animal skins. We are called to shape, render, create, in this life. Along with that comes unique grooming. Shaving, tattoos, piercings, hair cuts, jewelry, clothing, I believe God wants all of the different cultures to be expressed and celebrated in this life and in the reality after. I look at myself in the mirror these days and I see a man who has let go and I find confidence in the fact that I can let go but I find freedom that I don't have to. In the mirror I see the animal part of me, coming to terms with my mortality. Humans stink, we bleed, we die. I am no longer trying to avoid or deny my humanity. I sin. God as Jesus didn't flee from humanity, didn't flee from the mess why should I? Today I exist and today I celebrate existing for 27 years I can't guarantee I'll make it to 28 but at this moment I exist and that is so rare and beautiful. I am thankful I am not simply an animal and I am not simply an angel. I am that beautiful rare creation in between. I am human. I am Adam. I learned life is about dependency, community, hospitality, mercy, and most of all LOVE. With all this good I also learned that marriages can fail. I learned that if we don't work at it our lives can fall apart. I learned that friendships are the greatest things to invest in. It seems like every year I learn more about love. This year I learned love is more than something towards a woman. Love towards my friends is a very beautiful thing. I'm learning to value the love we have for each other and how long we've been friends. I'm learning that the love between friends is a powerful thing and as years pass I don't think I'll fully understand how valuable they are until I'm on my deathbed looking back at this life I've spent. I know with each passing year more and more of these men get married and have children. I am trying to enjoy the time I can spend with them. I am enjoying those friends who are single at this point. I'm growing and healing together with them as we go through divorces, as we become fathers, as we become husbands. As we enter our careers. We are facing these parts of life together. We are facing these fears not alone but with love and support. I know this season will one day pass but for now it is beautiful and I am so thankful for it.

1987 Born
1988 00
1989 01
1990 02
1991 03
1992 04
1993 05
1994 06 Started Grade School
1995 07
1996 08
1997 09
1998 10
1999 11
2000 12
2001 13
2002 14
2003 15
2004 16
2005 17
2006 18 Graduated High School
2007 19
2008 20
2009 21
2010 22 Graduated College
2011 23
2012 24
2013 25
2014 26