Meandering Moments by Elsi

Sallie is valiantly protecting me against predators and dangers as we drive the RV north on I-25. We were only out about four hours this afternoon, but we passed many potential hazards, and only Sallie’s cleverness and alertness kept us safe. For example: horses in fields along the highway … cows in fields … llamas in fields … camels, oddly enough, in a field just north of the Wyoming/Colorado border … boxy vehicles of any kind … a set of three semi-trailers, carrying enormous rolls of black pipe or hose … a ferris wheel on the grounds of Cheyenne Frontier Days … an SUV with four kayaks on its roof. I’m sure Dolphin and I are grateful for Sallie’s protection. And I wonder, how many of the things I’m afraid of are as dangerous as, say, those kayaks? Hm …

Summary of Scripture, in Rap, sort of …

God made the world in six short days.
The world was perfect! Give Him praise!
He stopped and looked and said, “It’s good!
I’ve made all things the way I should!”
But then ol’ Satan came along
And changed the future of life’s song.
He said, “Hey, Eve! Just listen to me
And eat the fruit from that one big tree!”
Well, Eve gave in, and Adam did, too,
And that’s why there’s sin for me and you.
Then God picked out the Jewish folk-
Peculiar people? that’s no joke-
To be His love, His very own,
And worship in heaven at His throne.
And every prophet who wasn’t a liar
Told that God would send the Messiah!

Then Jesus was born and, though it seems odd,
He’s the son of man and the Son of God.
He lived and taught and loved and healed;
Some folks hated Him; others kneeled.
“Let’s kill the guy and stop all this!”
So Judas betrayed Him with a kiss.
Nailed to a cross, He forgave and died,
And Satan laughed: “God, You have lied!”
But three days later, death gave in
And Jesus rose! Let joy begin!
He went to heaven; His Spirit stays
To fill each one who loves and prays.
And Jesus is coming back again-
It might be soon; we don’t know when.
So live for Him, and tell your friends,
“We’ll live forever when this life ends!”

Part of our homework in Bible study this past week was to outline the book of Jonah “in any way that will make it clear … what’s happening in the book.” So, I did:

God called Jonah; told him to “GO!”
Jonah ran off and told God, “NO!”
God sent a fish when the winds did blow.
God called Jonah; Jonah said, “YO!”
The king repented: “No more woe!”
Jonah was angry: “Told You so!”
–> I need to show mercy so I’ll grow.

My mother did the Jumble in the newspaper every morning. It seemed a pretty silly way to spend time, to me. But she’d fold the page in quarters, write the circled letters in the margin, and solve the thing before her day started.

I’ve begun doing the same! I read the paper during breakfast, and I do the Jumble before I read in the Bible. I fold the paper into quarters, scribble the letters in the margin, and figure it out.

About half the time I know the answer to the riddle just by reading it, and often I can just glance at the mixed letters and see the word. But other days I struggle over it, coming back to it until it becomes clear.

Either way, it’s fun to watch myself do what Mother did half a century ago.

Crying babies, pungent meat,
Dozens of styles of folding chairs,
Spinning footballs, wrestling kids—
We’re waiting for dusk and the rockets’ red glare.

The grass is damp; the rain is gone;
People spread blankets amidst the crowd.
Folks with books, and phones, and dogs …
Three fighter jets blaze through the clouds.

Poppers, sparklers, cans of pop,
Cupcakes and puppies, rain on the wind,
Quilts, policemen, games of chance …
Hurry! The fireworks soon will begin!

Bubbles, flags, and Frisbee golf …
Attention is focused across the park …
A bang … a flash … bright colors spread …
America’s birthday lights up the dark!

Sallie wants to write this one, but I’m going to do it anyway.

We had a barkingly exciting day yesterday! It started with Sallie’s barking enthusiastically out the window, with that peculiar tone of hysteria that generally means rabbit. There’s no way to inhibit this but to go to her, rub her ears, distract her, or drag her away. So, reluctantly, I did this. But when I got to the window, I discovered we had two mule deer in our yard. They were fascinated by Sallie—staring in the window, but quite different from the rabbit’s taunting … more of a “I wonder what’s so exciting” air.

I’ve been trying to teach Sallie to fetch, something we’ll need for obedience class Monday. She’s gotten the idea, at least, and will retrieve a particular toy and bring it to me, but she doesn’t like the activity at all. And she’s figured out how to stop it, too. When she gets bored or frustrated, and if barking at me doesn’t stop my attempts, she goes and gets the toy, takes it to the loveseat, and drops it over the back!

Sal always barks at the thunder, whether near or far. But yesterday’s rain was so phenomenally hard (I kept looking for hail, but it was just water!) that she started barking at the rain itself. I’m sure she takes credit for the storm’s ending.

As you may (or may not) recall, my last post focused on a mathematical puzzlement. At issue was the copyright restriction that quoted Bible verses may not comprise more than 25% of my total text. Having written what I wanted to write and counted both sets of words, I asked, how do I know how many Scripture words to delete?

Well, last night it came to me, and it’s so simple! I feel more than a bit foolish …

If I want to add narrative, to increase the total words, all I need to do is multiply the Scripture words by four and subtract the current total. The answer is how many words I must add to be legal. The formula, therefore, is 4(Scrip)-total = words to add.

If I want to delete some verses, again I multiply the current Scripture count by four and subtract the current total count. Then I divide that answer by three, and that’s how many words to delete! And the formula is (4Scrip-total)/3 = how many words to lose.

Sigh …

With my associate pastor, Cathy Howe, I’m working on a series of children’s books. The final set will look something like this:
—pre-kindergarten: basic Bible stories
—going into K and 1st: basic academics in light of the Bible
—1st, 2nd, and 3rd: Christian character qualities
—3rd, 4th, and 5th: God’s plan for salvation

We’re having a lot of fun putting this together. We’d like a usable prototype of the K/1 volume available for the start of school in August. And I want to take the proposal and samples to the Oregon Christian Writers Conference in July, too.

I’ve run into a rather odd snag, however. The International Bible Society will allow me to use quotations from Scripture, as long as the number of verses used is under 500, and as long as the quotes are less than 25% of the total text.

This is hard to figure out! My word processor is happy to tell me the total number of words in my current draft. But then I have to check the word count for every quote, add those up, and divide to get the percentage.

This is, obviously, do-able. But there I’m jammed. Since the total word count goes down as I delete quotes, I don’t have a target number of words to delete. Instead, I’m trying to keep track of how many words I’m taking out, then refiguring everything. Ponderous!

I asked the college boys who do my yard work if they were good at higher math. When they said yes, I showed them my predicament. They explained to me, very gently, that if I have 100 words, only 25 of them can be from the Bible. So I should count the words from the Bible and bring the number down to that target. I couldn’t successfully get across the fact that both numbers vary as I work …

Ah, well. I’m sure the ongoing subtracting and dividing serves to keep my brain working … and it sure is going to be fun to see the finished product!

Vicki and I met Sallie’s rabbit last night. We were coming back from supper, and it was sitting in the grass, twitching its nose (as usual). It didn’t hop away when we got out of my car, and we were able to walk quite close to it before it finally got irritated and hopped off. And even then it wasn’t particularly frightened—it lolloped around the tree, crossed the yard behind us, and vanished into the bushes.

Luckily Sallie didn’t see all this!

Oh, wow!

Don’t miss this movie!

Now, hear me—this isn’t a children’s movie. I went with Aidan and Ella (and their parents), going into 5th and 4th grades. And they said, “Yeah, they liked it,” in a tone that indicated, “It’s okay, I guess.”

Parts were very funny. No cheesy jokes or bathroom-level humor at all. Most was poignant, or sad, or heart-warming, or any combination of those. When I wasn’t laughing, I was fighting back tears.

So, definitely don’t miss this one! Wow … sniff … grin … twinge … wow!