August 16th, 2008 11:39pm
sarah
Two days after we got back from Cardiff and the Eisteddfod, we walked up Snowdon with a visiting friend from Germany. It has been on our list of things to do this year, and it was an interesting experience. I had never walked or climbed all the way up any kind of mountain, mostly because it has seemed beyond my athletic ability. But, this particular peak is a major tourist attraction. I thought if families with small children, older people, dogs, and runners could walk up it, then I could too.
At first, I just could not wrap my mind around the fact that at the end of the day, we would be standing on top of the far away peak that we saw. Which made it seem almost impossible, even knowing that so many other people really had stood on the top. The only thing I could grasp was the reality of putting one foot in front of the other. I couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to actually be at the top. The friend who was with us said that we would feel full of life (and I couldn’t imagine what that would feel like either!).
As we walked up, I was praying, talking to God about our time here in Wales, and I started thinking about how certain things in my life were/are like the experience of walking up a mountain for the first time. It was easy to say that I would walk up Snowdon, but I had no idea how that would happen. It is easy for me to articulate the goal of our time here, but hard to imagine what it will be like if or when that goal is accomplished. It is easy to describe how I want to have less anger and more trust in my life, but I can’t imagine how that will happen or what kind of person I will be when it does.
We did eventually reach the top. I didn’t feel any change in my sense of aliveness at the time, and after looking around at a beautiful view and eating the rest of our lunch, we walked back down (at times more like limped, because my knees were hurting). Over the next two days, as we rested our tired legs, I thought multiple times that I never wanted to do something like that ever again. But, this week, I think I changed my mind. The thing that God keeps bringing back to me is that something happened that I had always felt, deep down inside, to be impossible for me: I was standing on top of a mountain somewhere. Not looking at it, standing on it. That does make me feel alive. And it gives me hope. I can’t imagine what it would be like to have a day without some kind of anxiety or anger or whatever, but that doesn’t mean it is impossible. It just means I’m not at the top of that mountain yet.
August 15th, 2008 09:05pm
sarah
This is a little behind, but last week we did two very Welsh things. The first was the National Eisteddfod, a festival that celebrates Welsh performing arts and literature. Everything is done in Welsh, and it was a fantastic experience.
The day that we went, the Crowning ceremony was being held. It is the award for a collection of poetry. The collections are submitted under bardic names, then judged by a panel. At the ceremony, the panel gives their comments and announces the bardic name of the winner. The archdruid, the sort of master of ceremonies, calls for the winner to stand (as no one knows who he/she actually is). The winner was sitting behind us to the right, so we were able to see the procession come out to the audience to put a robe on him and bring him to the stage for the actual crowning.
I have put off writing this post because I don’t really know how to do justice. We had English translation for the crowning ceremony because we found that we were having a hard time understanding the Welsh of the people on the stage (different dialects and vocabulary than we are used to). Although it was seemingly a very solemn ceremony, it was not somber, and everyone seemed to be having a good time. This was the first Eisteddfod for this particular archdruid, and he made a few mistakes in the order of ceremony, but laughed it off easily and no one seemed bothered. The panel had very interesting comments about the poetry collections that had been submitted, and even quoted some lines from the winning collection that were very moving and beautiful even in translation.
I’ll save the second Welsh thing we did for the next post.
August 9th, 2008 10:43pm
sarah
From a walk one night along the promenade in our town.
August 9th, 2008 12:09pm
ryan
I used to work for a big corporation. One of the values that company extolled was safety. My wife often laughed at the sheer extremes to which my company went to ensure safety, but all in all, I liked it. They got the message across. Now I can’t mow the lawn without wearing safety goggles. I always make sure the Christmas tree is watered. We began all of our meetings with a “safety minute” which was just someone briefly sharing a way to practice safety at work or home or both. Some of my best memories of my time there are the creative ways people did safety minutes: the one about washing your hands in the bathroom and the one about Republicans and hunting accidents. My last week at work there I did a safety minute with the lyrics to “Roast Beef”, a song by Andy Gullahorn. It’s a ballad about the pig who ate roast beef leaving home. The song was inspired by the story of a man losing a toe to a lawn mower, which sounds really morbid, but the song is so witty that I can’t help but smile when I hear it. It also reminds me to wear proper footwear for any task. If you’d like to hear the song, you can get it (and the album it’s on) for just a few bucks or by telling some friends about it. Just use the embedded widget.
August 2nd, 2008 05:58pm
ryan
Some days I surprise myself. Today is one of those days. See, I usually don’t consider myself much of a fix-it man, or a do-it-yourselfer. I’m happy to let the mechanic at a garage change the oil in the car, etc. But today I went in to town and with just a fiver I bought two different knives, some tiny screwdrivers, and a tube of glue. With said supplies I have now endeavored to repair both a dresser and an apple wireless mighty mouse (pictured above). The glue is setting on the dresser now, so we’ll see. I have good hopes, except last time I did this the glue only lasted on the dresser for five months. That’s why this time I bought a big tube of glue. More exciting though, is the mouse. You see, about 7 months ago, I was rolling around way too fast in my desk chair in my office (as I have been known to do) and as luck would have it, I slammed into my desk and my mighty mouse went flying and hit the hard floor. And it was dead. No amount of tapping, clicking, or shaking would convince it’s spark (and LED) to reignite. So today I went at it with an exacto knife. I figured it’s been 7 months since I’ve been able to use it; it can’t get worse. So I tore it down and found no apparent thing to reattach, but when I put it back together it started working! Miracle! And so here it is. I haven’t glued it back together yet, so if you look closely in the picture you’ll see it’s partially held together with scotch tape for now (where is some duck tape when you need it?) but it’s working, and I am so pleased. I’ll be imposing a speed limit for the office if the mouse keeps up the good performance. And if you’re wondering, the macbook was used to take this picture. Somehow that seems ironic to me, but I can’t put my finger on why. Oh the joys of Photo Booth.
Previous Posts
