Noodles and Chicken
BEST USED BY APRIL 30, 2009

Recent newscasts and newspaper articles have spoken about the confusion with SELL BY and USE BY dates. Today I took the opportunity to perform my own test. Test subject: one. Trial: one.

This afternoon when neither a Brewer's baseball game nor a central division football game could hold my interest, I found myself looking through and rearranging the camping gear. I am not sure what my intentions were; other than "maybe someday... "

In the course of my moreorless aimless activity, I  came across two packages of freeze dried entrees. They are leftovers from canoe trips where they served as emergency rations should we have been unsuccessful in providing ourselves with a freshly caught fish supper.  I decided to make up the Noodles and Chicken to see if it was eatable. (I don't think that I will be needing emergency rations in the foreseeable future. If I should, there is a package of Mexican Style Rice and Chicken remaining with a best used by date of June 1, 2008.)

The dish simply made up according to the directions was quite good. It certainly didn't taste like it was four years too old. Then again, I have no idea what four-years-too-old should taste like. I suppose the next criterion as to whether the stuff was any good is whether or not I avoid an episode of gastric distress. That may serve as the subject for a future post or I may decide some things are best left "off the record."

The lady of the house has been gone since this past weekend tending to family business. That means that the home front has been downsized to a one-man operation. And I mean literally a one-man operation and not literally as in not literally factual, but used for emphasis.

Even though home alone, I have been acting responsibly and tending to a number of repair, fix-it, and minor improvement projects. I even power washed the deck. I tried that once several years back; I was so disappointed in the final outcome that I have stayed away from that task ever since. A day or two before the lady left town, she expressed her dissatisfaction with the current state of deck affairs and her expectation that something be done about it. This time around, I revised my earlier deck washing technique and employed a lot more patience. The end result supports my re-assessment that deck washing can be a worthwhile venture and my inclination is to do it all over again without waiting several years and then only in response to a direct order.

It was early afternoon, and I was feeling good. There were a couple of things remaining on the most current to-do list, but I also needed some things before I could tackle those items. Why not take a trip to Menards? It is only a 150 mile round trip; I'll just consider it as shipping and handling. I also figured I earned a little time off, so why not a road trip. I consulted with the members of the household present and heard neither an objection nor a word of caution. The weather was great; one couldn't have asked for better September weather for a road trip. I will admit that if the leaves were turning, it would have been downright spectacular. A 3:00PM club sandwich lunch was an added treat; every now and then a trucker has to fuel up and check fluid levels to insure that he keeps on keeping on.

Is it nothing more than a distinction without a difference? If so, then it is nothing more than a sly attempt to feign tolerance.

There has been lots of commentary on the Pope's comment about gay priests--a comment made on the return flight from Brazil to Rome. With very few exceptions, the comment has been applied to gay persons in general without any reference to priests. The Pope's statement, in part,"who am I to judge?" has been parsed by Cardinal Dolan and others and rendered as "We don't judge persons; we judge behaviors." This restatement is offered as evidence that the Pope is simply reaffirming long held moral beliefs.

What criteria are used to judge a person, if not behavior, words, or thoughts of the person being judged? How can behavior be judged apart from the agent of that behavior? If the actor and the action are not inextricably linked, how can we hold one another responsible for our individual actions? If I refuse to judge other persons, I can say that a particular behavior is inappropriate for me to participate in, but I cannot say that same behavior is inappropriate for someone else. The claim that one judges behaviors and not persons is a distinction without a difference. It does not foster clarity; rather, it intentionally compounds the confusion.

An ask-an-expert column in this week's Catholic paper speaks to the practice of centering prayer and the mixed reception it has in Catholic circles. It is a practice of eastern mysticism that has made its way into Christian contemplation. The expert speaks of the potential dangerousness of the practice and seems to imply that most who attempt the practice will end up in a place that is theologically unorthodox, that is, in an amorphous "melting into God" (quotes in the original) rather than "with the consciousness of one's own frailties in the face of God's majesty." The column composed of mostly definitive statements ends with somewhat of a caveat: "One needs to remember though, that the true contemplative experience of God in prayer comes only as a gift and can never be guaranteed by any particular technique."

How is it that any one tradition can so limit the experience of That Which is Beyond? If it is truly a gift, how can the recipient limit that gift once and for all time? How is it that the Roman Catholic contemplative is limited to a consciousness of his or her own frailties and is not permitted to experience his or her strength, beauty, and majesty in so far as the image of the Creator has been incorporated into the Created? The gift may well be to expand the notion of orthodoxy within any particular faith tradition.

If something is worth doing,
it is worth doing well.
Doing something well means doing something
as if one's life depends upon it,
because. . .it just might.

As of this morning we are entering the fourth day in a stretch of cool, wet July weather. It doesn't feel like July, even though the calendar says that it is. How un-summerlike have the conditions been? An extra-blanket-on-the-bed-night three nights in a row cool.

On Wednesday, the most recent real summer weather day, I put in a long day cutting firewood in the hopes that I could finish the job and that I would not have to go back at it Thursday should it rain as forecast. I finished the job, and it rained--either good foresight or causality on my part. I am glad that I saw that task through to the end. I am not so glad with the abrupt and marked change in the weather. Limited outside activities have been the order of the day these past three days. I have the option of permitting the weather to influence, if not dictate, my outdoor activities. Morning walks in the drizzle, mist, fog, or combinations thereof simply means that I take appropriate measures to dry my clothes on my return home. Breaks in the weather during these days have allowed for the completion of a few minor outdoor tasks. I am also well into my next read. During yesterday's morning walk I took the opportunity to stop at a local restaurant to enjoy a $1.50--tax included--cup of coffee with unlimited refills. I can also attribute that decision to the weather, at least, in part.

The coffee came with the chance encounter with a local artist, who had recently returned from a three-week job in southern Indiana painting stage sets. Next month he will return to Indiana to do up a local restaurant as a New Orleans street scene. If any of my readers, find themselves in southern Indiana somewhere along the Lincoln Highway thinking that they are in New Orleans, blame the confusion on an itinerant artist and his patron and not that extra glass of sweetened ice tea. I came away from this encounter thinking how much of our lives are spent thinking, imagining, and play-acting that we are not where we are, but that we are someplace else. In so doing, how much of the very real do we miss out on?

If we stay tuned into the weather, doesn't that encourage us to keep it real? The weather not only can dictate outdoor activities, but prompts adjustments to those in which we continue to be engaged: long or short sleeves, rain gear or sunscreen. Indoor activities are also weather influenced: the number of blankets on the bed, open or closed windows, fans, or a cake in the oven.

Hand-me-downs? At my age? Yes, they are hand-me-downs.

Yesterday the maple syrup crew, Rick, Bill and I, got together for the final clean-up of the 2013 season and to move firewood for the 2014 season to the sugarhouse. The latter task was delayed by the wet spring and early summer rains which kept the trail through the woods somewhat impassable. The rains have continued as late as yesterday morning; the low spot in the trail was wet enough to coat the truck and tractor tires as an unsightly and unserviceable recapping effort. (I am sure not all of my readers are aware that at one time worn tires were “recapped” and resold.) At the end of a seven hour day with coffee and lunch breaks—one of each—the firewood relocation effort is not yet completed. We plan to go back at it this morning.

During one of the breaks, Bill noted that I was wearing a t-shirt touting the advantages of ice cream and including the Dairy Farmers of Wisconsin logo. Bill then posed the question: “Where did you get that shirt?” I explained that it was a hand-me-down that Mom had given me after Dad passed away. Bill then pointed out that the belt he was wearing was his Dad’s, given to him by his mother after his father’s death. It was his Dad’s dress uniform Sam Browne belt from World War II with the shoulder piece removed. There we were a couple of guys in our late 60’s wearing hand-me-downs with an altogether different emotional content than we would have experienced at age ten when wearing hand-me-downs from an older brother, cousin, or neighbor.

I choose this particular t-shirt for purely utilitarian purposes. The forecast called for temperatures approaching 90 degrees, so I chose from the pile of work t-shirts—as opposed to the pile of dress t-shirts—the one lightest in color and weight. Despite that being my motivation, the history of that shirt is never forgotten whenever I put it on. It was duly worn, before it was hand down to me, so I wear it like I own it. By the end of the day it was filthy, but I didn’t rip it. It has survived a passage into and through the Valley of Filth before and came through the follow-up laundry experience unstained. I am certain that this particular t-shirt will not survive a passage into a following generation unless it simply becomes a member of someone’s ragbag. I plan to wear it and work it hard; it came to me with evidence of hard work, so it ain’t like it has never been there before. And I plan to be able to wear it and work it hard for some time..

Wearing hand-me-downs sourced by the previous wearer outgrowing them is very different than wearing hand-me-downs sourced by the previous wearer’s death. Connections with the previous wearer are also an important element in this exchange. There is a denim jacket in the downstairs closet that was given to my Dad by a neighbor after her husband passed away. This is a neighbor whom I never met. When Mom passed the jacket onto me, she commented that she didn’t think that Dad ever wore it, even after she had shortened the sleeves to fit Dad’s wingspan. The modification also fits my wingspan. What is the difference here? I think I can best sum it up with the following direct and heartfelt statement: If you are going to wear a dead man’s clothes, it is best to have known that man and to have an ongoing attachment to that man’s memory.