Rabble Within

180 degree panoramic view from small balcony just off dining room

Writing from Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Though I have visited much of Central America over the past 30 years in my fool's paradise (Thoreau called traveling a "fool's paradise"), I have avoided Honduras. Might be because I couldn't say this city's name easily. Have found that if something appears not easy, I avoid it. Probably why I became a pilot, fly over the difficult--The Flying Boy Robert Bly calls it-- so much easier than actually being on the ground dealing with tangles, emotional life, wild over-undergrowth, thorns, bugs, threats, and pain that makes life in the jungle so un-fun. My life has been obsessed with fun--aviator saying, "If you're not havin' fun then you're doin' somethin' wrong." Not that fun is bad...or a sin. (Heck, have had to let go of "sin" and "bad" and even "good" as labels in order to keep going. Probably because I have sinned so much and done so many bad things...just too much baggage to carry. (Airline only let me carry two bags down here.) Have had to let go to find new meaning for these concepts. Letting go has meant accepting, even welcoming, uncertainty--lose the illusion of control.) Back to fun. I realize that I couldn't say "Tegucigalpa" with any fun, no "r's" to roll excessively to impress. Have spent a lot of my life trying to impress. Indeed, am probably even trying to impress you now, those of you watching me, who have read to this point. Have also spent a lot of my life trying to get attention. So in this first paragraph, the following has  come to the fore: my desire for ease, to fly, for fun, to impress, to get attention. All this probably has to do with my childhood, a lot with my relationship to my father. If my actions have been "sins" or "bad," I should like to blame my father. For then I would not be responsible, I could skirt reflection (or reflect on skirts), and keep having fun. 

However, these days I sit quietly at 6 a.m. in meditation to start the day. Sitting here and now has become, for me, a new form of prayer, which many of you know has always been a vital part of my spiritual path (by the way, a gift from my father who showed me that men can pray in life). So as I sit here quietly in Tegus ("Teh goose"), meditating, just breathing, a subtle strong dynamic that I just cannot avoid flows into my life. Have had to start calling that dynamic, "Truth." I realize that blaming my father for my sins and bad acts makes me blind to seeing life for what is here and now, choices here and now, choices to come today and into tomorrow. Blaming him, or anyone, disempowers me from moving forward in freedom, as a child of God, loved intensely by the Divine. 

At the same time, though, sitting there quietly, voices mushroom in this contemplative jungle. One voice tells me, quite authoritarianly, "But if you don't blame your father, then you will have to accept responsibility for your choices. And if you go there with all the sin and bad things you have done, your life is not going to be fun. Nor will you impress anyone, anywhere, anymore, anyhow. No one will pay attention to you. You will be alone, (which is all you have ever really been, by the way, (see your last blog post!)). And on top of all that, you will die." Other voices, grouped with that guy, grumble in grisly agreement that death is a bad thing and suggest that continuing to blame father is the best way forward for fun. All these guys fear what looks like to them certain death.

Here's another view straight out from the balcony.

Okay, "So, what's with the voices, Tim/Bender?" you may ask. You may say, "That's crazy talk; crazy people have voices talking at them, crazy people hear voices, crazy people listen to those voices." Okay, call me crazy. Or let me offer an alternative articulation, call me 'tchrazy.' Back to the voices. That's why I titled this, "Rabble Within." Have come to recognize that I move around my day, in the midst of a rabble, a throng of persons inside, formed throughout my life by myriad experiences, good and bad, fun and droll, sinful and sacred. And it's only by Grace I can keep walking. Seems different moments in my life have congealed personalities I have used to survive, to get to here and now. Sitting there with Grace, I can recognize some of them. For example, there is a 22 year old fool who loves to travel, born of being able to travel for almost free on Frontier (thanks again, Dad) and solidified when I came through this region with Phil Neff and a backpack in 1984 (thanks, Phil). There's the five year old who had to protect himself from being tricked by his mother and brother; and the fifteen year old who is convinced that being told, "No, you cannot do that now," to immediate gratification equals searing inner pain and certain death; and the twenty-three year old who just wants to have fun, no strings attached, fly over emotional involvement; the 40 year old who genuinely strived for right action in marriage, in fatherhood, and in church membership; even the 51 year old sitting here, bent, broken, twisted, and cracked, opening up to you, now from far flung Tegus.

This city often under crawling cotton candy clouds sprawls, spreads through, up and around tropical tree and green covered steep hills, some with inclines that exceed holding houses, undevelopable. Other hills have a grade on the edge, able when dry or perhaps with some rain, to hold houses, especially poor houses, shacks really. With excessive rain, which you get from time to time with a Cat V hurricane raking into this vulnerable region, those shacks together in groups prove again gravity works. Would bring a new fun way to say out loud in a different racist way and crassly, "There goes the neighborhood," were the event not deadly and irrecoverably destructive to so many. 

Death and destruction run rampant here. Honduras has the distinction of being the most violent society in the world according to statistics. In this small country of about 8 million people, twenty people are murdered on average every day. Honduran political leaders point to the narcotraffickers; am relatively certain they are part of the cause. However, the statistic cited most frequently is 85.5 homicides occur per 100,000 people per year. Violence is somewhat why  I am here. State Department sent me to assess the probability of violence taking place in relation to the elections this Fall, November 24. People here seem sick up and fed with their politicians. May be a good thing these people are not part of Thomas Jefferson's political body that experiences, and I quote, "a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security." God bless these Hondurans who have such a strong sense of sovereignty and who pride themselves on their peacefulness and tranquility; perhaps they will find a way without violence. As you know, I took this job with full awareness the State Department would not send me to garden spots. But this place could be such a garden!

Mint, rosemary, a gardenia (Thanks, Hartwell!), and eucalyptus

Speaking of gardens, here are some pics. One of the persons inside me must be a gardener, enjoy relationships with plants! (Must gotta thank my grandfather for that: thanks, Tjerk! oh, and Mert: thanks, Mert!). Because I am working in the Political Section of the embassy, they have put me up in a four bedroom, three bath apartment, two levels, with a lower level patio and upper balconies. Compared to hooch living quarters in Afghanistan it is downright luxury and I am very grateful. From my apartment, I listen to this city, often quiet, quite peaceful. From out of nowhere, though, the shrill shriek of a car alarm frequently breaks out. I am strongly warned against walking the neighborhood or walking to work, a mere mile away. Thugs can at any moment zip up in any neighborhood in a car or on a motorcycle to take valuables at gunpoint then dissolve back into city jungle. (Sidenote: for this reason, it's illegal in the city for two males to ride on a motorcycle together. A couple weeks ago, a policeman pointed this out to a pair. The thugs pulled a gun, struggled with the cop, one of the good guys, put him to the ground, shot and killed him, cold blood, in the back, then sped off. The incident was caught on video camera.) Nevertheless, the rabid fifteen year old inside me hears, "No, you cannot walk to work or on the street or to a nearby park," and convulses in anger and pain, wanting to shout back, "Bullshit!" and "Watch me!" The 51 year old mentor, who likes his job, loves life, and finds more peace in temperance, enters the scene, acknowledges the fifteen year old's frustration at lack of freedom then motions lovingly the teenager sit down, and says firmly, "Not now, my young friend."

Gerbera daisy (thanks, Norrie!), cilantro, thyme, and basil

Life goes on. Robert Frost said that often. Life goes on. Speaking of which, Brennan and Rose released news that they are pregnant. Life does go on. With the blessing, I will be a grandfather in February 2014. Wow! What wonders will that new life experience? How will life go for him/her? Am uncertain, out of control. Lovingly, I let go to see. God bless them as father and mother, life goes on through them.

In other joyful news, Beth and I are promised to one another. Three years of being together, having enjoyed the fun honeymoon phase of dating, continue to as we learn ballroom dancing and adventure together, we now engage in the serious business of understanding how the great good living Lord has chosen us for each other to work us over, shaping, carving, twisting, bending, pruning, pushing, thawing, melting, and resolving us to be closer to each other and more ready for home together and home onward.

Beth will visit here soon and make this home momentarily. We plan a weekend on the northern coast hiking in Pico Bonito National Forest then out to snorkel in island waters off Cayos Cuchinos. (Good thing parts of this country are difficult to say, hard to get to, on a road less traveled.) Incidentally, we will be out there on Sunday, September 22nd. That day has been set aside by the churches here. The Catholic and Evangelical churches have come together (first time on this scale in this nation's history) to pray that Sunday for Honduras, unite against violence, honor the victims, and call on leaders, government and otherwise, to make real changes in the justice sector. Indeed, prayer could be the only operational activity that will work. Church bells will ring. Flowers will be placed in public places nationwide to sound out, seek Blessing. Some of you who read this are prone to prayer. For those of you so bent, I respectfully request you put this event on your calendar to pray for this nation, this capital city. (Don't worry if you have a hard time saying "Teh goo see gal pah," the Triune who knows what we all mean, always, will hear.)

Thank you for your thoughts and prayers, for paying attention to me, watching me as I wander this world, the whole time wending through self and gratitude for you in my life. Without you, I would be alone and I am grateful every day that I have you to send these to. Thank you for all the grace, love, and care for all the personalities over the years, rabble within. Until that next time when we can sit ourselves down together, quietly or talkatively, I will reach out to you in fun and reverence. All of me remains yours. Peace and Love, Tim

At the soccer game between Honduras and Panama with our State Department team

Don't mind that smug smile. Got me some plants for my balcony.

Alone again, naturally (and some pics of flowers on my balcony)

A Gilbert O'Sullivan song from the 70's croons in the refrain, "Alone again, naturally." The song played over and over on the radio in my coming of age, teen years. It was the same epoch that spotlighted Otis Redding and the suggestion to feel sorry for self in this world of suffering. The "Alone again, naturally" song seemed to acknowledge truth; geez, even though the song itself questions what kinda God we got, the Bible tells us the truth shall set us free. Aloneness appeared as my ticket out of the house of suffering. At college in Kentucky. At sea on the ship. Flying high in the sky. Often gone to far flung places. In Afghanistan. Looking back now at life,  I see how much I have emphasized my life alone, how much my mind refrained to that song. My beautiful friend, Norrie, pointed out when we were married how much I behaved so, in aloneness. She must have been right. Am trying to understand now. Perhaps it came to me as a survival method in my growing up. Perhaps I judged it the most efficient way to get through the day. Perhaps it made sense because I only really had a stab at knowing myself and could not guess, did not want to worry about, what was going on for others. And they need know nothing of me, the innerscape. Perhaps our culture teaches "stand alone...you're all you'll ever have...you are your own." Heck, my senior year high school picture, the opportunity for a graduating teen to have a voice in the noise, I chose the quote from Kahlil Gibran: "Alone and without his nest shall the eagle fly across the sun." Having flown across the sun alone, those words echo true, so very true. As if the words we choose have real power. Today, am alone. Or am I?

About a month ago, a female moved in with me. One late Saturday afternoon, the warm day cooling off, I was on my balcony reading my homework with my flowers and a cigar in that red chair you see to the right. I looked up and there she was, working away; her mission was what mattered, not minding me at all. The first voice to shout insistently at me was fear. The silhouette in the waning light appeared as a big butt black widow and the reactionary me wanted to kill that threat before it became a clear and present danger. What if I were reading, not paying attention, and she snuck up on me from above or below and bit me?!? Alone, I'd certainly be safer. But, tending towards the uncertain these days, the wondering voice in me asked. I took a deep breath to ponder, then looked more closely. Her industry, fast, elegant, intentional movement, attracted and gave pause to my male eye. She was building a web that reached from the transverse beam above the balcony down to the flower containers, a stretch of about 6 feet. And the pattern she created with her web as she danced and spun, descended and climbed: concentric, geometric, strong structural simplicity, a gossamer God's Eye, masterpiece of weaving that caused me to gaze in awe as if I were in the Prado, or Museum of Modern Art, or perhaps the Louvre (if ever I make it there). At the same time functional: deadly to the bugs she needed for life, her mission, and which, by the way, I didn't want flitting about me as I enjoyed my balcony. She was not a black widow but a beautiful light lime green with patterned amber spots. We formed a partnership, no words, just presence. 

In the morning before I raced away to school, when I watered my flowers, I was careful not to disturb her vertical threads which she would sometimes re-use. Once or twice I did not see the thread and accidentally ran into it. She must have forgiven me for she came back and recreated a new and amazing masterpiece, evening after evening. Web done, she would station herself patiently at center, master and participant in the weave. But life was not done. She would strike with lightning speed within milliseconds of bug contact, wrap her quarry caringly as if her life, and those she would bear, depended on her every move. Robinson Jeffers writes, "...I thought, painfully, but the whole mind,/ The destruction that brings a [spider] from heaven is better than mercy." (Author's note, "spider" inserted for "eagle" from the original, Fire on the Hills.)

But wait! There's more! The evening moving breeze inspired spider drama as the web gave surface to a three dimensional undulating invisible fluid, air, her holding to center, like a lone sailor in an invisible boat on a wide ocean with big waves. Relative to her size, she moved back and forth wildly in the wind. It looked like fun but then I projected she might feel fear, which made me admire her courage. Do spiders feel fear? Can they have courage? No matter, she inspired me to recite a prayer I learned after divorce that made sense after having been to sea, "God, please help me. My boat is so small and the ocean is so vast." I never knew her name. She no longer appears, as life would have it. Alone again, naturally. Or...?

Beth, Love of my life, went to Paris for September. She far away, I felt alone and ran smack dab into myself. Although in high school I had told myself not to feel jealousy with a woman because if she were to find another guy better for her, c'est la vie, and what I wanted was for her to be happy. (As an aside, I think now that was but one mechanism for me to cling to aloneness.) Back to Beth in Paris, long story short, I experienced pure genuine jealousy. Of course, Beth did not  necessarily give me cause to feel jealous (though we talked about how it  can be interpreted to see an American woman alone in Paris for a month). Voices inside my head yelled the jealousy thing. The collision came about in acknowledging myself as jealous, recognizing it as a human emotion, among the many we can feel and engage as we deal with life. I calmly discussed with those voices why I was feeling jealous. I actually admitted to Beth what I felt. My God, how vulnerable! How weak! How not alone! Does feeling and sharing emotions tie us together with others?

Also during September, during my alone time with Beth in Paris (though skype and FaceTime are a great antidote), I was driving back from school. All of a sudden I was overwhelmed by the beauty of the scene before me. Reality shifted. As I drove across the bridge over the mighty Missouri River, two spacious fields on either side opened for a kilometer or so on either side, leading to forests with a variety of trees that showed flaming fall colors: gold waving grass with crimson, green, yellow, light brown, and light green patches below, pixelated leaves above, many still a rich green, some a lighter green in the trees of rust, red, maroon, oranging, even pinks, bright yellow, dull yellow, brown tree trunks reaching from the ground upward and off in the distance the hills lifted all these patterns into rolling multicolored texture under a bright shining crystalline blue sky in golden sunlight. And I felt as if I were in the middle of a masterpiece painting, absolutely stunningly rapturous, alive motion, waving smoothly together in the wind. Some voice inside my heart told me that I was an integral part, that my traveling through belonged in this very alive canvas at this very moment. I think the voice whispered so I could hear that I was vital to that scene, the beauty around me. Some kind of waking up, I yielded to the truth I was experiencing and my heart filled with something that felt like...no, wait, it was: gratitude. Who's there then? Who knows but next time I am want to feel sad sorry for self, will slip thru it quickly to get outside, take a walk in the woods or in the park or in the mountains or around the block, become a grateful part of the scene in which I happen to be. A prayer from Thomas Merton comes to mind, the end of which asserts, "...Therefore will I trust you always, though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear for you are ever with me and you will never leave me to face my perils alone."

Beth sent me a song when I was in Kandahar, at the nadir of being alone in recent life.  The refrain of the song: "You're not alone." Over and over again, the Buddhist woman's voice sings in the kirtan, devotional chant, "You're not alone, you're not alone, you're not..." The message did not penetrate my tupid head, first reaction, "How strange. Perhaps that woman is a weirdo." (The singer, not Beth.)

Have spent a lot of my life emphasizing aloneness, exercising the illusion of being separate. From others. From surroundings. From true beauty. To say good bye for now to you this time, my heart turns to the greeting Beth taught me, which these Buddhists from time to time say at the usually no-talking monastery she visits in California. Looking to you in my mind's eye, my hands come together at my heart and I bow, "Gassho," which means, "Your heart and my heart are one." I take it to mean our hearts "are one in the One." Or as Red Green says in his Canadian matter of fact, humorous way, "We're all in this together." Peace and Love in the One, 

Tim

Afghanistan v. British Virgin Islands

Flying eastward a few thousand feet above the open ocean on a small two propellered plane from Puerto Rico to Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands, I sat in the copilot seat and spoke with the pilot, as I am want to do. Much to my surprise and counter to the prejudice I too easily form against pilots, he showed a depth of intelligence and life experience that opened my mind to being back in the United States compared to the penultimate five months in Kabul. First, the pilot, Jeff, explained to my inquiring mind why small puffs of clouds at about 1000 feet above the ocean often appear as lines, arrayed on invisible strings stretched straight to the northwest, a maritime abacus of variety sized white beads on deep blue. He also told me how he ended up in Puerto Rico as Chief Pilot for Fly BVI. Suffice it to say he went with the flow of his life, a delight to talk with him about his family, flying, sailing, and atmospherics of this particular place on Earth.

Another recent delight, my son Brennan provided the opportunity and suggestion to reread Herman Hesse's Siddhartha. Watching Siddhartha's spiral flow severing from father and mother, through youthful asceticism to discovering one's own path away from, at the same time toward, the Buddha, to a hedonistic wine-filled, profit-obsessed, business based existence to the requirement for a type of death to have new life in which Siddhartha discovers he has a son, new dimensions to love, new reasons to live simply, and new ways to cherish friends caused me to reflect on the message of Christ and God's deep, abiding, mysterious love that so often I have missed or renounced. Siddhartha also helped me understand better the title of a book and poem by Robert Bly, an American poet, What Have I Ever Lost by Dying? I think what I am trying to share with you is that letting go with dignity has become an important part of my life lately.

In my very humble opinion, it is time for the US to let go of Afghanistan with dignity. Or it is time for the characteristics of the presence we have in Afghanistan to change dramatically. As you well know, I have an astounding grasp on the obvious so please let me predict we will reduce our military relationship significantly and continue our economic development relationship to the degree that makes relative sense to us. Of course, opinion makers and mongers all have their view of what's wrong and right and in our political hype over the next few months we are sure to hear about a manichean world; God bless their views and voices and the tension of arguments that holds us together as Americans. I will not say we failed in Afghanistan. I will not say we succeeded, either. I will say that Afghanistan has changed and will continue to change. Enough Afghans understand enough about the US and the West that it is unlikely we will be attacked from there for the next 15-20 years. Of course, I could be wrong. We may not be able to see enough desired results of US power exercised in Afghanistan; outcome is uncertain. Get used to it.

Let me say something more about US power: super though it may be, limitless it is not. Each dollar we have spent and each life valiantly provided to the Afghan people sent a message to them that we as a people group care about them, about how we will fight and spend for their right to not be bullied. At the same time, though, the cost takes away from what that value or that life might have done elsewhere. What will be America's return on investment? Let me suggest respectfully that we won't have a reasonable understanding of that for another 10 or maybe 15 years. Security will move into Afghan hands, where it belongs, for only they have the capacity to secure what they value. Their equation for value differs significantly from ours which is why we use such frustrating words as "corruption," "freedom," and the concept of women's rights. We do not have the power to make them see the world as we do. Nor do we want that power. That power belongs to a world I want no part of: tyrannical, despotic, a kind of command and control environment that takes oxygen from the human spirit and puts a boot on the throat of innovation all in the name of that very scary word, "Security." Viz Syria. 

So what can we do? We, as Americans, can buy things so we own them and run them the way we do. That's what Jeff, the pilot, did. He bought the airline Fly BVI after owning a flight training business in Vermont and was able to institute American systems of maintenance, business sense, and customer service into the private airline industry in the Caribbean. Will it be profitable? Will it remain a going concern? Who knows. But he changed things from the way they were, apparently run shoddily with regard to safety, to the way things are now. Flying over the open ocean is a dangerous business. Am not saying that Americans need to go buying the world to secure it. Am saying that security comes from valuing and having the authority to run things accordingly. In Jeff's plane, I experienced security in a very small but important way. As I get older, am learning to live with how small I am, a drop in the ocean of this world. I can't change Afghanistan. All I can do is share a drink with you, hopefully soon. Thank you for your love, your prayers, your thoughts. Without you, my drop is dry. 

By the way, with the blessing, my drop will spend the next year, July thru June, in school at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas, trying to figure out more of what that word "Security" means. Anytime you are passing thru Kansas City, please drop me a line and let's get together to acknowledge "Water water everywhere and lots of drops to drink." Happy Father's Day. Peace, love, water, and light, T

Greatness, good, size, changing seasons

A few days ago, spent some time acknowledging the greatness that pervades this place, rugged and vast white mountains against a stark blue sky, sun setting in the west, smoking a cigar and just thinking. Was trying to understand current events here in Afghanistan. Protesters, agitated by what appears to us an unintentional burning of holy Qurans, shout, among other things, "Allahua akhbar!!!," and continue to express themselves with regard to what they believe is a direct assault on God. "Allahu akhbar!!! means, "God is great!!!" Some Afghans (and Pakistanis and Iranians, who for some reason are in Afghanistan)  are using violence and destruction as voice. Over forty people, six Americans, have been killed, many injured. Fast apologies from U. S. officials did not mollify. Two U. S. military officers who are doing what I am doing, working in a ministry, were shot point blank in the back of the head allegedly in required retaliation for the Quran burning. I don't understand it, being from the West, where freedom to do what you will--believe it, live it, burn it-- with what some believe to be the Book of God makes us what we are. Destruction, accidental or even intentional, of symbols on paper in books would not evoke such a response, would not require killing anyone. Unable to apprehend the inscrutable, my mind diverted to the language of "Allahu akhbar," searching for equivalent use of those words in the West; perhaps comparing would offer insight. Southern Germans greet one another with, "Gruss Got," which mostly acknowledges, "Great God." It's what one says in Bavaria when you greet someone or walk into a place or a shop. We have the children's dinner prayer, "God is great, God is good..." Surrounded by these mountains, I see how these people see God is great. In the expansive deserts of Kuwait back in 1994 looking at the quiet night starlit sky I perceived the same thing: sheer greatness. No doubt, Allahu akhbar. But is God good? How would the families of those two officers answer that question at this point? How would families of the Afghan casualties answer? Would they even ask the question?

Have always been a small sized person. At least that is how I grew up. In elementary school, when my sister wanted to provoke me, she would call me, "Small." And I would roll in with violence to "defend myself," as if she needed to learn that she were wrong and should be punished; that I could make her think what I wanted her to think with beatings! (Please forgive me, dear Judy.) Friends in high school, as our culture unwittingly promotes, tried to thicken my skin, prepare me for the onslaughts of the coming adult world, and would tease me about being small. I realize how much I wanted to be big, to be great, like the guys who were taller than me in the neighborhood, at school, on the football field. Size mattered as a kid. I took comfort in the story of King David, the small, ruddy lad who took down the giant Goliath and became king after Saul. To wit: Saul was chosen mostly because he was a head taller than anyone else and the people needed a king; tall people are popular from the gitgo. But what happened to Saul? Saul ends up a blithering idiot. Heck, what happened to David? Geez, one could look at those stories and legitimately wonder, Is God good? David gets chased across the countryside by Saul, the very king he served so loyally. Kingly though David was, with an eye for attractive women, he commits and is convicted of adultery, one of his sons dies as a child, and another son, Absalom, as a young man leads an insurrection against him! Talk about heartbreak: David, favored and chosen by the One True God in the holy book of the West, had his share.

Back to size from heartbreak. What is going on here in Afghanistan is so much bigger than what one person can change. Oh, I should have liked to imagine that I could be so big or great as to walk out the embassy gates, join the crowd with clenched fist, riled jaw, protest the burnings with fiery compassion, and shout, "Allahu akhbar!!!" from the bottom of my soul until a leader of the crowd noticed my white man zeal and then invited me to address the crowd. And I would find the words through a translator and a bullhorn that would promote peace and reconciliation not only between the West and Afghanistan but among the people themselves. And they would all go home to their families and the next day wake up and go to their jobs to build a country from the mud up into the beautiful place that Afghanistan could be. I did not imagine it, was not smoking hallucinogens. Perhaps it was the cigar and the setting sun and the sharpening cold but the mountains sent the very clear message to me about my size; I accepted my relative size in this situation and am even obeying the embassy rule of not going outside the compound for the past two weeks. Small truth is: no one person in this world has the power to affect this situation. Even our ambassador, Ryan Crocker, who did great things in Iraq, and by the way is a small man (I'm taller than he is!), could not do what I just outlined above. Larger truth: no one nation can change this place. Even larger truth: even our coalition of nations may not change Afghanistan to the degree that we in the West will be able to appreciate. Could be very heartbreaking for all the lives we have lost and treasure we have spent. 

In a separate but related event, am reading Gone with the Wind, an especially appropriate book for this place for the art in the book expresses an idyllic world changed through war and time. Reading the book makes me think that culture, along with all of its required ingredients--common language, foods, ethics, etc.-- also includes common and accepted distortions of reality that people mutually support to keep what they got, whether its things or belief systems. That is, truth becomes secondary to stories they tell themselves. A specific example from the old South: chattel slavery is a fine way to live for the slaves. A specific example from here and now from the Ulema council in Afghanistan, endorsed by President Karzai: "women are secondary." Time marches on, seasons change, and I see Afghanistan in a civil war with those of us in our world. Inexorable conflict as people meet people, old ways give way, and ambient temperatures change. What will happen here? Again, an open question. But to ask offers hope.

For the first day since the killings, I go back to the Ministry of Finance tomorrow. To what true and lasting effect, I do not know. All I know is I work alongside Afghan counterparts; they have affected me with their humanness, their work for change, their sense of humor, their hope for the future, their goodness. Is God good? I know where I come down on that question, whatever happens. But the question bears authentic asking. I request your prayers again, now more than ever, for the final stretch. Love, Tim

Here is a picture of Tammy, my coworker, just before we got into a car and headed toward the Ministry of Finance. 

Snow, boundaries, and that curious beast, the American

Snow today again in Kabul. Absolutely beautiful, big, floating flakes quiet the air and cover the ground. My mind remembers Brennan's first remark about snow as we looked out our small apartment second floor window in 1992 Medford, Mass: "White covers the whole world, Daddy." So it did, that 4 year old's world. And so it does here now, this 50 year old man's world. The white accumulates on everything able to collect flakes and turns this warzone into a menagerie, magical city, hushed. The menacing concertina wire that spirals atop gray slabs of tall concrete catches flakes and becomes a softened horizontal helix; the sharp barbs disappear in whiteness and reach into the distance in fascinating shapes, stitching together with white thread walls between embassies, ministries, houses. Indeed, one beautiful facet of snow: eliminates the lines we draw between ourselves, between grass, concrete, dirt, rocks, between property. Looking down, all white, grace covers all. People here respond to the snow falling. The playfulness of Afghans emerges and spontaneous snowball fights erupt; great snow for snowballs, light, dry but packable. Snow brings about authentic community compassion. Bundled and roving security guards carrying AK-47 or SAW automatic weapons smile in the mysterious warmth that surrounds soft falling snow; even these guards seem to realize, whether you are Afghan, American, Tibetan, Indian, Canadian, Brit, French, Italian, Macedonian, Spanish, we are all in this together. 

Which we are. Except news reports assert this as the coldest winter in Kabul in 15 years. Those same news reports present tragedy and isolation. Apparently, twenty two children in internally displaced refugee camps throughout Kabul have died as a result of the cold. And the media is fast to point out how absurd it is for us to be spending billions of dollars over the past years but here in the Kabul, right under our noses, vulnerable children are freezing to death! Of course, as soon as some Western readers became aware, they responded, which is our way. Blankets and food and firewood were quickly delivered by Western aid; response to what we are aware of. (There is so much, though, here that we are not aware of.) John Donne writes, "Do not ask for whom the bell tolls..." One of Donne's points was that when one person dies, the whole corporate body of the community loses. Another point of that fantastic Meditation XVII was that the bell tolling, the death of one person, evokes mindfulness of one's own mortality. And a sober person begins to experience the vastness of uncertainty that surrounds, how much could go wrong, the ocean of threats that swim about our ordered island lives; and in John Donne's world, a sober person would turn to God, our only security. Parents, even in our Western lives, quickly learn how fragile health is when their child gets sick for the first time and runs a fever of 102, climbing; my God, I felt so powerless when that happened to Brennan! Some parents learn the practicality of praying, with all the things that threaten kids these days; prayer is often all we can do. I imagine the parents of those children were praying. The snow and compassion grieves me for those parents.

Something an American said in the newspapers about the death of those children struck me as indicative. A mother and obstetrician from Cambridge, MA wrote the NY Times: "when you described the children dying of cold, it drove me crazy...I have fantasies when I'm on the treadmill of flying large passenger aircraft to those places and loading up all the moms and dads and children and flying them back to live in Florida or California." Now, am a student of language and these words here shine a light of insight about the American approach to Afghanistan. First, the heartbreak. The urge to take action. The imagination snatching for solutions. All of those good intentions are there. So is the naivete, the misunderstanding of this place, that this world differs from hers so very much as she ambles on a treadmill indoors. And let me suggest there is selfishness in that as well. If I listen to the words one way, the woman seems to want the suffering of these people to stop more for herself than she wants to understand their situation to genuinely help them. Taking Afghans, (especially Pashtun, which these people are, from Helmand) moms and dads and children and flying them to Florida or California would be the worst act for it would rip them out of their social fabric here, their community, their group and plunk them down in the middle of... fish outta water doesn't begin to describe the mouth agape, or the myorcardial infarction, these people would have if they landed on Venice Beach or South Beach. So, God bless that doctor for her big heart and her clear articulation that points to how little our Western world understands this Eastern world. Kipling wrote, "East is east. And West is west. And never the twain shall meet." We have met. We're still trying to figure it out. Let me get back to you in a few years.

Like Colorado, the sun will come out tomorrow morning. Morning, shining sun will light the clear cobalt sky and blinding whiteness all around, no boundaries for a while, just white. And the snow will crunch under my feet as I walk to the motor pool, breath puffing condensed moisture punctuating my step, smile at the Gurka guard, "Nah mah STAY," (I salute the light that emanates from within you.) And he will smile back and say, "Nah mah STAY, sir." And I will push open the door to the Motor Pool Dispatch Office and say, "Salaam alaykum, Sobik khay air." (Peace be upon you, good morning.) And the dispatcher will kindly greet me and recognize me as the guy who goes to the Ministry of Finance and then yell loudly for my driver, "Kakoo!!!" or "Suleiman!!!" or "Naseeb!!!" And we will get in the up armored Toyota SUV and drive through the streets of coming-to-life-through-the-white Kabul. A giant shark fin mountain swims to the southeast of this city, its menace softened in smooth white against a beautiful blue sky. And I will climb the cold marble stairs up three floors to take my place in the workaday world here. Much like any other gubment job in any other place. Except it's Kabul.

Love to you, T

Weapon of Choice

(Please know, up front, the pictures have nothing to do with the writing.) 

Sporadic pop pop pop gunshots erupted on the street on my last full day at Kabul embassy. Gunfire continued, enough to get up from my nap (!). Looked out the third floor window of my room. Scurrying security guards moved about pointedly. 

One guard took a prone firing position, on the deck, aiming outward from the wall that encloses the embassy compound towards a place where Afghan kids usually play in the street. The gunfire sounds came from that direction. Sametime, sirens began wailing and, here at the embassy not a woman's but a man's recorded voice stiltingly broadcast over a loudspeaker, "Duck. And. Cover. Duck. And. Cover. Stay. Away. From the. Windows. And seek. Shelter." That message continued to play over and over for about twenty minutes, sirens wailing.

 

Americans have certain ways of reacting to seemingly dangerous situations. One way: humor. We have a place on the embassy where many overworked government servants congregate at the end of the day, after dinner, to enjoy each other's company and partake of libations. In a kind of psychologically twisted way, we named the bar, Duck and Cover. As that siren wailed and the voice told me to, "Duck. And. Cover," I couldn't help of any better way to pass the time than to hightail it to the Duck and Cover to have a beer whilst the Taliban hordes tried to breach the walls and come after us. Another example of American humor in the midst of a difficult situation: the crew of an American EP-3 was forced to hard land in China and held hostage about 11 years or so ago. Chinese guards were befuddled by the insurmountable attitude of the Americans. Often, unpredictably, the guys and gals in the crew would break out in the Eagles song, Hotel California, the one that goes, "You can check out any time you like. But you can never leave." How could those Americans sing when surrounded by guards, living in Chinese barracks, not knowing when or if they would ever get out or if they would be shot for "spying" on China? Must have something to do with hope. I like to think that in the middle of all that they hoped, i.e. they knew, their government was doing all it could and would continue to do all it could in its power, very considerable power, for every individual in that crew.

 

Back to the story. Turned out that Taliban hordes were not trying to breach the walls on this occasion. Word on the street: an Afghan on Afghan bungled kidnapping attempt or bank robbery. But that brings me to another way Americans react to situations with others or other nations: fear. We often come across as a fearful lot. Not knowing exactly what was going on outside those embassy walls, our "security" guys drew their guns and were ready to go, guns a blazin'. It was necessary in this case, to be sure. But people make mistakes, all the training in the world notwithstanding. Guys with guns are not exempt from this reality, especially fearful guys with guns. 

On the other hand, what comes across as fear to others could also be called, "attentiveness," which is not such a bad thing to have. Our world requires attentiveness. Indeed, this experiment in which we are all engaged, this attempt to exercise free government as a body politic, remains a fragile undertaking in history; must be protected. However, to the extent that we react at others from fear instead of who we are as a nation, motivated by the power of individual liberty and justice for all, we can make others edgy. Not a good thing where weapons, some capable of killing  whole cities of people in one fell swoop, abound. People with weapons can make mistakes.

My point seeks to agree somewhat with Brennan in his blog. In an "Us and Them" world, if we relate to others only in ways that dominate by armed force, or seem to over rely on force, we become a significant cause of our own insecurity. Others will resist. I surely would. I guess my point is: if our weapon of choice in relating with others in the world seems to be through weapons, then our nation will be short lived on the world stage. Live by the sword, die by the sword. Is that in the Bible?

Don't know. But what is in the Bible is the human strain to beat "swords into ploughshares," meaning enough with the weapons, let's get on with doing productive things that bring food to the table, both to our own tables and to those with whom we share this crowded and growing smaller place, Earth. If guns dominate relations, no one is growing the food or making tables or chairs or eating utensils or financing the people who do. What makes these United States the great nation it is, in my humble opinion (imho), are ideas assembled and arranged in such a way in our Constitution that men and women are incentivized to discover who they are as individuals and apply that in freedom to serving others in community, receiving value for service, be it farming or banking or construction or waiting tables, and sharing value with others who serve because none of us will ever have all we need alone. It is a great system, a balance not struck quite so well by any other nation in the world, again, imho. If I understand Brennan's thrust: self reflection, idea sharing, dialogue, commerce, and honest true-to-self-and-others negotiations will make the global neighborhood much better than weapon pointing.

 

I began this post thinking I would move to Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) and their relevance to what is going on in Afghanistan. However, I shall let it rest; will get to that on my next post.

 

Am returned to the U. S.; amongst you I dwell. Thank you for your prayers while I was over there. Prayers work miracles, no doubt, and this strange mix of dust and water inside my flesh will look to smile with each of you again. Airborne, enroute to Colorado, am struck by the beauty of this verdant land of ours. God shed His grace on thee. Please know you are blessed just to be living in these United States. If you are prone to gratefulness, let me suggest your life here is one thing for which to be grateful. I am. I do not love my country more than I love my God. However, I love my country because it gives me the space to love my God, who calls me to love you, which I do, deeply, of my own accord, which is how I believe my God would want it. Peace, Tim

p.s. These pictures are a tribute to two groups of people. One, the beautiful people in Afghanistan, for whom you are devoting considerable resources and sending your fellow countrymen and women; some give their lives most immediately on the Afghan behalf, the most unselfish act. Two: to you, the group of people who offer your bounty and lives so the Afghans may have life, freedom to choose, as well. Who knows if what you offer will be enough? But you offer it anyway, another unselfish act.

 Have recently come back into touch with a long ago friend who has encouraged me to love myself. Now, those of you who know me might think that I have never had a problem with self love, heck sometimes all I have thought about is myself, selfish guy by nature that Tim Roorda. My friend, though, has encouraged me to love myself practically, i.e. make a practice of loving myself. My immediate response is, heck, since 14 or so, I have practiced loving myself...all too often! What my friend means, though, I have realized, appears alien to me. Among the ramifications, first: actually quit accusing myself of being a bad person; set down the negative adjectives; cease and desist the selfishness that beats me over the head with how inadequate I am or what I just did is. Let go the self obsessed judgment in how I relate with others; stop prefacing interaction with apologies. Second: become aware of how I do fit in, how I am contributing to the work around me, of the attributes I genuinely love about myself. My friend encouraged me to write a love letter to myself, read, record, and listen to it. How weird! So I did: a fascinating exercise, healing practice, highly recommend it. To love self anew, I had to realize the old way, the obsessed judgment that self castigates, injects guilt and/or shame, forces me to read self improvement books and induces me to buy what advertisements tell me to buy, did not achieve the desired effect: better self. To love myself anew, I have to apply myself to seeing the good, look inward for resolution, "don't just do something, sit there." Strangely, this corresponds with one of my focused prayers over the past few years:  "God, please turn my eyes away from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. God, please help open my eyes to the Tree of Life." In short, God, Who has everything to do with the Tree of Life, encourages self love, has given Self through the Christ, has always been encouraging me that way: am a beloved child of The Author. Could that be one of Christ's most profound messages: peace on earth good will to men (and women), forgive not only others but self, love yourself because the Great, Good, Living, Loving God loves you? When you genuinely love self, loving others comes naturally? Saw an evocative quote recently with my friend from the beginning of this paragraph: "Bad news is: there is no key to the universe. Good news: universe was never locked." - Beyondnanda

So, am better because of my long ago friend. And being better contributes to wanting to be better in mind, in heart,  in body. Looking inward with my mind at my body, I realized I lack core strength. Not just a little but a lot; anatomically articulated, very 

underdeveloped psoas, transverse abdominal and related core muscles. Sure, have done yoga for years. Been an athlete all my life. Took pride in physical fitness and working out. But since I was a kid, I have used strength in all-around muscles to make it look like I was performing a particular motion, like walking or climbing stairs, or striking a pose, e.g. "tree" in yoga. Took four years but yoga 

and my friend have exposed me as a fake. Absent the value judgment and self flagellation (see paragraph one), I can get on with doing things correctly. Estimate it will take about three years to aright. But engaging my core as I sit, as I walk, and doing specific exercises that isolate and encourage the underdeveloped muscles makes everyday actions easier. Dear God, has everyone else known this all their lives? All my life, been working my butt off (literally because I used a lot of butt muscles to compensate...probably used my butt muscles to smile...have been a buttface then, no? Forgive me, please, for being a buttface and for digressing) for sitting, walking, among other activities.  Breathing, especially, has gotten easier. And for a guy who had asthma as a child, like that it could kill me, breathing better brings new life.

Almost fifty, learning how to breathe. So much to learn. A kid again. What pain in the butt! What fun! What next, Papa?

Returning to the U.S. next Saturday. Intend to share with you in next post impressions of this place, another planet,  from this time, some nine months past since I landed in southern Afghanistan. Have interspersed pictures of self and this place over these past nine months to hint at the next post, should be soon. Maybe even next week. Happy Father's Day. Love you all dearly, Tim