Jacob Bembry's Blog, page 5
August 13, 2014
Back Up to Speed
I am hoping that I have this website back up to speed. I have been working on it for a good part of the day. Sorry for any inconvenience that the slow load times have caused.
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August 12, 2014
The Great Illusion
Falling from buildings which scrape the sky
Downward I go, realizing I can’t fly,
In the jungle with the lion and the snake,
Afraid is a feeling that I cannot escape.
In the night, a whispering ghost torments my soul,
And the blackness of the night seems a black hole,
But somewhere in the clatter of all the confusion,
I awaken to the fact that fear is only an illusion.
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August 11, 2014
Requiem for Robin: In Memory of Mork
I was introduced to Robin Williams in the late 1970s when he made an appearance on the tv series, Happy Days, playing Mork from Ork. The episode, which featured him doing battle with the Fonz, served as the pilot for the TV show, Mork and Mindy, starring Williams and Pam Dawber.
Williams served up delicious dishes of juvenile humor, which were just right for my teenage tastes at the time. Later, however, I noticed his routines hedged on being more vulgar and blasphemous than funny, as Williams reportedly battled drug and alcohol addiction at the time. The comic and his comedy, which had been so funny before, began to leave a sour taste in my mouth and I could no longer laugh. However, they would change years later, which several movies Williams starred in showed his dramatic chops and others filled my heart with laughter.
The dramatic turns included The Dead Poets’ Society and the strange One Hour Photo. Comedy turns included Mrs. Doubtfire, Jumanji and Old Dogs. I was a fan again.
The life of Robin Williams, which caused so much laughter ended with a sad note earlier today, August 11, 2014, as he took his own life. They say that he battled severe depression. They said that he was an atheist. I hope somehow, before his life waned away, he found Jesus Christ and accepted him as his Savior, like the thief on the Cross did.
The movies and TV appearances of Robin Williams will live on even though he has gone. May we all see the talent that he possessed and enjoy humor from his films and some of those TV appearances. Let us always remember Mork from Ork, the teacher in The Dead Poets’ Society, Mrs. Doubtfire and the man who wore the tattoo “Fremont” in Old Dogs.
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Food Stamps
I couldn’t tell how old he was. Probably late fifties. Could have even been in his forties. Who knows? He could have been in his thirties.
The evidence of guilt was on his face. Cigarettes and alcohol and maybe even drugs had cut a path of deep creases into his forehead and his face. He sat on the sidewalk in front of Wal-Mart. One of his friends sat next to him. It was a pack of some generic brand of cigarettes but even they probably cost three or four dollars a pack. I came out of Wal-Mart with a buggy full of groceries and he asked me a stupid question.
“Would you like to buy some food stamps?”
I just walked past him. He asked people walking into the store if they wanted to buy food stamps.
I wondered if the man had children at home that were hungry. He could use the food stamps to buy them food. Instead, the man probably had a monkey on his back that he could not shake off.
I knew what he could possibly do with the cash if he had it. The beer companies, the cigarette companies and the Florida Lotto could all make money. Children could go hungry.
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August 10, 2014
Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down
Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down. The song, and its lonesome lyrics, seemed to be the theme song of my Sunday mornings, when I sat at home or worked each Sunday and didn’t go to church.
Each Sunday seemed to be boring to me with no life in them. For a couple of years, I worked as a disk jockey on WMFL Radio in Monticello, Florida, playing gospel music, Billy Graham’s Hour of Decision broadcast and a 15-minute broadcast by a local African American minister named Willie Cuyler. My workday would close with a show called Country Crossroads, hosted by longtime country music DJ Bill Mack and comedian Jerry Clower, as they shared the Word of God through the music and musicians of Nashville. I would close out the shift by playing country gospel songs, sang by country singers. My sign-off song for Sunday was a song, written by Rusty Goodman, called “(Home) Where I Belong.” The version was sang by B.J. Thomas, who was most famous for his songs, “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head” and “Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song.”
Later, as my life would go on, and I would grow apart from the church more and more, I found myself just sitting at home on a Sunday morning, watching televangelists like Jimmy Swaggart, Oral Roberts and Rex Humbard and just feeling like the lyrics that Kris Kristofferson wrote and Johnny Cash sang on “Sunday Morning Coming Down.” Still later, work consumed my Sunday mornings while the song still haunted and taunted me. Then even later, it was back to staying at home each Sunday morning, watching television and TV evangelists, such as Charles Stanley, while the same lonesome lyrics went across my mind.
In 1994, however, as my mother began to grow ill and put up a fight with her diabetes that would last until she went to be with Jesus in the early months of 1999, I began attending church again. I rededicated my commitment to Christ. I had a relationship with Christ before but something had been missing and I discovered that it had been attending church. In those 20 years, since I have returned to church, I have hardly missed a Sunday. The loneliness of the lyrics to “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down” evade me. This morning, I woke up to the song playing its frets inside my head and I was reminded of the loneliness. Later, I saw a post of Facebook where a friend had posted that he was listening to the song. I thought, “Weird” because I had awakened to the song. Songs being songs and lyrics being lyrics, they affect each person differently and I am sure that my friend was not assaulted with the same loneliness that the song once gave me.
I will head to church today and not worry about the loneliness of a Sunday gnawing at my nerves because I know that this, like all days, is a day that the Lord has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it. (Psalm 118:24)
Below (courtesy of http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/johnny...) are the lyrics to the “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down” :
“Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down”
Well I woke up Sunday morning
With no way to hold my head, that didn’t hurt
And the beer I had for breakfast wasn’t bad,
So I had one more for dessert.
Then I fumbled in my closet through my clothes
And found my cleanest dirty shirt.
Then I washed my face and combed my hair
And stumbled down the stairs to meet the day.I’d smoked my mind the night before
With cigarettes and the songs I’d been pickin’
But I lit my first and watched a small kid
Playin’ with a can that he was kicking
Then I walked across the street
And caught the Sunday smell of someone’s fryin’ chicken
And it took me back to somethin’
That I’d lost somewhere, somehow along the way.
On a Sunday morning sidewalk
I’m wishing Lord that I was stoned
‘Cause there’s something in a Sunday
That makes a body feel alone.
And there’s nothin’ short of dyin’
That’s half as lonesome as the sound
Of a sleepin’ city sidewalk
And Sunday mornin’ comin’ down.
In the park I saw a daddy
With a laughin’ little girl who he was swingin’
And I stopped beside a Sunday school
And listened to the songs they were singin’
Then I headed down the street
And somewhere far away a lonely bell was ringin’
And it echoed thru the canyon
Like the disappearing dreams of yesterday.
On a Sunday morning sidewalk
I’m wishing Lord that I was stoned
‘Cause there’s something in a Sunday
That makes a body feel alone.
And there’s nothin’ short of dyin’
That’s half as lonesome as the sound
Of a sleepin’ city sidewalk
And Sunday mornin’ comin’ down.
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