Dallin Malmgren's Blog, page 33

In Praise of Jubal (Music makes the world go round)

According to the Bible, Jubal was the inventor of musical instruments.

“After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.” –Aldous Huxley

When I decided to write about music, I asked Aunt Faith what kind of music under what circumstances has had an impact on her life. “None,” she replied. “I don’t listen to music.” I was amazed. We moved a collection of around 80 CD’s from her house. But it’s true. She hasn’t listened to a single song in eight months, unless it was coming through the TV. I guess that’s not uncommon for many people—I just don’t think I could live without music.

The only musical skill I possess is listening. I can’t even sing. Long ago I was singing robustly in church. The woman next to me giggled. When I looked at her, she blushed and turned away. My vocals have become quite muted.

However, I’m an excellent listener. As I age, music is taking pre-eminence over television as a pastime. My $16.23/month to Spotify is a drop in the bucket, and well-spent too. I love to sit out on my back porch in the summer, when the sun is setting and the temp is cooling and the air is freshening and the breeze is caressing and the music is playing. I’ve always felt that when Jesus said, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand,” he was implying that if we could just raise our awareness, we would recognize beauty and joy and glory right here, right now. Music draws us nearer to that recognition.

I suspect I am over-spiritualizing it. Music speaks to multitudinous individuals in infinite ways (thus all the ear pods). When I once asked a JV tennis player what he had done over the weekend, he told me he had lay on his bed and listened to “Glycerine” by Bush for 24 straight hours! He said it kind of rapturously. One of the stupidest things you can do is argue about music, like this artist is superior to that artist. It’s like Coke vs. Pepsi. I remember telling my friend Bill Wax that Bob Dylan was one of the greatest harmonica players of all-time. Bill rolled his eyes—he knew (and still does) a lot more about music than I ever will. Okay, I understand that when it comes to technical virtuosity and skill, he was right. But when it comes to Bob’s notes rolling through my soul in “I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight,” I was right. Musical taste is utterly subjective—do you think your spouse is better than mine?

As regards subjectivity, I do believe music can serve as an oracle. There are numerous times God has spoken to me through music. I will go a step further and suspect that it is one of His favorite avenues. We are crazy to think God relies on words. Music goes way deeper than just saying something we agree with. However, a word of caution: when I worked in the mental hospital, there was a young man (diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic) who told me the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Doors, Jimi Hendrix, all of rockdom, had identified him as the avatar of the New Age—he was to rise up and lead the revolution (spiritual and otherwise). One Saturday—when not much happens—I came to work with an armload of rock records, and he and I went into the music room. After listening to certain songs and listening to him for about four hours (probably not part of his treatment plan), I was 49% convinced that he was, in fact, the leader of the next revolution. Take heed.

I feel bad for Faith and everyone else who doesn’t allow music to play a role in their daily lives. My son-in-law Dylan is a brilliant musician. One of the coolest things is watching him enchant my granddaughters by picking up a guitar or banjo and plucking something magical out. I am left with a semi-consoling remark from Kurt Vonnegut: “Virtually every writer I know would rather be a musician.”

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The Other

Hark the herald…

So you are here. You know that you cannot have created yourself, but you are aware of a self. Your mom and dad? That’s just biology—they had no hand in designing you. They were busy enjoying other things. You and The Other—that which created you. This is an immediate and an eternal relationship. If you deny It, It will never deny you, so you will just be walking around with blinders on. It is elemental—a connection without which you cannot grow in the spiritual sense. So many of us have made tacit agreements with It: yeah, I know you’re there – I realize it’s meaningful – there’s so much going on – let’s keep in touch.

But, silly creature, your whims are puffs of smoke in the winds of the Spirit. The triumphant march is inexorable. It is just a matter if you choose to join it.

So let’s define this relationship a little bit. A conscious creation and a conscious creator. It’s not far-fetched to suspect that the ideal situation would be for the two to be in amiable contact with one another on a regular basis. A relationship. If you believe the literature, there is a guarantee that The Other is with you always, for all eternity, and that It will love you. No matter what. Pretty attractive. And you can always be yourself, because you can never not be yourself with It. Where you go, It goes.

The most obvious question is: If the relationship is there, do you want it? First of all, it astounds me that it’s a choice. I’ve created a few things, but all the characters in every book I wrote had to do what I told them to do. But in our relationship it’s certainly a choice…I know thousands of people who feel connected to The Other in thousands of different ways, and thousands who don’t feel connected at all, and thousands in between. Every single one of us is different, but The Other is not different to any single one of us. The same yesterday and today and forever.

So let’s suppose you’ve been won over (a miracle). You acknowledge an Other and you want to be connected. (This is the most natural course to take in the history of life). How do you say yes? How do you actually connect?

This is the trickiest part of the whole equation…and the most subtle and the most beautiful—you have to believe. Oh my goodness. The connection is faith. We’ve tried sacrifices and promises and resolutions and vows and negotiations and equivocations and even prevarications. To no avail. The bridge is faith. “Abraham believed Him, and He counted it as righteousness.” What a strange little covenant—and yet it makes perfect sense. The foundation of any long-term relationship is trust. And forgiveness. The terms of the contract.

Now we have to examine this faith thing. “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Whoa. Sounds like a carnival barker to me. But so it is. This is The Other’s wedding vow to you: believe…that is what I ask of you…that is what I need from you. And I (Dallin) understand it seems an outrageous demand—except that The Other does not demand. It pleads, It entices, It implores, It flirts, It reaches in every possible way and says: believe in me.

Is that fair? None of us who opens our eyes can help but see the evil in this world—yet The Other says believe. That is the solution. Of course, this obliterates the ego. Whatever you wanted to do personally to alleviate the suffering in the world (or not)—it is fruitless. Believe. You don’t have the solutions—The Other does. Believe. Wow, pretty deflating.

The next tricky part: you can sit there and believe and not do anything for eons. No, you can’t. James said, “Faith without works is dead.” I’ve spent a good deal of my life trying to come up with the works to prove my faith isn’t dead. Foolish Galatian. Ramp up the faith and it is impossible for the works not to come.

This is what I’ve come to know: The Other made me, and It loves Its creation. The first purpose in creating me was to be with me. How sad that so many refuse that invitation, for it is always an invitation. We never have to be alone. As we draw near to The Other, there are only two possible responses: love and adoration.

So here you are. You and The Other. Say hello. Believe.

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Dreams (…are only in your head…)

I used to tell my students that dreams were one of the greatest gifts we received—free life. I’d tell them that I knew exactly how it felt to be shot because one time I had—in a dream. I had experienced, close up, in an open field, the power of a hurricane. (If I was on my game, I’d play-act one of them in front of the class). Some students would tell us about their dreams, and I’d smile sympathetically at the ones who said they didn’t dream.

That was a cavalier attitude. I’ve come to realize that dreams have a whole lot they would like to teach us. Most of my dreams are not like the above adventures—few of them are. Most of them are familiar—people I’ve known, places I’ve been, situations re-imagined. I don’t come off very well in my dreams. I’m frequently stressed, seldom in control, and usually pessimistic about what is going on. But not always. I loooove those dreams where you wake up and you want to go right back to sleep and rejoin the movie.

Sometimes those are boy-girl dreams. It is fun to find yourself with a girl in a dream—and you like being with her and she likes being with you. Mine can go two ways? I will realize (in my dream) that I am married, and be hugely disappointed and realize I have to get out of there—or the dream is pre-marriage and things progress until I wake up. I don’t dream of my wife romantically that often (not as much as I used to); when we appear together we are usually in some semi-apocalyptic setting or at a family reunion or something like that. Rarely, I will dream of her with someone else—that is very unsettling.

I smoked cigarettes from the time I was 16 to 32. Since then I have only smoked one cigarette. But I have smoked hundreds in my dreams. I woke up with the cold fear that I had started smoking again.

Do you have nightmares? Those are the worst. I will wake up and not want to go back to sleep. Sometimes I will snuggle up next to Karen, even though she is sound asleep with zero interest in physical contact. Often I will pray. On bad nights I cannot go back to sleep even then.

A strange phenomenon occurred just after I retired. I started having school anxiety dreams—like four or five times a week! It was very disturbing. My career was an area of satisfaction for me. I enjoyed what I did and felt good about doing it. So why those horrors? During my career I think it was easy for me, as it is for most teachers, to bury the stress and plow forward. That’s the ticket to survival. Buried but not dead; just dormant. My theory sags when I realize I have a lot of retired teacher friends who are not tormented by these dreams. (To any teacher friends reading this, I’d love to hear your theory.)

Another distressing element is that the Lord has almost zero presence in my dreams. I feel certain that I will call upon Him as any distressing circumstance arises in my waking life. Why should it be any different in my dreams? True, my chronology is always shape-shifting. I am frequently living in an age before I became a christian. But even my elder self ignores Jesus.

I believe that dreams are factories of experience and repentance, fueled by memory and hidden feelings. I receive insight into the person I was or would like to be in a given situation. That is experience. I too often awoke relieved that it was just a dream. That is repentance. The product the factories are trying to produce is self-acceptance.

Six years on, I’m still have school anxiety dreams, but more sporadically. I look forward to dreaming, and I try to write something down when I wake up. If I don’t do it then, it is gone. (Most of the time, it is gone.) My wife and I sometimes share our dreams, but often we don’t. I suppose it is better that way. I always liked what Bob Dylan said through his apocalyptic psychiatrist in “Talking World War III Blues”: “I wouldn’t worry about it—those dreams are only in your head.”

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Part II: Phrases and thoughts…(from God)

This might seem like just a continuation of my last post, but really it’s not. Those last ones (Phrases and thoughts that opened up my mind) I would call accidental—I was living my life and these ideas jumped out at me and stuck. This next set I would call interventional—at the risk of grandiosity, God was trying to tell me something. Some are profound, some whimsical, some sobering. Not surprisingly, many are from the Bible. All of them are meant to teach me. Am I listening?

• “In Him we live and move and have our being.” (Acts 17:28) Truly mind-blowing. Paul was talking to Athenians, so he clearly didn’t mean just christians. I tended to think of it as me down here and Him up there, and me hoping to do stuff that might please Him, but realizing I most often fell short. I can act against Him, but I can never act apart from Him, because He is always here.

• “All is vanity and striving after wind.” (Ecclesiastes 1:14) A definition of living in this world without a spiritual center.

• “I gaze into the doorway of temptation’s angry flame/ And every time I pass that way I always hear my name/ Then onward in my journey I come to understand/ That every hair is numbered, like every grain of sand.” Bob Dylan in “Every Grain of Sand” on Shot of Love. This is so autobiographical (except I didn’t write it)—me drifting away, seeking after false idols, Him patiently pulling me back with His love.

• I Corinthians 13 – the love chapter. I know I was lost and I think I was stoned the first time I read it. Tears streamed down my face and I knew that was what I wanted.

• “…your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit…” ( I Corinthians 6:19) Okay, this one makes me squirm, whether I’m sitting in front of a plate of French fries or pouring a third glass of wine. But it is.

• “And when I run, I feel His pleasure.” From Eric Liddell the christian Olympian in Chariots of Fire. I have felt it when I hit a particularly good golf shot. I love Him being present in our daily lives. He experiences with us. It awes me that God can take pleasure in what I enjoy. I know there is a fine line that crosses over into selfish pleasure. Love is never selfish. That is our guideline.

• “The tongue is an unquenchable fire.” (James 3:6) Another squirmy one… It is easy to say unloving things, especially to the ones we love the most. And you can’t take them back—if you’re lucky, you can cover them up. I try to imprint this on my mind and shut up a lot.

• “Speak the truth in love.” (Ephesians 4:15) Ah, this is the hard one, the piece de resistance. One or the other, it’s possible; but both? This is the greatest balancing act between couples. One of you leans one way, one the other. The sides change all the time (though there are inclinations). See more of this at: “…the two shall become one…”

• “It is better to live alone in the desert than with a nagging woman.” (Proverbs 21:19) Haha! I must have used this one in the classroom a thousand times, especially on teenage girls who were fussing at me (and on some boys, too). I will never use it on my wife (again).

• “Lord, I believe; help me in my unbelief.” (Mark 9:24) Can you will faith? Kinda, but not on your own. You gotta have help.

• “…the two shall become one…” (Genesis 2:24) I finally get it. That is God’s plan for Karen and me. We can align ourselves with the plan, or stray from it, but the plan never changes. God is One. I want oneness.

• “Be still and know that I am God.” (Psalms 46:10) I use this one when I am putting. Be still is the best technical advice you can give, and the second part is emotionally liberating.

• “Even a fool appears to be wise if he remains silent.” (Proverbs 17:28) I think about this sometimes when I am writing…

• “He must increase and I must decrease.” (John 3:30) How breath-taking! That is the formula. This is not a command or an act of your will. This is a glorious promise.

• “Will I join the ocean blue, or run into a Savior true, and shake hands laughing? And walk through the night straight into the light, Holding the love I’ve known in my life, and no hard feelings.” The Avett Brothers, “No Hard Feelings” on True Sadness. My family knows that this is the song they play at my memorial. (I definitely want a memorial, not a funeral—they seem like so much more fun!) I love how he imagines face to Face. Sounds wonderful.

My son wants to know if all my posts are going to be so religious. On this one I probably got carried away. My son is very understanding.

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Phrases and thoughts that have opened up my mind

(Photo by Steve Slate)

Okay, I am sure you have your own list, but if mine gets you thinking about yours, that is a good thing. All that follows are illuminations, insights, existential hypotheses, moments of clarity, revelations that changed the way I looked at the world. I mean, stuff that stuck with me. Most of these are literary or musical voices, but I am certain your mind can be opened in innumerable ways.

• Timshal – from East of Eden, Steinbeck’s greatest novel. I can’t remember the context, but the message I got was clear: Thou mayest. God gave me free will—He invites me to exercise it. The morality comes from the inside, not the outside.

• “Wait and hope.” – from The Count of Monte Cristo, Edmund Dantes’ last words of advice to his beloved Mercedes and her husband. No matter what storms life unveils upon you, there is always a safe haven…wait and hope. I think I’ve shared that quote with hundreds of people—two word primer on how to deal with sorrow.

• “You don’t know what it’s like to be a man until you stand inside his shoes.” Atticus Finch to Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird, the most compassionate novel ever written, expressed in this one sentence.

• “He not busy being born is busy dying.” Bob Dylan, from “It’s alright, Ma, I’m only bleeding” on Bringing It All Back Home. You cannot stand still. If you are not moving forward, then you are floating backward. You have to choose to live. (This song may be the greatest anthem for being your own person that ever was.)

• “Que sera, sera” — This is a Doris Day song and in a Hitchcock movie, but I got it from my mom. “Whatever will be, will be.” We have to try and do good, we have to try to make the world better, but we have to always remember—we are not in control.

• “Gehennam deh.” — this was Tatar or Tartar or whatever my grandmother spoke. It meant “Go to hell.” She said it to me often, sardonically.

• This is a throwback to sixth or seventh grade: “Some people cower and wince and shrink, owing to fear of what people might think. There is one answer to worries like these—people can think whatever they please.” Piet Heins in Grooks II. It might have enabled me to survive my adolescence. Aw, I was probably as susceptible to peer pressure as anyone else, and there are probably a thousand incidents to illustrate it. But I knew…that who I was was not determined by what people thought of me. I used to run that little poem through my head many times when I needed it.

• “It is better to ask forgiveness than permission.” Source unknown. The anthem of my teaching career, although it scares the hell out of me now. I do believe that you have to take risks.

• “I have measured out my life in coffee spoons.” The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Elliot. Wonderful image—what I absolutely do not want to say about my life. Was it all about the routine? Is that what kept me going? I don’t think so, and I certainly hope not.

• “In vino veritas.” — (latin) good or bad, there is some truth to this.

• “You are what you eat.” The Beatles in Yellow Submarine. The dawn of my dietary consciousness.

• “Is it fun being you?” Okay, this is mine. I used to ask my tennis players this all the time. I feel, deep down, that it should be fun being you. I promise, most of the time, it is fun being me. If it is not fun being you, something is out of whack. Figure out what it is, and fix it.

• “God isn’t that generous.” My mother, again. She would say it sometimes consolingly, when our realities didn’t live up to our hopes. She would say it sometimes cynically, when our visions soared over her experiences. She was wrong. He is.

• “And in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make.” The Beatles, the end of Abbey Road. I think this song changed my life. I was in my late adolescence…I was wondering what I wanted to do with myself—career, etc. And they taught me that it wasn’t about money…it was about the impact you have on people in a positive way—which is love. And you didn’t have to worry about yourself, because it would automatically come back to you. I believed the Beatles and changed my direction, and they have never been proven wrong.

That’s it, that’s my list. (Well, I could come up with more.) This was a really fun post for me to write, because I have realized how these thoughts and phrases have influenced me throughout my life. I’ll bet you anything you have your own list. You ought to think about it.

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Discord (marital and otherwise)

Discord (marital and otherwise)

Sometimes it feels like a bear-trap snapping shut. You were just walking along, and the next thing you know it’s right in front of you. I’m not saying you can’t see it coming…you just choose not to. So when it hits you’re not ready. Which generally leads to more discord.

Of course, you is me. I’m trying to figure out this fearsome beast because I don’t like running into him. Can ruin a day—and my days are precious. Here’s how he appeared today (today being several months ago): Karen and Aunt Faith and I are discussing what to serve when we have five grand-daughters and my dear Bethany here for the weekend. Me: How about meatball subs on Jimmy John’s bread? Karen: No, we’re not having meatball subs. What are you thinking? Me (offended): If you think my suggestions are ridiculous, that hurts my feelings, and I’ll just stay out of the conversation. Aunt Faith: I thought it was ridiculous too. Me: Fine. That also hurts my feelings.” And I got up and started cleaning up the dishes, while they ate dessert (in silence). And discord roamed freely about our home.

A comment can spring the trap. It might be a weighted comment, it might be an innocuous comment, taken wrongly. There are two sides sending and receiving messages, and little margin for error in every transmission. That is why living in harmony is such a challenge.

I write this as the confession of a ridiculous man. My suggestion was stupid (meatball subs—can you imagine the mess, three of the five girls under the age of three?)! But my feelings are all about tone and nuance and perception. I would hate not to feel, but I should hate even more to have my behavior controlled by my feelings. The apostle Paul’s solution to being in a situation in which someone offends you: “…why not rather be wronged?” (1 Corinthians 6:7) Paul gets it. Absorb the pain rather than reflect it. There cannot be discord unless two people are at odds. Pride might call that abject surrender, but pride is a pretty unreliable ally when dealing with discord. I don’t mean give in, but rather don’t let your negative feelings take control of the situation. The other person may not respond similarly—that is rare. It does mean you will not make the situation worse. A start.

Discord is like the morning frost on the golf course. (They won’t let you play when there’s frost—it kils the grass.) You can’t will it away—you just have to let it melt. But like the sun and the breeze, you can help it along its way. A soft word, a kindness, a touch, an unsolicited gesture…the iciness of discord is nothing to the warmth of reconciliation.

As we get older, we should be able to avoid these pitfalls. We should be able to laugh instead of bristle, to roll our eyes instead of turn away. People talk about humility like it is something required in the midst of a throng of people adoring you. The greatest humility is learned in your most elemental relationships. Don’t leave the house to go find humility.

Good old Paul said, “Grace and mercy and peace be unto you…” He wasn’t hoping; he was announcing. Grace is the driving force—mercy and peace are the by-products. The cure for discord is grace. We should be willing to give what we receive so freely.

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The Log

Okay, I told this story a hundred times in my classroom: At my old high school in Upper Darby, PA there was a revered couple, Johnny Scott and Sally Drake. Johnny was the star quarterback and Sally was the head cheerleader somewhere back in the 1950’s. They went to Silver Lake to make out, and somehow their car rolled into the lake and they both drowned. Fast forward to me in 1966, on a date with a hot girl. I asked her if she knew the legend of Silver Lake—she was interested. The legend was that if you parked your car backwards on the boat ramp on certain nights, you could see the lights of their car moving through the lake. Did she want to try it? She did. (I usually got a little hammy about my make-out skills at this point.) The car rolled backwards. The brakes didn’t work. We freaked out. Just as we were sliding into the lake, a log wedged itself in between the car wheels and our watery doom. On the log was carved a heart with the initials “JS” and “SD” in it. It was their lake.

I cannot even begin to describe how effective this story was in my classes, especially Creative Writing. The kids hung on every word. (I have to admit, I told it pretty well.) I used to give a quiz afterwards—stupid questions, like “What song was playing on the radio as we rolled backwards into the lake?” Everybody aced it. My students would approach my children in the hallways: was it true? (Beth would back me up, the boys, not so much). Toward the end of my career, my students would google Silver Lake and Johnny Scott and Sally Drake. I explained that it was a long time ago.

Clemens finally gave me an Advanced Creative Writing class, whose sole purpose was to be filmmaking, and the first film my students wanted to make was the story of Silver Lake. What a time it was! My students were totally into it, and I’m not sure I’ve ever had my creative juices flowing like that. I probably never came so close to getting fired, and yet it was one of the most fulfilling times in my career. And, I gotta admit, I ended up really liking “The Lights of Silver Lake.”

How did I come up with this story? I don’t even know. I’m sure I stole things from other stuff that I read. I felt like one of the most important things I could do as a creative writing teacher was to tell stories that held my kids’ attention. I can’t even remember when I started telling it. I do remember sitting on my back porch and carving a heart and “JS” and “SD” into a log. My son Nathan was with me at the time, and yes, he sold me out a few times in his high school years.

So here is my moral/ethical question: was it okay to lie to my students? When I told this story, I really sold it. I did everything I could do to make my students believe it. And I didn’t back down. When skeptical students asked skeptical questions, I held firm. I sometimes wondered if I should confess—I was just messing with you all—but I never decided to do that. I know it is wrong to lie. I just do not think that it is black and white. Jesus’s disciples ate wheat on the Sabbath. There is a Spirit who leads. What I lost in integrity, I gained in imaginativity.

At least, that’s what I tell myself. I am at peace with my log. It is sitting up there on my bookshelf looking down at me right now. And Karen and my kids know that when I get cremated, that baby gets cremated with me.

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That was the Lord (events, major and minor)

We all have experiences that illuminate my selected title—even if we don’t acknowledge them. As long as you accept that there is an Other out there—as a creature (you didn’t make yourself) you accredit a creator—you have to be available for the possibility of an interaction with Him/Her/It/Force. Maybe you don’t have to—if He speaks, will you listen?

Because He is speaking. It’s just that most of the time He is whispering, and if you’re not listening carefully, you’re not going to get it. It seems to me that is the secret to a rich spiritual life—listening carefully, otherwise known as being aware. (A modest disclaimer here…I am only learning these things. I have never been a good listener. My students used to wave their hands in my face to get my attention.)

So how does He whisper? Family Feud answer #1 is: Through His word (and I don’t dispute that at all). Can’t go wrong with the Bible, as long as it’s reading you and not the opposite. But I think we tend to try to trap God in the Blble. “If it’s not in the Good Book, it’s not from God.” We limit how we perceive Him by how we understand one book. I came to the realization awhile back that Buddhists are seeking the same God that Christians are. There is only one God, the creator of all. (We Christians believe He is triune in essence.) Could there be two? Doesn’t that split the universe? We need to be open to God whispering to us in an infinite variety of ways.

Many of us acknowledge Him on the big stuff…God brought us together, God gave us a child, God called me to a career (maybe not so much on that one—I know too many people who hate their jobs). And, of course, we come to Him in times of desperation…an illness, a disaster, the unknown whereabouts of a loved one. It wasn’t until the end of my teaching career that I learned to pray before each class instead of during each crisis.

I don’t want to downplay those moments of illumination. Those are the major events in our lives—the plot points. But life is not a synopsis or an obituary. Its vitality is in the present—the here and now. Trapping God in the major moments is as bad as trapping Him in a book, or as bad as visiting Him once a week when you go to church. If you really want to hear Him whisper, you have to let Him decide when.

Almost everyone of a religious bent has been through those “startling” moments—swerving to miss another car, deciding not to go someplace, choosing A when you were leaning toward B—when you realize “That was the Lord.” It could have gone that way, but it went this way, favoring me—thank You. Honestly, I am inundated with those moments (if I am paying attention…). And we know, deep down, we have been favored. I freely admit that I am not addressing the problem of pain and suffering in this lost world. I am just saying that the Lord is beneficially disposed toward you. He wants it to be good. And He will respond. Listen.

The Lone Ranger was a metaphor. At the end of the show everything would be resolved and he would ride away, and one of the beneficiaries would say, “Who was that masked man?”

That was the Lord.

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Why I Am Writing Again

Craziness. To think anyone would want to know…to think you have a chance of reaching anyone in this world of a billion messages a second (or whatever)…to think you possibly have any hope of expressing that which is inexpressible. But not inaccessible. Dallas Willard told John Ortberg (two christians I admire): “Don’t hurry. “ So that’s what I’ve been trying to do, writing-wise. I don’t want to write for money or fame or ego or duty—I want to declare what is most clear and most precious to me. I’m at the point that I have to share what I’ve learned (always still learning)—interpret what I have observed—give credit where credit is due—or I’ll wither.

Love. Love God and your neighbor. Simplest formula ever. But all you have to do is concentrate on applying the formula into every moment of your daily existence, and it becomes the most complex, confounding, convoluted strategy imaginable. And yet, the formula always applies and always works. Try it for a day, try it for an hour—you’ll admit you fell short. No problem. Confess and press on to the upward calling. You always get to start again.

Humility. Man, I struggle with that one. Thinking I am humble is one of the most egocentric thoughts in thoughtdom. As soon as you try to be humble, pride is involved. I can’t master it—my sneaky self is always in there trying to improve his image. I think I’ve learned this much: you don’t get humility looking at yourself.

Hope. That might come out egotistical—that I hope I can help you. But I do. And how do I hope to help you? By inspiring you to do good. As I hope you inspire me. Goodness improves every situation. It is doable every moment of your life. If you’re not doing good, you’re preparing to do it. Even if you’re not doing anything, you can pray (or think positive thoughts, if you prefer) for others. And it will always have its effect—good will promote more good. It’s the secret to changing the world.

Obedience. I’ve had trouble with that word my entire christian walk. The thought lurks within my inner self: no one can tell me what to do. God never tells me what to do. He only points me in the direction of what I should do. I got a Facebook notification recently, in response to one of those “Name a teacher who affected your life” kind of surveys. A former student wrote “Mine was…Dallin Malmgren. Saved my life. Literally. Love him and all teachers who truly connect with kids.” She had written an autobiography in my creative writing class which indicated she was suicidal. Call it an instinct or an intuition or the voice of God—I intervened. She got treatment and got better. (This is not to toot my own horn—I suspect that I probably ignored tons of other cries for help in the course of my career.) But in that case I believe I listened to God and it helped someone. Now I believe God wants me to write again. I’m listening.

Finally, diversity. I gotta do more than just play golf.

 

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Lists, lists, lists.…(a cry for help)

A confession: I am a list maker. I started thinking about it the other day, and I might have gone over the top. But I am too close to the issue to know if it’s a problem. Can you help? My first instinct is to suspect that I have become OCD. But that doesn’t hold up—I am one of the least OCD people I know. My wife wishes I was more OCD. So I am looking for some input here—I’m not sure if it’s a good thing or not. Maybe it would be helpful to examine some lists.

 

My Things to Do list – (center, sticky notes which attach to my Daily Log) – has an obvious purpose to it. How would I get things done? This is how I organize what I need to do and what I hope to do. I usually do a new one around every two weeks. I’ll occasionally make a daily one if I’m particularly scattered. I used to let Karen add to my list, but that was a bad idea. (She has decided she would rather make her own for me.) I don’t have a single list (I save them…sigh) that has every single item crossed off. Should the undone bother me? In fact, the real pleasure of this list is crossing things off. Sometimes I’ll cheat and add an item to the list that I already did just so I can cross it off. Come to think, the TtD list is non-negotiable—I couldn’t live without it.
My Daily Log – (bottom left) – keeps track of how I spent my day. I’ll summarize a golf round (score, who I played with, $ won or lost). Any event that happened. My quiet time and what I’m reading. What we watched on TV (unless it was mindless). Food if it was exceptional or we ate out (I grade restaurants). Steps and sleep data from my Vivofit. And I try to write down a one-sentence description of any dream I remember (but if I don’t do that early, it will fade). The Daily Log is pretty ingrained in me—but I’m listening.
My Planner’s – (top row left) – first function is to be a calendar. Appointments, golf tournaments, get-togethers, birthdays, holidays, vacations and trips. Yes, a phone is perfectly capable of doing this—I need the hard copy. And it’s useful to take it and compare it with Karen’s calendar hanging inside the pantry door. But my planner was becoming atrophied—Karen and I don’t really do that much. Then I discovered a new function. I write down every expenditure we make. It’s not that hard—we pay for everything by credit card or check, so all I have to do is go to Recent Transactions. For the little cash we use, I just record ATM transactions. A promise: in the face of financial woes, if you just start writing down where the money goes, your financial status will improve. Guaranteed.
My Life Log – (top row center) – is nothing but a collection of lists. Over 130 cell phone #’s I don’t use frequently. A 20 year old address book (nine dead people in it). Screenplays I’ve read. A record of all the golf rounds I played from 1997 to 2009. All the books I’ve read since our book group started in 2000 (with grades). A log of all my submissions when I was trying to be an author. Nineteen easy-to-make dinners. Every movie I’ve seen since 1997 (with grades). Also lists of books, movies, and television series that I want to read and watch. Man, there’s a lot of useful information in that thing!
My Prayer Journal – (bottom row center) – goes with me wherever I travel. Not sure if that qualifies as a list, but I have a whole drawer full of them, so it’s at least a collection. The reason I write my prayers is because my mind would wander uncontrollably when I did it the other way. What started as a paean of praise would end up as a puzzlement on why I putted from off the fringe on #7. An earnest entreaty would end up in the realization that Leonard and Penny would never be together in real life. So I write.
I could go on…I have an Exercise Journal (bottom row right). Each page is a day of the year, January 1 to December 31, with spaces allotted for five years (2015 to 2019 for mine). I’m about half a year behind in that, but I can get the info from my Daily Log. And I have a Fantasy Sports Notebook (top row right).
There’s hope! I thought of a list I’ve dropped: New Year’s Resolutions. I’ve come to believe that I’m never going to change myself. I have to allow God to change me. Somewhere it says, “…we are being transformed by the renewing of our minds…” It’s not about will-power; it’s about faith. And you don’t grow faith by making a list.

 

Time for a verdict—to list or not to list? I can make a reasonable defense. Life can be a blur; if you allow yourself to fall into a routine, it can become a fog. We are in danger of turning into automatons. And our culture has become a trash heap among which lie certain obscure gems.  The antidote is awareness—of what we do, what we eat, who we are with, what we watch, how we spend our time. My lists help me figure all that out. “Teach us to number our days,” the Bible says. Unfortunately, I can also see the other side—so busy making lists one forgets to live—a schedule is the death knell for spontaneity—one man’s trash is another man’s treasure–you’ve only created more junk for your children to have to throw away.

So cast your vote. Be specific. Help me out.

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