Monday, May 07, 2007
everybody knows
I just watched a good documentary, Shut Up and Sing about the Dixie Chicks and the controversy around lead singer Natalie Maines comments in London during the 2003 run up to the recent Iraq quagmire. In the midst of the ongoing debates I hesitate using the term "war" because...well, I just do.
I'm a Dixie Chicks fan, I'll admit it. Have been for years, and it was just fueled honestly by not so much her comments and actions but rather by the amazing reaction from the American people. It was once radio stations started having Chick merchandise smashing parties that I finally bought the album they were promoting at the time. From a K-Mart in Marietta, Ohio. A few weeks before the shock and awe began. I remember it very clearly. I was very scared of my country, for the first time in my life. I felt like I was growing up very fast. I understood episodes of The Wonder Years much more personally than ever before.
And yes, I was a victim of the PR. And I really liked the album. Not as much as their follow-up to the controversy, their latest Taking the Long Way. This movie show a remarkable image of our country four years ago. In the current times of George Tenet's tell-all and GOP turnaround, I'm just very...upset. Am I ashamed that the President is from Texas? Well, no...he was born in Connecticut. As a Texan I'm ashamed he associates himself with Texas to the rest of the world, but I get over that. No, I'm ashamed at the corporate administration down there in D.C. and the direction they have taken my country over the past seven years. That's what ashames me, as a...person.
I have felt a lot more lately as if I am becoming, as I say, righteously angry. Yes I'm sick of this war and of the constant deaths in Darfur and of human rights violations in China and Central America and just about everywhere else you turn, but it's so much more. I'm angry all over the place. And I'm trying so very hard to make sure I know why. I use the term "righteously angry" so as not to make 'anger' an emotion but a honest, sincere state of mind. Jesus was righteously angry, and He had and has every right to be. Righteous anger includes a great degree of love and concern. And I don't think there is enough of it in the world right now. And there needs to be.
I am going to go to Haiti this summer for several days, to help out with a mission that is building a school for the children of a small rural community there. I'm praying for this mission but for so much more. It is overwhelming. And I don't do nearly enough to feed the need...and to feed my soul. But I have felt recently like I have to acknowledge that whatever service I am able to do, whatever I am led to do, to support positive change in this world...well how can I deny that?
Sure this trip costs money, money I don't have. I think I'm down to about $50.00 in the bank right now. And my crazy work will make me take the week off without pay. But like any of that is important. Money will come for this project. If I have to sell my possessions....well I have been selling DVD's and CD's to raise additional funds. So I guess I do. But so what.
And now for something completely different: Rob and Kase are having a baby. Our boy is gonna be a father. What can I say? It's just great for them. Great, great. I'll never forget where I was when I heard the news: conked out cold in bed on Nyquill!
¶ 5/07/2007 09:49:00 PM
I'm a Dixie Chicks fan, I'll admit it. Have been for years, and it was just fueled honestly by not so much her comments and actions but rather by the amazing reaction from the American people. It was once radio stations started having Chick merchandise smashing parties that I finally bought the album they were promoting at the time. From a K-Mart in Marietta, Ohio. A few weeks before the shock and awe began. I remember it very clearly. I was very scared of my country, for the first time in my life. I felt like I was growing up very fast. I understood episodes of The Wonder Years much more personally than ever before.
And yes, I was a victim of the PR. And I really liked the album. Not as much as their follow-up to the controversy, their latest Taking the Long Way. This movie show a remarkable image of our country four years ago. In the current times of George Tenet's tell-all and GOP turnaround, I'm just very...upset. Am I ashamed that the President is from Texas? Well, no...he was born in Connecticut. As a Texan I'm ashamed he associates himself with Texas to the rest of the world, but I get over that. No, I'm ashamed at the corporate administration down there in D.C. and the direction they have taken my country over the past seven years. That's what ashames me, as a...person.
I have felt a lot more lately as if I am becoming, as I say, righteously angry. Yes I'm sick of this war and of the constant deaths in Darfur and of human rights violations in China and Central America and just about everywhere else you turn, but it's so much more. I'm angry all over the place. And I'm trying so very hard to make sure I know why. I use the term "righteously angry" so as not to make 'anger' an emotion but a honest, sincere state of mind. Jesus was righteously angry, and He had and has every right to be. Righteous anger includes a great degree of love and concern. And I don't think there is enough of it in the world right now. And there needs to be.
I am going to go to Haiti this summer for several days, to help out with a mission that is building a school for the children of a small rural community there. I'm praying for this mission but for so much more. It is overwhelming. And I don't do nearly enough to feed the need...and to feed my soul. But I have felt recently like I have to acknowledge that whatever service I am able to do, whatever I am led to do, to support positive change in this world...well how can I deny that?
Sure this trip costs money, money I don't have. I think I'm down to about $50.00 in the bank right now. And my crazy work will make me take the week off without pay. But like any of that is important. Money will come for this project. If I have to sell my possessions....well I have been selling DVD's and CD's to raise additional funds. So I guess I do. But so what.
And now for something completely different: Rob and Kase are having a baby. Our boy is gonna be a father. What can I say? It's just great for them. Great, great. I'll never forget where I was when I heard the news: conked out cold in bed on Nyquill!
¶ 5/07/2007 09:49:00 PM
