I am sitting in my screened in porch and listening to the most lovely music.  The birds are warbling a most melodious tune.

At night, the frogs in our pond, croak to each other in a syncopated rhythm.  When we first moved to our ‘new house’…which is now sixteen years old…I could not believe our good fortune as I listened to the songs of the pond!

So much can be expressed in music…that words, often, do not do justice.

I have been busily re-forming my vinyl record collection…that my mother disposed of sometime after I moved away from home at the tender age of seventeen.

I was listening to the Lake Street Dive, the other day.  I marvel at their seamless harmony and their lead singer’s, Rachael Price,  tremendous voice.

The power of music helped to fuel the Civil Rights Movement.

‘We shall overcome,

We shall overcome,

We shall overcome, some day.

Oh, deep in my heart,

I do believe

We shall overcome, some day.

We’ll walk hand in hand,

We’ll walk hand in hand,

We’ll walk hand in hand, some day,

Oh, deep in my heart,

We shall live in peace,

We shall live in peace,

We shall live in peace, someday,

Oh, deep in my heart,

We shall be free,

We shall be free,

We shall be free, someday.

Oh, deep in my heart,

We are not afraid,

We are not afraid,

We are not afraid, TODAY

Oh, deep in my heart

We shall overcome,

We shall overcome,

We shall overcome, some day.’

‘The first eight measures derive from ‘O Sanctissima,’ a hymn to the Virgin Mary that was first published in 1792 and later arranged by Beethoven,’   according to Spiritual Politics by Mark Silk.

I remember viewing a Christmas Production in Shryock Auditorium, many years ago, when the performers who were playing the Kings of the East coming to visit the Christ Child in the Manger, unexpectedly proceeded up the aisle of the Theatre from behind us…singing in magnificent bass tones!  I was transported and suddenly became part of the performance!

The other Sunday, as Elder John Baker was delivering the sermon…he asked, Carlyn Zimmermann, to sing a song that beautifully illustrated the message he was delivering.

Often our Pastor, Rev. Janice West, sings a prayer…she has a beautiful voice!

Have you ever listened for the music of Nature…even in silence?  Often nature has it’s own musical accompaniment…even if you have to be still and quiet and anticipate it’s melody.

Or…the magnificent…majestic…peaceful sound…of the ocean?

A supervisor told me, many years ago, that I could be a philosopher.  I pondered on the meaning of his comment.  But, it does seem that my Blog Posts, of late, have leaned toward the philosophy realm?

I was watching the Gershwin Prize for Popular Song ceremony for Willie Nelson.  We were privileged to see Willie perform live at the DuQuoin, Illinois State Fair, a few years ago.  He is a dynamic performer and I was left with many thoughts and memories after the music ended.

Willie performed, at the conclusion of the tribute, Living in the Promised Land, and received a standing ovation for the songs moving…timely…lyrics.

‘Give us your tired and weak

And we will make them strong

Bring us you foreign songs

And we will sing along

Leave us your broken dreams

We’ll give them time to mend

There’s still a lot of love

Living in the Promiseland

There is a winding road

Across the shifting sand

And room for everyone

Living in the Promiseland

So they came from a distant isle

Nameless woman

Faithless child like a bad dream

Until there was no room at all

No place to run, and no place to fall

Give us our daily bread

We have no shoes to wear

No place to call our home

Only this cross to bear

We are the multitudes

Lend us a helping hand

Is there no love anymore

Living in the Promiseland

Living in the Promiseland

Our dreams are made of steel

The prayer of every man

Is to know how freedom feels

There is a winding road

Across the shifting sand

And room for everyone

Living in the Promiseland’

Songwriters: Paul Madeira; Jimmy Dorsey

Time…has always fascinated me.  The idea of a year…or ten…or one hundred…being a long period is a false construct that is formed by our relatively short lives in comparison with the Universe that surrounds us.

My lifelong friend, Jeff, asked me last year when we were visiting he and Margo, in the United Kingdom…If I ever thought about my mortality.

I must admit that the older I become…the more apparent that there is an end to this life… is evident.

I responded to Jeff…that I have often thought that death may be nothing like we have feared…but indeed a revealing of our true life and purpose…or our first ‘Big Break!’

Roger Ebert, the famous film critic, during the last few minutes before he died said, according to his wife Chaz, “The one thing people might be surprised about-Roger said that he didn’t know if he could believe in God.  He had his doubts.  But toward the end, something really interesting happened.  That week before Roger passed away, I would see him and he would talk about visiting this other place.  I thought he was hallucinating.  I thought they were giving him to much medication.  But the day before he passed away, he wrote me a note: ‘This is all an elaborate hoax.’  I asked him, ‘What’s a hoax?’  And he was talking about this world, this place.  He said it was all an illusion.  I thought he was just confused.  But he was not confused.  He wasn’t visiting heaven, not the way we think of heaven.  He described it as a vastness that you can’t even imagine.  It was a place where the past, present, and future were all happening at once.”

What if this life is nothing more than a Pop Quiz…in God’s Eternity?

Job said, ‘My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle, and are spent without hope.’

Perhaps the Creator has placed us all in the Sandbox of life…to see how we will play with with each other?

Promiseland

‘You may be ambassador to England or France

You may like to gamble, you might like to dance

You may be the heavyweight champion of the world

You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls,

But you gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed

You gonna have to serve somebody,

It may be the devil, or it may be the Lord

But you gonna have to serve somebody.’   Bob Dylan

Although I have watched several documentaries regarding the Church of Scientology, the one that I watched last night, on Netflix, was extremely revealing.

The film, My Scientology Movie by Louis Theroux, was captivating in it’s examination of the power of mind control that the current Church leader, David Miscavige, has over the group.

One of the succinct points ,of the engaging piece of cinema, was the fact that the members of the church felt compelled to act and speak in only the manner that was approved by Miscavige.

Apparently, according to the film, Miscavige is prone to extreme mood swings…and is given to physical punishment of members…for the slightest perceived infraction or deviation from his norm…if you can discern what his norm is at any given moment.

I have watched, Presidential Spokesman, Sean Spicer, and his associate, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, seemingly perform for an audience of one.  Many of the assertions that they present as fact…are illogical and border on the absurd.  It is obvious that they are performing for the President alone.

How often have you been involved in an endeavor, be it church…or your employment…or your relationships, where you struggled to emulate or speak or act as a person in your life had indicated or instructed you to do?

How often have you, truly, wanted to say or do or act, in a manner that represented…who you are…and how you feel…and your honest thoughts on the matter?

There is something so refreshing when you meet an original human being!

Someone who is not saying or acting or mindlessly accepting what the, Boss, or the Preacher, or the President, told them to do.

A Lemming will follow their fellow Lemmings off a cliff

When something seems illogical or immoral or un-ethical…it probably is.

The freest and most enjoyable life that I know of is a life lived on your own terms…thinking for yourself…and acting on your personal convictions.

One of my best friends told me recently, that it appeared that I really did my own thing.  He is right…and I appreciated the great compliment.

Another friend, regrettably of my past, told me that I was a Renaissance Man,…of which I was honored and humbled.

Group Think and Mind Control are insidious aliments of our human family.

‘There are not may kinds of historical events in the world that are near impossible to comprehend.  Genocides, however, will always be one of them.  Possibly the most horrid and systematic genocide was the Holocaust, Nazi Germany’s mass murder of Jewish people in the 1930’s  and 1940’s.  There are many different arguments behind the causes of the Holocaust and the Nazi regime’s rise to power, but the problem is there is no one specific cause.  However, it could be argued that one of the most prominent causes was the psychological state of mind of everyone involved at the time.  Hitler’s anger and the country’s general anti-semitism, groupthink, fear and defense mechanisms, and deception are a number of key factors in an unstable psychological balance.  Though there were a lot of external causes, it was the way people reacted to these causes that truly infiltrated the Holocaust,’   according to Philadelphia University: Germany 2012

We must ask ourselves; are groups of people to be ostracized because our group says that they should be…is faith the ‘substance of things hoped for and the evidence of thing not seen’  or is it the marginalizing of large groups of our fellow human beings?

Is God so small that he created the Heaven and the Earth…and yet only cares about a fraction of his creation?

The Southern Illinois Board of Trustees has named Carlo Montemagno as the Chancellor of SIU – Carbondale.  Dr. Montemagno, ‘is currently professor of engineering at the University of Alberta’s Department of Chemical and Materials and founder of the Ingenuity Lab for the Province of Alberta,’ according to the Southern Illinoisan.

‘SIU Carbondale is an institution that possess the DNA of greatness.  It is an institution with strong genes that enable opportunity, creativity and discovery,’ Montemagno said in an SIU news release.

‘By engaging with the entire SIUC community – including faculty, staff, students, alumni, friends, the Southern Illinois community and industry – will fully activate SIUC’s DNA to realize the possible,’ according to Chancellor Carlo Montemagno.

It is with great anticipation that I look forward to our new Chancellor bringing us all together to energize and restore our great University!

It has been often said…and I have witnessed this unusual phenomena, that the further you travel from SIU…the more glowing accounts that you hear regarding it!  SIU has far in excess of two hundred thousand living Alumni across our planet.  The days that they spent at Southern…are often the happiest of their lives!

Having been associated with our Campus for almost forty years…I know all of the stories of discontent and hurt and disappointment.

I personally was disappointed, severely, with a leadership change that occurred many years ago…but today is the first day of the rest of our lives!

SIU is much to important to each of us…to not release the negative…and embrace the positive!

‘The Teachers College Board elected Morris as the University’s leader in 1948, just a few months before state lawmakers created a seven-member independent governing board to oversee SIU.  In his 22 years at SIU, Morris built upon the rich, early history of the University, which he recognized was situated in the most disadvantaged, rural region of Illinois.  His foresight and leadership catapulted SIU into the ranks of major American universities,’ according to SIU.

Now is our opportunity to be a part of something great.

I am so pleased to see former Interim Chancellor, Brad Colwell, named as the Vice President for Academic Affairs.  Brad has been a friend of mine for several years…and his openness and thoughtful consideration of my requests regarding not outsourcing several of our vital service units on Campus…was deeply appreciated!

The Scripture admonishes the reader that, ‘…Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.’    Psalm 30:5   NKJV

The ‘Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame, is a story that has continually fascinated me.  The characters are all animals, Mr. Toad, Badger, Ratty, and Mole.

Badger, Ratty, Mole and Mr. Toad spend much of their time, ‘simply messing about in boats,’ along the Thames and living in the Thames Valley.  Their anthropomorphized, or very human adventures, are mesmerizing.

‘One summer day, Rat and Mole disembark near the grand Toad Hall and pay a visit to Toad.  Toad is rich, jovial, friendly and kind-hearted, but aimless and conceited; he regularly becomes obsessed with current fads, only to abandon  them abruptly.  Having recently given up boating, Toad’s current craze is his horse-drawn caravan.  He persuades the reluctant Rat and willing Mole to join him on a trip.  Toad soon tires of the realities of camp life, and sleeps in the following day to avoid chores.  Later that day, a passing motorcar scares the horse, causing the caravan to overturn into a ditch.  Rat threaten to have the law on the car driver, while Mole claims the horse, but Toad’s craze for caravan travel is immediately replaced by obsession with motorcars,’   according to Wikipedia.

Mary Jane and I took our friend of thirteen years, Brody, to the Veterinarian today for his annual check up.  He is doing remarkably well of his age.

Our good friend, Betsy the Veterinarian Technician, told us that often Boston Terriers live to sixteen or seventeen years of age…Hurray!

In the 1990’s I faithfully watched ‘The Wind in the Willows’ on the Disney Chanel, each Sunday before we attended Church.  Often I enjoyed the program’s lessons more than the sermon.

We have had dogs, primarily Boston Terriers, for thirty years.  They have been consistently an integral part of our family.  I am convinced that they understand most of what you say to them and what is going on in the household…which is their world!

Wallace is our Brown Boston.  He was purchased in Fairview Heights, Illinois immediately after Mary Jane received good news regarding an eye problem that she was experiencing.  We all were worried…a lot!

When she received the good news we proceeded to Lotta Watta Creek Restaurant for a Lunch Celebration!  Long Island Ice Tea…was on special…after a few Specials…we proceeded to the Mall that was next door…and thus we have Wallace T. Brooks!

Parker Gulley…is our rescue dog.  She was thrown from a automobile in Gulley Park and her Jaw was broken…and she was an adorable Lab/Mix.  We have raised her from a pup.  She is a sweet and loyal friend!

We, in the early 90’s purchased two dogs…for the boys.  I fear that they were as much for us.  Their love and never-failing companionship is a tremendous gift.  They are down…when you are down..and they are happy when you are happy!

When the end of life comes….and God’s future presents itself for our joyful surprise and enthusiasm…I am certain that members of the animal kingdom will be there…in  all of their pristine glory…and very likely with the ability to speak to we humans…and tell us of the majesty of creation!

As I walked the beautiful Campus of Southern Illinois University, today, I thought…now SIU has a chance to stabilize and obtain it’s former greatness.

Last week our Illinois Legislature had the courage to override our Governor’s veto and pass a budget…something that had not happened in over two years.

Many Republicans joined the Democratic majority…before Our University and many others…went over the cliff.

With SIU being the Economic Engine that drives the economy of Southern Illinois, needless to say, we felt relief, and joy, and now it is time to go to work!

SIU has suffered from an identity crisis for a number of years.  This can, no better, be illustrated than in the numerous changes in leadership…with over nine different Campus Leaders since 1999.

It has been postulated that Southern will no longer have the great enrollment numbers that it enjoyed in the early 1990’s due to regional competition and less high school students graduating across the country.

These issues can be greatly ameliorated if SIU returns to the Vision that made it great.  A Vision that reached outward…first to Southern Illinois…then to the Country…and finally to the world.

Leadership that has the communication ability and heartfelt belief that all members of the Southern Illinois University Community have intrinsic value and are vital to the success of the School!

The mission of bringing everyone together to reach out to all prospective students and demonstrate by our actions that nothing is more important to us than their attending SIU and their ultimate success!

The re-forming of the Construct… to put students first… and leadership with a Servant’s Heart.

In church, this morning,  Elder John Baker delivered a thought provoking sermon.  He spoke regarding the unusual appearance of John the Baptist and his all consuming passion in announcing the coming of Christ.

John asked the congregation, at one point in his sermon, would we welcome the forerunner of Christ…if he came in and sat in the back of the church and began to loudly exclaim his message of the coming of Jesus?  Would his un-cut hair and his un-shaven beard and his dirty clothes not impede our asking him to come to the front of the church to deliver his profound message?

‘Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold thy King cometh unto three: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass.’   Zechariah 9:9   KJV

‘For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.’     Isaiah 53:2   KJV

I was watching the wonderful documentary series, ‘The 80’s’, on CNN last night.  One of the segments was regarding the Praise the Lord Club or more commonly known as PTL.  The piece focused on the the Reverends Jim and Tammy Faye Baker and their quest for increasing cash flow from their viewers.

I remember this extremely popular program, well.  I worked with people who were very excited about the ministry of the Bakers and their outreach to the U.S.

The CNN program stated that many of the people who were donating to PTL, were very poor and often did not have money to live on.  It was commonly believed, by these humble givers, that when Jim and Tammy Faye had many luxury automobiles and several mansions…that they by association, with them, were blessed by God.

‘Notwithstanding, lest we should offend them, go thou to the sea, and cast an hook, and take up the fish that first cometh up; and when thou hast opened his mouth, thou shalt find a piece of money: that take, and give unto them for me and thee.’   Matthew 17:27   KJV

When we pass by the poor and the homeless and the hungry and the destitute…are we satisfied in the surety that anyone can make it in America?

Don’t we all feel secure that in our churches…with the bathed and well coiffed and perfumed and polite…we are certainly doing the work of the Christ of the Bible?

‘When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay.’   John 9:6   KJV

I just returned from the newest Spider-Man Movie, ‘Spider-Man Homecoming’, with Aaron and I enjoying it very much.

I mentioned to Mary Jane, that I had mysteriously lost 4 lb.. from 10:am this morning until 3:00pm this afternoon.  I told her that this had happened before, more than once, when I have gone to the movies.

I have been a movie aficionado since childhood.  One of my favorite movies, that I went with my Mother and some friends in Chicago to see, was Lady and the Tramp.  I was probably about three years old at the time…and I remember it explicitly.

Lady and the Tramp transported me to an idyllic world of talking dogs and their intricate lives.  The Christmas scenes, in the movie, were imprinted on my brain.  The Siamese Cats stating that, ‘I hear baby cry’, I have never forgotten…and quote this saying anytime that I actually hear a baby cry.

In 1989 I saw ‘Driving Mrs. Daisy’, and my entire concept of friendship and loyalty and race discrimination…was altered forever.

In 1991 I saw JFK.  I have been fascinated with the Kennedy Assassination since Mrs. Kittinger, my first grade teacher, announced that the President had been shot and that school was canceled for the remainder of the day.

The hypothesis that were brought forth in the movie were compelling and food for thought in a mystery that has never seemed answered by the Warren Commission.

When I arrived home from school on the day of the Assassination, my mother was crying as if one of our close relatives had died, I then learned that our President had been killed.

When I saw, on live television, that Jack Ruby cavalierly walked toward Lee Harvey Oswald and shot him at point blank range…my six year old mind knew that something was not right and that there was more to the story than what we were being told.

In 1990 we went with our dear friends, Steve and Faye, to see Godfather Part III.  This was during the Holiday Season…and we often took in movies during this festive time.  I had such a splitting headache that I asked Faye if she had any headache pills, and she did and gave me one.  I felt almost immediate relief.  We watched this movie and I fell in love with the Godfather Saga.  Shortly thereafter I watched the original Godfather and Godfather II…but Godfather Part III has a special place in my heart…because I was with the LaBrier’s…my lifelong friends.

Life is funny with its’ twists and turns…but nothing can replace the little moments that stay with you for the rest of your life!

It is not only the movies that give me peace and relaxation but also being with my newfound brother, Brock, and his family, Marcy, Jeb, and Jamie.  I have been enjoying their Great Alaskan Adventure…vicariously.

Writing…brings me peace and relaxation.  I enjoy it in its’ pure simplicity.

Photography makes me feel peace and happiness and relaxation.

Nature, nurtures me, and teaches me the permanence of God…and my place in his creation.

My sons, Aaron and Jonathon, and the love of my life, Mary Jane, bring me peace and relaxation.

Our dogs, Brody, Wallace, and Parker, bring me peace and an understanding of the intricacy of creation.

Find what gives you peace and relaxes you and makes you happy and pursue it.