simple

for me, the essence of faith is summed up in the exchange that took place between jesus and one of the criminals dying beside him...

"One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: "Aren't you the Christ? Save yourself and us!" But the other criminal rebuked him. "Don't you fear God," he said, "since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong."

Then he said, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom. " Jesus answered him, "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise." (luke 23:39-43)

when everything else is stripped away...all the man-made laws that we impose to make our faith more complicated than it really is...the debates on baptism and dress codes and alcohol and what version of the bible to read and who's worthy, or not worthy, to receive communion...

for me, all of those distractions fall away when i read this excerpt from luke. a man, a criminal, acknowledges as he is dying, that jesus is the son of god.

jesus' response? simple and unquestioning. the essence of grace. the criminal has done nothing to deserve christ's love. he simply believes.

i am the criminal. i am filthy. i deserve death.

i could not exist without christ's mercy. i could not live without his grace.

and i ask him every day to remember me in his kingdom.

happy st. patrick's day

i'm a day late, but what the heck ~ erin go bragh! or in this case, mobile go bragh!

my father's daughter

my dad is 63 years old today! below is a picture of him and his sister vickie...note the strong resemblance to ian (can you see it?):


my father and i are so much alike. i have inherited his need for order and organization and perfection. (i'm not sure if this is a blessing or a curse.) dad is and always has been a worrier (oh, that's me). he is passionate about the reds (yeah baby!) and loves, loves, loves old movies. he can remember the most minute details about family gatherings, is often incredibly stubborn, pouts when he doesn't get his way, and loves my mom more than anything in the world.

when we girls were growing up, we spent most of our time with our dad. mom was a tupperware lady, and a very successful one at that. she was gone practically every evening from the time we were ten years old until we went away to college. this meant that dad was the one at home enforcing chores (we did all the laundry and dishes, among other things) and bedtimes. but dad was also the one that did incredibly fun stuff with us...

our father was the only dad on the street who played ball with his kids. he taught us how to throw curveballs and knuckleballs at a very early age; dad was a wonderful ballplayer himself, inheriting that same talent from his own father (my grandfather played semi-professional baseball prior to world war two). i also remember we had a tradition during the winter months of watching ohio state basketball on tv while munching popcorn sprinkled with powdered cheese and drinking orange juice (ick?).

when we were really little, dad would teach us to say all kinds of things. for example, by the age of six i could recite the pythagorean theorem: the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the square of the other two sides. that came from dad. or ~ we would be waiting in the car while mom was grocery shopping and he would make up some ridiculous math problem, like, "what is 764 x 397?", and one of us would yell someting like, "54!" and he would marvel "OH MY GOSH THAT'S AMAZING! YOU ARE SO SMART!!!" and on and on he would go, with the three of us girls just beaming. he was really full of sh*t in the best possible way.

when i started my period for the first time, my dad was home with me, not my mom. (we sent that poor guy to kroger's so many times to get "feminine supplies" ~ i don't think it bothered him in the least.) i would (and still do) get incredibly emotional and weepy before starting my period; dad could look at me the wrong way and i would burst into tears. i remember doing this one time, then hearing him say in the other room, "connie, jodi's getting ready to start her period...she's crying again." as i recently stated, dad is incredibly organized and pretty anal; he would plan our family vacations six to seven months in advance. i remember several januarys when he would sit all of us down with the calendar and say, "i'm getting ready to book our vacation in july. i want every one of you to count ahead and see when you're going to be on your period that month." he always tried to plan around it, but my gosh, with four women in the house, it was practically impossible!

our dad was at every basketball game, softball tournament, quiz bowl, honor society function, etc. if we were in it, he and mom were there. they never missed an event. i think many of our friends, whose parents weren't as supportive, came to depend on my mom and dad as surrogate family members. everybody knew connie and "big rog".

i love my dad's sense of humor. i said earlier that he can pout when he doesn't get his way, but my gosh the man can be hilarious. earlier today, i called him at work and told him that i bought his birthday present on ebay, but it had not been delivered yet. his response, "that's okay, jodi. i'll just sit up tonight and wait for it to get here." which, okay, doesn't sound that funny...you just had to hear it come from his mouth.

speaking of his birthday present (he doesn't read my blog, so i'm not worried about ruining the surprise), i found a mint condition sports illustrated featuring my dad's favorite baseball line-up of all time ~ the 1956 reds. the cover of the magazine features gus bell, wally post, and ted kluszewski. dad has told me, on more than one occasion, that the '56 reds were, in his mind, more amazing and enjoyable than the big red machine of the '70s. he can quote the '56 roster by name, position, and number. i love to hear him talk about them...his nostalgia is so heartfelt and endearing...

i love my dad for a million and one reasons. and if sat here long enough, i could probably think of a million and one more stories to tell about him. he can be a pain in the butt (simply because he's a guy), but he's also pretty spectacular.

i sure am thankful he's mine.

this made me laugh out loud

my sister, jill, turned me on to this jimmy kimmel video. guillermo, uncle frank & veatrice work on kimmel's show, and he uses them frequently in skits. if you ever have time to kill, go to youtube and type in "guillermo". he's always hilarious.

not a good sign

there's a blizzard warning out right now. my son, who went to the doctor today for bronchialitis, just walked up to me and said, "i'm bored. what is there to do?".

uhm. we in trouble. (bad grammar intended)

yum

i saw a link on the imdb to the "100 sexiest movie stars of all time". here's my #1...gary cooper. he ranked #40 on this list ~ ahead of mel gibson, tom cruise, and johnny depp. scrumptious.

not in the job description

junior high is tough. bodies are changing, hormones are raging. peer groups are solidifying.

today, one of my kids smelled so badly...it was shocking. but here's the rub...he has water, and toiletries, and deodorant. his twin sister is also in my class. she's always clean. but jake (not his real name) is literally too lazy to take a bath. his sister lisa (not her real name) has also told me that he is too lazy to go to the bathroom at home ~ no kidding, jake will urinate in the corner of his room, in a pop bottle, whatever, to keep from walking down the hall to relieve himself. lisa is pretty sure that the urine gets on his clothes, which are lying on the floor. the clothes, by the way, rarely get washed because he is too lazy to take care of that. and don't ask me why mom isn't all over this. i can't answer that question.

tuesday, jake's body odor was horrible. i had to open my classroom windows at the end of the day and spray febreze air neutralizer to combat the smell.

yesterday, jake and lisa were absent.

today, jake shows up in the same clothes he wore on tuesday...only now they are twice as pungent as they were two days ago. first thing this morning, he asked to speak to me about some trouble he was in, and i literally had to back away from him.

i spoke with my principal...and long story short, one of my male co-workers rounded up some clothes from the home ec. room, and explained to jake that he had to take a shower (we have facilities). i took his clothes and ran them through the school washing machine twice, before drying them with two downy sheets.

the hardest part of the day was talking with him about staying clean. i grabbed a male co-worker from across the hall and asked him to listen as i talked to jake about the effects of not being clean...people don't like to sit close to others who smell (i put it nicely), people who don't take care of themselves open themselves up to ridicule, people who have body odor have difficulty making and keeping friends, etc.

i put my arm around him and told him that i loved him, and that's why i knew i should be honest with him....that i wanted him to be the best he could be...that i would never want people to miss out on getting to know the real jake...that good habits will benefit him for the rest of his life. it was such a "girlie" talk, now that i look back on it. my co-worker jon simply said, "it (not bathing) is just not healthy". that's true. duh! i hadn't even thought of that!

so now i'm wondering if jake will stay clean. i'm wondering if his mother is going to come in and rip my hind end for trying to help her son.

teaching is not about teaching anymore. it's about taking care of kids who need it. it's about feeding them and clothing them...counseling them through emotional problems and fits of criminal behavior...listening to their struggles...and proving to them that there is at least one person in this world who cares about what happens to them.

it's exhausting. it's worth it. but man, i'm so tired...

and that's a magic number

9.

yes, nine. nine automated political messages left on my answering machine tuesday between 5:00 and 8:30. and unfortunately, we have one of those machines where you have to listen to the message before you can delete it.

i hit the "play" button and walked away...

and yes, i voted for barack obama. shockingly, i was reminded at school on wednesday, that prejudice is alive and well here in rural southern ohio. one of my students said that his father voted for hilllary because "he'd rather die than vote for a nigger". oh. my. gosh.

unbelievable.