June 26, 2006
A few years ago I
A few years ago I had a dream that I could breathe underwater and my apartment had filled up with water like a huge aquarium. When the dream began, I was watching Jacob sleep, and bubbles began floating from his mouth. Strange considering the room looked dry, but seconds later I noticed water flowing down the bedroom walls...you know...kinda like those water walls you see in shopping malls. Well, eventually, the room was seamlessly filled with water...not even a bubble of air from the ceiling to the floor. I know it sort of sounds scary because it's hard not to get hung up on the humans-breathe-air-and-have-poor-eyesite underwater situation, BUT somehow in the dream we were able to see clearly and breathe effortlessly. SO IT WAS GREAT! I'm sure other things happed in the dream, but all I can remember was that we were swimming around like the happiest mermaid and merman one ever did see...or one ever did imagine. Anyway, the dream was really soothing, and sometimes when I'm stressed out, I think about swimming around my enviornment to alleviate stress. If you get a moment, I recommend thinking about what room or building you would want to make your own aquarium. And do share your thoughts! For those of you perplexed by the impending doom of electrical problems, pluming disasters, and or general property damage...imagine that you have the ability to aquariumize the place of your choice and the ability to snap your fingers again to turn everything back to normal...oh yeah...no electrical or sewer problems would occur.
P.S. Today, I was thinking the Sistine Chapel would be neat because you could swim up to the paintings on the ceiling, but I think I would pick either a castle (it's doorless and the tapestries would be kinda kelpish), OR the room to the right of the entry of the City Museum (It has all these amazing mother of pearl murals and the ceiling has all this silky cloth stuff streaming down. I think that setting would create one heck of a magical swim). So, what room or building would you want to swim in?
P.S.S. The picture is of the City Museum room I was referring to. It's much more glorious in person, but you get the idea.
Posted by Heidi V. at 12:29 PM | Comments (15)
June 21, 2006
My Dad
I had a nice chat with my dad this weekend in honor of Father's day. I think Father's day has always been is a bitter-sweet holiday for dad. He has been plagued by what I call the "ties and flies epidemic". By this I mean, people, without fail, buy him neck ties, or fly fishing flies every year. The ties pile in his closet away from view---he hates ties, and he has a well founded paranoia about making himself look like he stepped out of a 70's sitcom. And the flies, well, this is a ridiculous gift considering he has his own professional fly tying business. The epidemic is really a result of the unspoken understanding that you don't ASK dad what he wants for Father's day. This is cause he's a wee bit eccentric and accident prone--a lethal combination. Not as if the tie, being much like a noose, is safe gift! The thing is, deep down my dad is a true scientist and probably would ask for: splicing tools (too sharp), explosives (self-explanatory), or camera paraphernalia (with which you run the risk of him gallivanting off to some cliff in pursuit of the perfect picture). For this reason, all his loved ones...including myself, are avid tie and fly buyers. When I say dad's eccentric, I mean it! Let's just focus on his teeth issues for a moment. About 10 years ago, my dad got his front tooth knocked out by one of our horses. With some prodding, he got a bridge thing put in. Well, a few years later, when my sister and I were presenting at a 4-H club meeting, my dad stood up, ran into a pole and knocked the fake tooth off the bridge. As mortifying as it was to have your dad nearly knocked unconscious and toothless before your peers, it was far more mortifying to walk into the kitchen with a friend to see dad melting his tooth back onto the bridge himself. He was using the kitchen stove, a soldering gun, and a paperclip. Not the best method of repair, but I will say interesting problem solving tactic. I also have memories of my dad being in the newspaper for classroom related accidents from him many years of teaching 6th, 7th, and 8th grade science. Like once, he took a big brick of some chemical and all his students to a local body of water to show dangerous it is to deal carelessness with chemicals. Noble cause, but he proved his point by dropped a chuck of the chemical in the lake which resulted in a massive fire and news coverage! My favorite of his moments had to be the stories my grandmother told me about when he got his first mini-chemistry set. The outcome was so horrific that grandma, a delightful, always-paint-the-world-rosy-kinda lady, prefaced the story with a "honey, you know grandma doesn't like to tell that story". I won't go into all the details, but I will say two words...Household Damage! For all these reasons, the fly and tie epidemic is, well, still an epidemic. Perhaps this year I could send him an assortment of Pop Rocks candy? Explosive yet safe? Really, at this rate he is never going to get a gift from me.
Posted by Heidi V. at 08:40 AM | Comments (6)
June 12, 2006
Egg-warming Anyone?
The other day I came across a quote from a Denise Levertov's poem that struck me. Levertov said,
"Just when you seem to yourself nothing but a flimsy web of questions, you are given the questions of others to hold in the emptiness of your hands, songbird eggs that can still hatch if you keep them warm..."
I immediately stopped reading for a bout of egg warming...Meaning, I pulled Jacob from his book and asked him what question plagued him most. Unfortunately, Jacob's question not only plagued him, but has also been plauging churches for centuries! A wee bit daunting for session #1 of intentional egg warming! Needless to say, a lengthy incubation period resulted in no major hatchings. However, the attempt to answer his question lent itself to a the reassuring truth; salvation doesn't depend on having a demystified puzzle perfect theology! Mollified, I cozied back into Levertov. A bit later Jacob asked me what question plagued ME most. He and I discussed it and I ended up just feeling a bit blue. SO, I thought I could offer my egg up as a blog topic. My question's this: How are woman and men innately different? I mean, most women I know cry more easily then men, and I noticed woman tend to work together to build conversations (expecting input during the process), where as men tend to build their ideas independantly then display them. Not that they don't take imput, but that they like to finish their monologue before getting another's input (both methods are great...just different). Now I will say that I have read a lot of stuff on this topic and the result; feel a bit insecure in my womaness, even though I like dresses now, and I've got a deep maternal instinct. All I'm saying is that-to John Eldridge's horror-I think if I were unconstrained, I would full heartedly emulate every defender, rescuer, pursuer superhero I have ever known! Normal, maybe? Maybe that's just my sin? The point is, I am curious if you all have thought about this topic. If so, what do you think? If you want to discuss whether you think gender is a discipline that is learned and needs to be practiced...cool! If you want to discuss the breakdown of gender roles in the family...that's cool too! Any attempt of you to warm this egg would be cherished. Men, if the image of egg warming makes you uncomfortable, remember Luke 13:31-35.
Posted by Heidi V. at 11:42 AM | Comments (18)
June 06, 2006
Play-World
Yesterday night I was reading The Silver Chair, delighting in a scene where Puddleglum, a marsh-wiggle, confronts the queen of the underworld. The queen is maliciously trying to distort reality by convincing her audience that their reality is just a silly dream. Ah but good Ol' Puddleglum retorts with, "Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things-trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies make a play-world that licks your real world hollow. That's why I am going to stand by the play-world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't an Aslan to lead it!
So, for my first official Blog entry, I was wondering if you would join me in a "play-world that licks the real one hollow." In my play-world imagine you are the size of a grain of sand and that you can go anywhere and do anything. To make it more feasible, you can designate a person to cart you around to experience your salt-sized life. Would you swim in a dew filled tulip or hike the forest of a friend's eyebrow?
Note: I spend absorbent amounts of time contemplating such things, the possibilities are endless...now explore your cerebral cortexes and see where the convolutions lead. K?
Posted by Heidi V. at 11:35 AM | Comments (16)
June 04, 2006
This is a henna tatoo!
This is a henna tatoo!Posted by Heidi V. at 07:13 PM | Comments (5)
Hello this is my new
Hello this is my new blog!
Posted by Heidi V. at 06:51 PM | Comments (3)