The Perfect Sort of Weird

Daniel has a habit of breaking out laughing at me. Usually I have just done or said something utterly bizarre. (Yes, it happens often.) When I ask why he is laughing, he says "You are so weird. I love you. You are the perfect sort of weird for me!" Anyhow, Sunday marked the day we met six years ago. So, here, 2 days late and several dollars short, I dedicate this classic love song to the man who is the perfect sort of weird for me!

PIG LATIN SONG
(John D. Loudermilk)
BOB LUMAN (WARNER BROS. 5204, 1961)

Oink-oink, oink-oink
Two little piggies go walkin'
Two little piggies go talkin'
Down the lane, hand in hand each day
The he-piggy steals a kiss from her
And then starts to whisper
And this is what the little piggies say

Iay, Iay ovelay...
Iay ovelay ouyay ithway all of my heart
Iay ovelay ouyay ithway all of my heart
Darling please tell me that we'll never never part
If you're not hip or if you don't understand
They're sayin' I love you in P-I-G-L-A-T-I-N
Oh yeah, Iay, Iay ovelay
Iay ovelay ouyay ithway all of my heart
Iay ovelay ouyay ithway all of my heart
Darling please tell me that we'll never never part

Me and my baby go walkin'
Me and my baby go talkin'
Down the lane, hand in hand each day
I steal a kiss from her
And then we're startin' to whisper
And this is what, what we have to say

Iay, Iay ovelay...
Iay ovelay ouyay ithway all of my heart
Iay ovelay ouyay ithway all of my heart
Darling please tell me that we'll never never part
If you're not hip or if you don't understand
They're sayin' I love you in P-I-G-L-A-T-I-N
Oh yeah, Iay, Iay ovelay
Iay ovelay ouyay ithway all of my heart
Iay ovelay ouyay ithway all of my heart
Darling please tell me that we'll never never part
Please tell me that we'll never never part
Please tell me that we'll never never part

South of the Border

Everyone knows that if you travel south of the border in California, you are headed to Mexico, commonly just referred to as "South of the Border". What most people do not know is that if you travel south of the border in North Carolina on I-95, you end up at "South of the Border" in Dillon, South Carolina. We used to live just over 2 hours North of the Mexican border, so this "attraction" about 2 hours South of our new home takes on a special poignancy.

Don't think you can miss the place. Indescribably tacky billboards announce its approach for over 60 miles in either direction (picture a giant 3-D wiener with the phrase "You never sausage a place" and you will get the idea), and the skyline is indelibly blighted by the Sombrero Tower, dubbed by some as the "Eiffel Tower of the South".

"Pedro", the mascot of "S. O. B.", would have you believe you have arrived in little Mexico (Tijuana comes to mind, sort of, in a very bizarre Dixie kind of way). In fact, it's a wonderland of fun if you like pseudo-Mexican kitsch, terrible puns, carnival rides at Pedroland, giant fiberglass animals and shop after shop of cheap molded plastic garbage masquerading as toys, clothing and dinnerware. Let's just say that we wondered quietly why human rights groups haven't lobbied to shut the place down, and we weren't terrifically surprised that we didn't see a single person that looked remotely Mexican for miles in any direction. Perhaps they prefer not to shop at "El Drug Store".

Still, we were looking to stretch our legs, use the restroom and get a bite to eat, and South of the Border turned out to be a great place for the former, an adequate place for the second, and a regrettable place for the latter, despite our decidedly low standards at that point in our journey.

This most interesting locale proved to be a rather accurate caricature of what many Americans think of when they think border-town Mexico. That is a fact I find mildly embarrassing, having spent about 3 months of my life in Mexico over the years. To quote a caricature of American culture, "Aye Caramba!" Rather than attempting further description, I think I will let my camera do the talking.

Be Still and Know

If there was ever a time I deeply wanted to hear "no" in response to my question, it was one Sunday in early 2001. I was in college at the time, and I was in the middle of one of a string of unhealthy relationships. I was, once again, experiencing the desperation and dismay that only comes from reflecting on who I ought to be in Christ and who I actually am wrapped up in myself. I was going to confession every two weeks at the instructions of my confessor priest, and I was rather distraught by how many sins I could manage to commit in the short 14 days that would elapse before I would formally make my confession to Christ in the presence of this kindly priest.

It's not that I was an incredibly bad person. In fact, I am quite sure I never had to confess anything out of the common way for someone in my age and situation. But much of the reason I was at confession so often was because, this priest, in his wisdom, knew that I needed more frequent reminders of grace, forgiveness and love. It wasn't that I was so sinful as much as that I was so weak. He could see that I needed to unburden my soul of the weights I carried and watch them become nailed to the cross. I needed to hear the words, after a reminder of God's love and compassion, "Have no further anxiety; go in peace."

Have no further anxiety. Go in peace.

I think if you look up the word "anxiety" in the dictionary, you may find my picture as an illustration. I haven't the heart to look. It would probably only contribute to my anxiety. As for peace, I know not of what you speak. I cannot sit or stand without fidgeting, and the tell-tale jiggling of my leg and twitching of my fingers provide a pretty accurate glimpse of what my mind is doing not quite so visibly. I don't know how to be still. I don't know how to be peaceful. I don't know how to release the anxiety I feel about all of the aspects of my life -- including my sinful condition.

The faith I have embraced is not one of guilt. It isn't at all. In fact, Orthodoxy's emphasis is on the divine in mankind, not the damage. Ours is not a theology of depravity and damnation, but of a loving and compassionate Savior.

No, the guilt is mine. I carry it with me, fused to my soul like an extra limb: one that drags itself behind to slow progress whenever I, fragmented and conflicted, choose to move towards God. That limb is a convenient place to rest when I decide the struggle against it is too much.

That Sunday six years ago, I sat and asked my priest, in deadly seriousness, if the saints had something in them that I didn't. I've read the stories -- all of the amazing men and women who have become vessels of uncreated light and grace -- from the dawn of mankind to today. Surely they have something, some deep longing that is greater than the pull of temptation, some divine spark that grows into a flame, some preternatural force of will. My priest looked at me and answered, also deadly serious: "No."

I think he went on to explain, but I was too distracted by all the parts of "no" I understood to really listen to the rest. The impact of his words was clear. For we believe in a will that is free -- free to choose the right and good, and free sit idly by, a willing slave to sin. "No" means that I am not off the hook. "No" means that I am made to become holy as Christ is holy, and that if I am not, I have nobody but myself to blame, because I am free to run home to my Father, like the prodigal son who squandered his living. Home to my Father who will dress me in the finest clothing and kill the fatted calf.

I like my guilt. I must. It has been my friend and companion these 30-odd years. It provides me with a ready excuse: You want to be like who? Hahahaha. Good one. At least you still have your sense of humor. I've told you before, and I will tell you again, there is no way God has any use for a "Christian" like you. If you like, I can catalog for you all of the things you have done in the last week... no, I only need the last day to prove my point. Why bother repenting when you know you will do it again? And you will -- you will fail. Even now, while you have been listening to me, you've added to the list of failings.

On it drags. On it drones and drowns out the other voices, including the ones I most need to hear:

"I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, And I will not remember your sins."

"Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more."

Hence the frequent reminder: Have no further anxiety. Go in peace.

"NO, there is nothing about you that is fundamentally different from those who love me to their martyrs' deaths. There is NO sin so great I cannot forgive it. There is NO offense I am unwilling to forget. It is you who cling to it, I can set you free."

For You This Thanksgiving

MooMoo nearly always has some portion of her tongue hanging out. This was a rather classic example.

But seriously ... We're very thankful for all of our friends and family and hope you have all had a blessed time of feasting and joy with those you love!

Hooked

There have been many firsts in my life, but it seems I have rarely (since I was an infant and everything was new) had so many firsts in the space of a few months. Of course, the new things seem to have multiplied some when I got married anyway. Daniel had plenty of interests that I didn't yet share and together we have found reasons to go new places and try new things. He took me to my first opera. He has been with me for my first trips to London, Dublin, Savannah, Charleston, Philadelphia and other fun places. He was with me for my first soccer game. And, tonight, in the midst of my first "real" fall, I had another first: my first hockey game.

Mind you, I have never even watched a full hockey game on television before. I have watched a few minutes, yes, but not a full game. I didn't know what high sticking was, or what power plays were, or that goal tenders seem to enjoy turning themselves into pretzels at the first hint of an incoming puck. I couldn't have told you that a double minor was a relatively major penalty, that the linesmen (the referee-types without orange armbands) were known to do graceful leaps to avoid becoming obstacles, that players hop in and out of the game like they might get hit by lightening if they stay on the ice more than 25 seconds at a stretch, or that hockey fans are at least as fanatical as their counterparts in other sports.

I knew so little, in fact, that I asked a friend who had attended a hockey game a few days ago to tell me how cool it is in the arena. He informed me that it is a little cool by my standards (he's used to sub-zero temps where he's from and has been seen wandering around in short sleeves when it's 35F outside and I am bundled up like a blizzard may flatten me at any moment). He assured me, however, that if I stood up and cheered properly, I would be fine.

Cheering properly? Well, maybe I could get that right. I *did* know enough to cheer for the home team. Still, at the beginning, I sometimes wasn't sure why, exactly, in that I couldn't have told you why whatever acrobatic or violent thing had just occurred on the ice was laudable. Nor did I understand precisely why I was chanting "Ref, you suck" with all of the black-and-red clad folks around me.

We were 8 rows from the ice and plenty close to the spot where the players repeatedly slam into the glass when they are trying to keep the opponent from passing the puck out of the corner to a teammate out in front of the goal. That was a sight, and sound. But there were other sights and sounds right there in the stands. We were also one row and an aisle from some of the people I will refer to as "donkeys" who were rooting for the wrong team. They even managed to make the otherwise cute and intelligent children in front of them root for the wrong team. This provoked silly comments from the fans behind me and was more than mildly annoying when the other team scored. But why should I care?

I was giggling at "Come on... we all know Philadelphians don't have sticks long enough to grab onto" from the die-hard fans behind me, directed at the guys across the aisle, when the woman on the other side of Daniel asked, "Is this your first hockey game?" I had to admit it was, and I was promptly informed by three of the fans around me that it gets worse (or better, depending on how you look at it).

Well, it got better. And it got worse. The better part was that I began to have a clue and even found myself spontaneously standing and yelling at the right moments. I even understood why the man behind me yelled "Get your head out of your a**, ref... you are missing a good game here." The "it got worse" part is that the good guys played badly. Very badly. Even I could tell it wasn't working.

As the game drew to a close, I leaned over to the woman who had inquired about my newbie status and said, "I am not even a real fan yet and I have already lost my voice." She smiled and replied, "It doesn't take long to get hooked." She's right. I think I may be hooked. Daniel smiled when I said as much as we were leaving.
I left wrapped in a cozy oversized Hurricanes sweatshirt and in possession of a working knowledge of the Hurricanes lineup. Cullen, Wallin, Williams, Brind'Amour, Ladd, Staal, Ward, Stillman, Walker ... Don't you silly hockey players know that hooking is a penalty? To the penalty box with all of you! (But thanks for the rather costly lessons in cheering properly -- and please have the decency to win next time!)

Self-loathing and Vindication

“How often we recall, with regret, that Napoleon once shot at a magazine editor and missed him and killed a publisher. But we remember with charity that his intentions were good.”
~ Mark Twain

I have a love-hate relationship with my job. I adore words and I have great affection for writers. The problem is that this particular pair of loves sometimes feels like it was modeled after God and Mammon.

Some weeks ago I was sent a book to review with the idea that we would print an excerpt. I opened it expectantly. I had not read more than a page or two before the dreaded realization hit me that the book had not been professionally edited before publication. That, or it had been poorly edited and somebody had been ripped off. I hate that. I especially hate it when I deeply want to like the book on its other merits.

Here's where the realist in me sits myself down for a firm talking-to. I can't seem to manage to write a single blog post without some infelicity or error, so what business have I meddling in other people's writing? I suppose the answer is principally economic: I get paid to meddle.

I imagine the authors I work with have a rather love-hate relationship with me, too. I sometimes get the "That's perfect - it is exactly what I was trying to say!" response. I've even been told that I am the best editor a particular writer has ever worked with. The pessimist in me wonders if that statement hinges on a single fact that makes anything said in that particular form true, much the way my dear husband's admission that I am his "very best wife ever" is just as true as the statement he never utters that I am his "very worst wife ever." Meanwhile, the cynic in me starts looking for whatever it is the author wants from me. Perhaps, in my short career, I already feel I have dodged a bullet or two.

I very rarely get the feeling that an author hates my guts. The pragmatist in me believes this is principally because authors are so skilled with words and so clever in general that they can mask their venom and simply decide to never work with me again. However, I am sometimes struck by the conviction that what I have done in daring to touch someone's work is somehow reprehensible, whether or not the writer comes out and says it.

Oh phooey, I'll be out with it!
I hate editors.
I am an editor.
My logic classes at UCLA notwithstanding, I suppose that means I have some degree of self-loathing.

In my volunteer library job, I am sometimes asked to "weed" books that have a high number of "circs." This means that I get to find a designated book on the shelf, look at it briefly, and decide whether to consign it to the shredder or grant it a reprieve. I talked with one of my fellow volunteers about the feelings this particular job evokes. We tend to come up with the same sort of words to describe what we become when we do what we must do: inquisitor, executioner, tyrant ... In short, we become firemen worthy of Bradbury's dim future. Sentencing books to death makes us animals.

Sometimes (when I am NOT giddy with the power -- who am I kidding? I am seldom giddy with it, I am more often sick with it) editing evokes the same feelings. I must juggle the righteous indignation provoked by would-be words and sentences that affront the reader and the those unshakable feelings that creative efforts just oughtn't be touched.

I sat down early this morning to craft an email to the author before I started my day officially and, more to the point, before I lost my nerve. I had put it off for several days. Basically, my assessment boiled down to four words: Great material, terrible editing. Conflicted as I was, I couldn't bring myself to just come out and say it in those words.

The book has printed. It is already selling. My summation of the editing situation is likely to be as welcome as a hairball on the new beige carpet.

I eventually wrote a rather apologetic and lengthy email essentially asking if I can edit the heck out of a passage and call it an "adaptation." I sat and rewrote and reviewed and revised and revisited my message for a good 20 minutes. I read it out loud, imagining how my words would sound to me if I had written the book and found this message sitting in my inbox. Finally, I pressed send and squeezed my eyes shut for a moment, waiting for that lightening bolt to hit.

When I realized I had been spared God's immediate vengeance, I got back to some of the things I needed to do, such as buying a few groceries for dinner. I walked into the store -- the nice boutique grocer with upscale products and uptown prices that happens to be conveniently located -- and was greeted by a sign: "Try Are Clementines." My coworker from Tennessee reminded me that it could have been worse. If he had written the sign the way he actually says those words, it would have read "Try Air Clementines."

In a moment it dawned on me: I am an angel of mercy. I have a purpose. I can do more than cause writers pain. I can bring grammatical light to the darkness of modern prose. Besides... I am right, darn it!

I got home to find an email waiting for me. The author was very gracious and was perfectly willing to let me adapt the material. The message closed with a few words in parenthesis:

(And you're correct -- the book needed editing and we should have had it sent out).

The editor in me is vindicated.

Conversations

Daniel: One thing

I just heard a bit of wisdom

sounds like A---'s wife just hit a deer

NIKKI: oooh

oh no

Daniel: the advice B--- gave is

don't wash the blood off the car

that way you can prove to the insurance co. that it was a deer

NIKKI: lol

okay

Daniel: Apparently the deer hit the windshield, and now there's glass in the backseat

NIKKI: I would be most upset about the deer

Daniel: bizarre. She hit the deer in mid-leap

she was in an SUV, and the deer hit the windshield and roof

NIKKI: yikes

I love you.

Please don't hit any deer, dear.

Daniel: fine then.

you always take away all my fun.

NIKKI: I try.

:P

Daniel: such is your wifely duty.

------------

Daniel and I have a long tradition, stretching back to the first week of our acquaintance -- when I was in Los Angeles and he was almost two hours away -- of communicating during the days or evenings apart via instant messaging programs. I have now-vague memories of joking about tambourines with ribbons and spirited praise songs in the online time spent together between our first meeting and our first date. It's how we got to know each other when the distance and our responsibilities kept us apart. I mean, this was, after all, the relationship that commenced with "May I email you?"

Of course, we know each other pretty well by now, but it still seems perfectly normal to us to exchange laughter, information and even endearments via text on a screen. It gives us no pause. It's just something we do, like reading a book together in the evenings, watching CSI or The Simpsons from the love-seat during dinner, going to lunch together when we worked in the same office, and talking about the big and small wrinkles in our lives before we drift off to sleep.

On Sunday the two of us stood chatting with a bunch of mostly young mothers as their children threw branches at each other on the lawn. Somehow the topic of communicating with spouses during the day came up. Most of these women are stay-at-home moms who use phones to make the occasional call to their office-working husbands. One mentioned the sometimes "I can't talk now" response that greets her spoken "I love you" as one of the hazards of work-day calls. There was some debate whether a typed "I love you", greeted by the same, was inferior when there are phones that can convey the voice in all of its intimacy and reality.

I'm not sure it matters to Dan or to me what is "better." I think what we value is all of the ways we can carry on the constant, though admittedly intermittent, conversation of our lives.

I just finished Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking -- the memoir she wrote in reflection on the year of her life that followed the sudden death of her husband, John Gregory Dunne. As is our custom, I would read passages from the book to Daniel that struck me as I read. In this book, there were quite a lot of things that had that effect. I read the first three chapters while soaking in the bath, and by the time Dan wandered in to check on me or tell me something, my toes were raisins, my eyes were glowing red orbs and my face was damp, ruddy and tear-streaked. He took one look at me, asked what was wrong, and plopped down on the toilet seat to listen.

Such is his husbandly duty.

Perhaps the book resonated with me because, as Dan put it, "Her magical thinking is much like yours. I can see you doing and thinking the same things."

"Read, learn, work it up, go to the literature.
Information is control."

I think he's right, as much I can imagine what I might be like without him. The truth is that neither of us knows what we might be like facing an empty house, clothes without anyone to wear them, half-finished projects and reminders everywhere that we were once not so desperately empty and alone.

I think another reason for that reaction is how much of our own marriage I saw in their relationship as described by Joan. I recognized that constant conversation, which, for them, both writers working at home, happened most often in person:

"I could not count the times during the average day when something would come up that I needed to tell him. This impulse didn't end with his death. What ended was the possibility of response. I read something in the paper I would normally have read to him. I notice some change in the neighborhood that would interest him [...] I recall coming in from Central Park one morning in mid-August with urgent news to report: the deep summer green is already changing. We need to make a plan for the fall, I remember thinking. We need to decide where we want to be at Thanksgiving, Christmas, the end of the year.
I am dropping my keys on the table inside the door before I fully remember. There is no one to hear this news, nowhere to go with the unmade plan, the uncompleted thought. There is no one to agree, disagree, talk back."

By the grace of God, our conversation continues. Sometimes it is rather mundane and irrelevant.

Daniel: I see the Britney saga never ends... now a celeb-watch website has posted video of her running a red light with the kids in the car

it's like watching a train wreck, I tell ya

NIKKI: only less entertaining

Daniel: too true

Sometimes it is deep, serious and life-changing.

NIKKI: your vino arrived

all red

2005 Wine Club #4 (34% Cab Franc, 33% Malbec, 33% Pt. Verdot)

2005 Tre Vini (50% Sangiovese, 27% Cab, Sauv., 23% Malbec)

2004 "Reserve" Merlot

Daniel: awesome!

Sometimes it is humorous, and sometimes it simply displays our insanity - the special sort of insanity that we share.

NIKKI: Mr. Orange-cat just came calling at the front porch

Daniel: fun

NIKKI: except Monkey growled at orange cat

which made Moomoo mad

because Moomoo didn't see orange cat

so Moomoo got riled and took it out on Monkey

hissing and swatting at him

Daniel: she's so high strung

NIKKI: yes

well, it was upsetting

he howled

Daniel: did she eventually see Mr. Orange?

NIKKI: nope

I tried to explain, though

lol

Daniel: Now is when you need an electronically-controlled squirtgun on the porch

NIKKI: lol

Daniel: it'd be like playing Unreal Tournament against a cat

NIKKI: haha

What matters is that the conversation keeps going as long as we are given to carry it on. So, I just keep talking, chatting, calling and loving... whenever I have a moment to do so.

Such is my wifely privilege.

We're Not in So. Cal. Anymore, MooMoo!

I'm not sure when fall arrived. I had been watching for it, looking for any sign. Then, somewhere in the space of a week or two, autumn crept in when I grew too tired of straining to keep my vigil. Now the trees are draped in colors of flame and a few have even shed their leaves altogether in favor of their simple, unassuming winter simplicity. The grass is settling down for a nap under the crunchy blanket of oranges and browns. The stream has turned into a leaf-strewn ribbon of glass, and the water level has stopped rising and falling, as if preparing to be frozen in place. At night a genuine chill falls, and we curl up on the love-seat to watch a movie or read before the warmth of our modest fireplace.

This weekend we took some time out to picnic at a public park in Raleigh. We rented a pedal-boat and floated on the lake for a little under an hour, marveling at the deepening colors of the foliage as the gilded sun began its slow descent behind the tree line. We shared the our lake-side lunch with geese, ducks and coots, and the lake itself with a blue heron, a few people in small fishing boats and one other couple in a pedal boat. It was beautiful, solitary, cool and peaceful.

California is beautiful, there's no question about that, but I, for one, am reveling in a different sort of beauty here in my own backyard. No, MooMoo... we're not in So Cal anymore.

The Major Purchase

I received a rather insistent instant message from Ashleigh several days ago asking that I be less cryptic and more forthcoming about the purchase we made that I alluded to several posts back. She managed to get it out of me, but assuming there were others of you who wished to know... here's the answer: we got a new (second) car.

I think my resolution to find money for a car somewhere has grown out of a few facts:
1. Not that it will ever be an issue, but I would like to think that *if* there were a nuclear disaster at the power plant less than 10 miles from here, I would be able to pack up myself and the cats and attempt to evacuate.
2. The weather is turning cool enough that I don't want to be out walking in it -- in part because the cold, dry air has caused me asthma problems.
3. I have time to do things in the morning before work most days, but without a vehicle, my choices were limited.
4. I had started getting nervous about taking our older car on the driving trips that we have begun to make more regularly.

I'd been researching what to buy for several weeks and running the ideas by Daniel. My greatest goals were to get the safest cheap car on the market, and to get a few features we missed in the Rav-4 we sold when we left California: a manual transmission, a hatchback for hauling purposes and cruise control. We actually went car shopping while Dad was here to go to the dealership with us.

We settled on a Nissan Versa liftback and bought the one car on the lot that had the features we wanted and only the features we wanted, keeping the price within reach. That car just happened to be black. I think it's cute.

We're enjoying making the mileage climb from the initial 7.8 miles the odometer boasted. Dan takes it to work most days, and we cleaned up the Corolla so both of our cars are reasonably spiffy. I have the Corolla most days, which is working just fine.
We celebrated the large purchase (as is the tradition in my family) with a lovely dinner... this time at J Betski's in Raleigh. That was also my birthday dinner. The food was absolutely amazing. All in all, that day (October 27) was quite memorable and fun.

The Year of My Imminent Death (a.k.a. 2-inch Jesus)

When I was a small child I had several interesting theological notions. Most of them resulted from my determined attempts to wrap my brain around concepts that were (and are, I confess) beyond my comprehension.

I remember my solution to the problem of omnipresence. Though the whole was admittedly admittedly heretical, I got the omni part right. In order to get there, I had to postulate several billion little Jesus-figures, each about 2-inches high, that, if I were able to see with spiritual eyes, would have been stacked in millions of rows, creating a sort of floating 3-dimensional Jesus "wallpaper" (my word for it at the time) that invisibly surrounded the earth. I never got a glimpse of the myriad 2-inch Jesus figures for obvious reasons, but I would sometimes sit with my eyes closed and envision him there... replicated as many times as needed in order to be absolutely everywhere all at once.

I also remember trying to imagine what it must be like for God to really listen to everyone's prayers. I believe that I counted it genius that His vision for the world meant that a respectable number of us were asleep at any given time. That certainly must have made matters easier. Still, I would sit and wonder if God really did see me and hear me -- uniquely me -- in the thunder of human voices. I hadn't yet grown into the idea that somehow my little prayers for the trivial circumstances of my young life couldn't possibly matter to a God who had a whole world of disaster, sin and suffering to contend with. That particular mistake would come later.

I recall having a whole lot of faith, as well. I regularly prayed for things I wanted with the full expectation that they would happen. Most of these prayers were selfish -- that I would win the silver dollar to be awarded to only one child in my class, that it would rain, that our stalled car would start, that (in spite of my parents' insistence to the contrary) I would get a dog -- and they very often came to pass. Each of those examples is specific, and for each one I have a memory of a prayer and the circumstances that I took to be God's "yes." Perhaps this was an indication that I had the "cosmic vending machine" idea of God. Perhaps, instead, I was onto something.

I seemed to understand love in a more primitive way. There is a cassette tape that surfaced in my late teens. I have since lost it, but I remember some of the contents. It was a just-over-5-year-old me singing songs I had composed. The lyrics to one of them included these words: "I love God and He loves me. Just thinking about the love of God to me. That's my song of Jesus." Another was just the words "I love you" repeated over and over again in different note and rhythm patterns. Love was instinctive somehow. It was just a natural part of my experience, and then, as now, I expressed my experience in song.

The strangest theological blunder, if one can call it that, may have been my conviction that my parents would die at 33 years of age. Adding to my fear was that I knew their birthdays were days apart, so I was likely to suffer their loss one after the other. This particular conviction arose out of a logic similar, I think, to that displayed by a Korean student I tutored in English when Daniel and I lived in Mission Viejo. She sat at our dining table, above which was hung an icon of a bearded, long-haired Christ. Daniel walked into the room -- her first glimpse of my bearded, long-haired husband. Her eyes grew wide as he walked quietly to the other room. When he had closed the door behind him, she whispered to me with some urgency: "He must really love Jesus a lot." Why?" I asked. "Because he looks just like him!"

If my parents loved Jesus, they would certainly die at 33 as he did, through probably by means other than crucifixion. I don't think the fact that generations of Jesus-loving people had lived to ripe old ages (or died tragically younger) made any difference. So, until they turned 34 and I was forced to allow that I had been mistaken, I held my breath for a year.

My fear was irrational... then again, so were my faith and love.

Now I have, myself, turned 33. Perhaps this is the year God has ordained for my death. I don't know. All I know is that I have now turned the age that I thought was so magical so many years ago and that my views on God and life are incredibly different from those I held during that year of breath-holding.

Of course, my childhood notions of truth were flawed. It is growth to have left my 2-inch Jesus figures and superstitious notions about age behind. Still, I would like to think the logic of my Korean friend is within reach. Loving Christ really ought to make me look different. It ought to make me different.

In some ways, I think I would be better off reverting to the convictions I held as a child, when my simple lack of the adult virtues of logic and reason and reasonable doubt made Christ as present to me as the wallpaper in my bedroom, prayer unquestionably efficacious and love for Christ powerful enough to determine even the moment of death. Sometimes I wonder where the faith I had then has gone. There are moments when I send up some selfish, trivial prayer and still feel, for an instant, the urgency of that child in the words. Sometimes those silly prayers are all I can find in myself to pray.

My prayers for this year? That I learn to love again. That I learn that logic and reason do not spell the end of faith. That Christ will be bigger to me than fear and doubt. That the God of the universe will hear my selfish, trivial prayers in the midst of the millions of voices and love me -- uniquely me -- in spite of the size of my doubts and fears and my reliance on a logic that would crowd Him out. That my heart will spontaneously sing of that love, however many years He may give me to live.