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Harry Potter + Ann Arbor = Awesomeness

Last weekend I picke dup a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, read it, and took a day trip to Ann Arbor. It quite possibly was one of my favorite weekends of the summer. Colin was off in Vegas, learning more about his new internship congregation and getting to know the great people there, and I was in Tiffin with my new best friend, Kirby, and Colin's high school best friend, Mr. Gillig. Ben and I stood in line to get our copy of the book, went to get milkshakes at McDonalds, and sat for a cople of hours reading. I pooped out after a couple of hours, but Ben managed to stay up and read, and read, and read.

The next day came too early as I found myself rushing out the door in order to meet my friends Emily and Jim in Ann Arbor by 11 a.m. Emily & Jim are in my small group for CPE. Have I mentioned that my small group is great?! Jim and I butt heads a lot, but there is a lot of respect on both ends. Emily and I are like sisters from another mister, and though we do not look a like (as Natalie and I do) we have a very simillar trajectory in life. She goes to PLTS, Luther's partner school in the Western Mission Cluster. Anyway, we gt together to grab Indian food and to attend the Ann Arbor Art Fair. It is the largest in the country, I believe.

Some highlights:

(l-r) Steven Daniel, Audrey Heller, Marie Gruber

Though the fair offered much more than photographs, it was mostly photographs that caught my eye. I am really excited to take some photos next year on internship!

Later, I made my way to Zingerman's Deli, where I picked up some challa bread, kalamata olives and gorgonzola cheese. It was hectic; full of people and full of life! It is a must see, eat, experience in Ann Arbor.

I also made my way to Trader Joe's!

After all of this I even managed to see an old friend, Stephanie. I haven't seen her since we were in Freiburg together. She is pictured here, the one on the left, laughing.

On my way back from Ann Arbor I received a text message from Ben: what page are you on...I'm finished. He read the book in less than one full day! He won that round! It took me another day and a half to finish.

I've never had as much fun reading as I have with the Harry Potter series. I think I might start over from the beginning. Nothing has captured my imagination and focus more than this series. I don't want to spoil it for anyone who has not yet read the book, but I do want to say that I heart Neville Longbottom!

I have to say that I wasn't expecting a lot out of a weekend in which Colin was gone and I was left to Tiffin Ohio all by my lonesome, but with the help of a few friends, a great dog, and an incredible story, I did get by!

Three weeks to go before heading back to Minnesota and about four weeks until internship. It's hard not to look ahead, but here's to enjoying today!

Seasonal Feasting :: A Wedding, A Funeral

For everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven.

My friends Erin & Mitch were married today, Friday the 13th, a day that black cats and broken mirrors cannot touch superstitiuosly. But this particular Friday the 13th holds particular significance; Erin's grandparents were married 50 years prior on that same Friday the 13th. What a celebration: a new marriage, a golden anniversary!

I am sad that I couldn't be there. Being in Ohio doesn't afford for that. Nevertheless, through pictures and conversations with friends in attendance, the day was as beautiful as the bride.

Friday the 13th for me involved a funeral.

Last Sunday, one day after the flood, one day after musing about the ubiquitous page, call, tolling bell that seems to surround Colin's internship and my experience thereof, I received my first page, my first call. The bell was tolling for one of my patients.

The call came when I was as scrubby looking, hungry and active as possible. I was surprised to hear the phone ring, it never had before. In the car on my way to the grocery store, I fumbled toward my holster, flipped it open and sheepishly said, "This is Jeni." It was the nurse on call who asked if I could assist with a patient who was actively dying. A decision needed to be made and the family needed help in making it. I arrived 45 minutes later, cleaner, better looking, but still hungry for lunch. One hour and thirty minutes later, the patient breathed his last, surrounded by some family and one awkward yet calm chaplain.

They say you never forget your last death. I wonder if that is true. I guess time will tell.

I attended the funeral on Friday, a great service and a surprisingly good eulogy. The text was from Ecclesiastes 3, the same text used at my grandfather's funeral. The preacher talked about the different seasons in this man's life; a person's life is made up of seasons and seasons change. Nevertheless, God's promises don't change. God gives us our seasons, God is with us in our seasons, God brings us through our seasons, especially the season of death, and gives us life.

I find it pleasing to have had a funeral on this Friday the 13th, this same day as my friends' wedding, this same day as the 50th wedding anniversary, for these seasonal feastings are enveloped in God's great love which calls us all to the great feast, now and forever. While our seasons may be different, our lives woven at different times, at different places and with different materials, the promise remains: in Christ Jesus, God is with and for us and nothing can separate us from that.

the flood

Thank God for geraniums. Geraniums.

I had a plan for the weekend. A plan to see Colin on Saturday morning, to have breakfast with him before he started his shift, to go to Columbus and do some shopping, specifically at Trader Joes. I had a plan.

Saturday morning, in a hurry to get to Lima to see Colin before his shift started, I hustled from his house, where I am taking care of his dog while he is away for the weekend, to go to the Baker's house, where I house sit while they are in China. The Bakers left on Friday morning. Peg asked me to water her geraniums every day: two glasses for the geranium and one glass for the fern. I was already running late for Lima, and a trip over to the Bakers would add 20+ minutes to my trek, but deontology, what can you do?

I open the door, and, water. Water everywhere. Water all over the floor, water running through the vents, water dropping through the floor to the basement. Water. And there I was in my cute little dress. A damsel.

I tried to turn the water off, I tried to contain the water, but, like anyone who sees a mouse, I was on high ground, out of the water. I called for reinforcements.

Thankfully with the Bakers, the reinforcements include The National Center for Water Quality.

Within minutes, I was flooded with help. Ellen called and Nancy and her crew were over to shut off the water, dry up the mess and provide this distressed damsel with calm. Thanks be to God for such good neighbors.

I also called the plumber. He found the culprit: a quarter inch piece of plastic tube that up and cracked, bursting and flooding and ruining any chance for me to go to Lima any time soon. He'll come back on Tuesday to finish the job.

I did manage to water the geraniums. And because I came to water the geraniums and happened upon the flood at that moment, the water stayed off of the Baker's beautiful new hardwood floor. Thank God for geraniums.

And as for Lima, I made it eventually, just in time for Colin to be paged. Sigh.

We're getting used to responsibility. This call, this job, this life...Life seems to hang on the mercy of others, ebbing and flowing in rhythm with jarring pager beeps. I hate that beep. But that beep is me too.

That beep for me was to break my plans in order to stop a flood.

All in all the day wasn't half bad. I called up Colin's high school buddy Ben and went out to lunch at the Clover Club. Ben's pretty cool. He mostly likes good music, especially alt country. I love alt country. I heart Ryan Adams.

Kirb and I were also able to spend most of the day together. I know he likes that. He misses people when they're not around. He pouts when we go away. We napped and watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I always cry when Cedric is killed by Wormtail's Avada Kedrava spell. So sad.

In Lima, when Colin was paged, I went shopping. I became that guy.

We ended up getting a late dinner at Milano Cafe, our second favorite restuarant in Lima. And instead of catching a movie or bowling, we got a call from our great buddy Jesse, who is in Denver for the summer for CPE.

So much for plans, life happens anyway.

Toledo Museum of Art, The

CPE Group today comprised of a visit to the Toledo Museum of Art. Didactic was presented through art.

We sat in front of The Architect's Dream by Thomas Cole, The Adoration of the Child by Piero di Cosimo; we shared about what we saw and what we thought was going on in the painting.

The museum was surprisingly well-stocked; it had its share of the greats and some of my faves: Rothko, Van Gogh, Monet, Renoir, Cranach (nerd!), Rembrandt, Modigliani, Picasso et al, et al.

There were two exhibits that we took in, the first was Speaking Out, the art of Elizabeth Catlett.
The exhibit offered pieces sculptured, printed and drawn; a wide variety that ran the gamut from political action to the love of a mother.

Next we saw "Dream American;" an exhibit on Andy Warhol. I've taken in a few AW exhibits, and the things that always strikes me is his parallel use of death and the cult of celebrity. In Warhol's words, "The more you look at the same exact thing, the more the meaning goes away, and the better and emptier you feel." Warhol's multiple images of the celebrity offers familiarity in place of a sense of the strange. Likewise with death. Images of death and those who have died, plastered over and over again creates familiarity rather than strangeness.

Underscoring these two poles is American consumerism. About those Campbell soup cans, it was written, "[Warhol] considered consumerism the bedrock of American Culture and felt tthat art should reflect the priorities of the culture back to itself." To this Warhol adds, "Buying is more American than thinking and I'm as American as they come."

The best Warhol quote of the day: "I am a superficially deep person."

A good day. Back to the grind tomorrow.

Cheers.

Ben Kweller :: Penny on a Traintrack

My Song of the Day