Midlife Meditation

We don't teach to get rich. No American teacher has ever taught with an eye toward luxury. Since public education was conceived by Thomas Jefferson, teaching has always been treated as a calling akin to the priesthood or the military: a servant profession that relies upon dedicated idealists whose primary reward is the work itself. Becoming a teacher in the nineteenth or early twentieth century was tantamount to taking a vow of poverty. Teachers were revered not just for the good work they did, but also for the sacrifices they made in order to do that work. The unionization of education helped bring teacher salaries up to a living wage, and to grant teachers pensions and health benefits (in fact, the first insurance companies were created precisely to make health care affordable to cash-strapped teachers), so that today, teachers can expect to live comfortable middle class lives, looking forward to secure retirements. But no one--not even administrators, the best paid professio...

Three years and two months. That's how long I've lived at 6420 NW Starflower Drive. That's a long time for me to have an address. In fact, it's a record for me: my previous record for holding one address as an adult was two years and ten months. You may be thinking that's a horribly itinerant way to live. The saving grace, you may also be thinking, is that the word "adult" in that paragraph means I had a more stable childhood. And you'd be right for thinking that--but not a lot. The longest I lived anywhere before college was four years. When I tell people this, their first response is typically "Army brat?" "Preacher's kid" is my reply. And that does explain all that moving around in my childhood, an average of every three years: my father was an American Baptist, and then a United Methodist, pastor. As an American Baptist, his job was subject to the whims of his church council and the personalities that ran it. After...

Just over half the Republican Presidential candidates. In the end, will there be anyone left to vote for whomever survives the GOP presidential nomination race? Donald Trump set the tone for the campaign with his vicious, unapologetic assault on immigrants. He started by slandering Mexican immigrants, and under criticism, doubled down to propose eliminating birthright citizenship, the crown jewel of post-Civil War Constitutional reforms. Following Mitt Romney's embarrassing defeat in 2012, the Republican Party did some deep navel-gazing. One of its conclusions was that the party had to start appealing to immigrants if it was to have any chance of ever winning the White House again. Trump's two-month tirade against immigrants is a brutish repudiation of that conclusion, and the speed with which so many of his opponents for the nomination jumped on the Constitution-scrapping bandwagon demonstrates the shallowness of the introspection. Ted Cruz has downplayed the immigra...

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. The year was 1981, and we had just gotten out of a jazz ensemble rehearsal. That year, jazz rehearsals had been scheduled at noon, which meant by the time we got out, it was too late for me to have lunch in my dorm, which only served it until 1:00. That meant eating on the east side of campus, where the kitchen stayed open until 1:30. While I missed eating with my friends, I was able to forge relationships with two of my fellow jazzers, whose names now escape me, and through them, to gain some insights into Greek culture. During this particular lunch, the usual topics of conversation--courses, professors, whatever charts we'd been working on during rehearsal, trumpet technique--never emerged, because my two bandmates launched into a pissing match over their drinking exploits; more to the point, with the messy aftermaths of said exploits. And that's when one of them described the Blow Chart hanging in the common room of ...

The Scouts beat the Methodists. On July 18, the Scout Executive announced that the policy forbidding gay adults from serving as Cub and Boy Scout leaders had been revoked. Chartering organizations still have final say in whom is qualified to lead a pack or troop, meaning churches may continue to discriminate, but the national organization no longer ties the hands of those sponsors who seek to remove sexual orientation from their lists of qualifications. Putting the decision in local hands was not enough for a number of churches, who promptly disavowed their association with Scouting. The radical religious right will continue to bury its head in the sand of denial even as it goes on blindly lashing out at people whose identity is itself sinful by their definition. Consequently, evangelicalism continues its slide deeper into irrelevance. By the time Millennials are fully in charge of this nation's government and other institutions, conservative Christians will be little ...

Muggles don't get it. By muggles, I'm referring to people who, while not themselves part of the improv or music worlds, nonetheless are appreciators of those worlds. The more enthusiastic ones can be called "fans," the obsessed ones "nerds" or "geeks," but all of them, from the utterly dedicated down to the mildly intrigued, constitute a group best characterized as "the audience." As the audience, they do utterly get that what they're experiencing is cool. That is to say, they're witnessing performers do something powerful, entertaining, deeply moving, something that resonates deep within the observer; and they're seeing it appear to be effortless. Seeing it happen, feeling awe at how polished it appears to be, how seamless are the transitions from one part to another, they cannot help but think there is something magical about what is happening on stage or, barring the supernatural, at least a sign of great talent. An...

I'm very proud of this. Not so proud of this. I've always been DIY--up to a point. For most of my life, moving, house repairs, furniture assembly, yard work, auto maintenance, etc. have been things I did myself if I felt capable, got help with if I didn't (and could find the help), and only hired professionals for once those two avenues were exhausted--and only if I had the cash (or credit) on hand. When I was a pastor, that meant, often, that taking care of issues in my house was subject to the whim of the church trustees, which could often mean waiting a very long time. Leaving ministry meant it was now up to landlords and property managers to deal with home maintenance issues--and again, that could mean waiting a long time. A year ago, I made a big change, and became a home owner. Now, if something isn't getting done, it's my own damn fault.* I do need to say that my income has improved to the point that I can afford to bring in a plumber, elec...