The Night Writer

In the wink of an eye

The Night Writer — 2009-05-23T16:05+00:00

Sometimes God speaks like a mighty wind, and often as a still, quiet voice...and sometimes He just gives you a wink.

We have been blessed by so many people in preparing for today's wedding. It even goes back to last fall when a large group descended on our back yard to help clean out the gardens and prepare them for today's event; to the flights of volunteers who are helping with decorating, set up, food prep, serving, singing, DJ-ing and more; to the friends and family coming from near and far to be here. This morning I opened my Dietrich Bonhoeffer daily reader and here is the entry for May 23:

The Gift of Community (from Life Together)
Because God already has laid the only foundation of our community, because God has united us in one body with other Christians in Jesus Christ long before we entered into common life with them, we enter into that life together with other Christians, not as those who make demands, but as those who thankfully receive. We thank God for what God has done for us. We thank God for giving us other Christians who live by God's call, forgiveness and promise. We do not complain about what God does not give us; rather we are thankful for what God does give us daily. And is not what has been given enough: other believers who will go on living with us through sin and need under the blessing of God's grace? Is the gift of God any less immeasurably great than this on any given day, even on the most difficult and distressing days of a Christian community?

Where is everyone?

The Night Writer — 2009-05-23T02:05+00:00

The new roof is on.
The yard is mowed and edged.
Flower boxes filled.
Portico painted.
Arch in place.
150 chairs in place with 19 tables tucked in the garage (three trips in the pick-up), ready for deployment.
Fresh wood-chips and mulch worked into the landscaping (four trips in the pick-up).
Less than 22 hours to go.

Forecast for the wedding day: 75 degrees and partly cloudy, light breeze. Thank you, God, for RSVPing.

Let's do it.

Your invitation to the Blog Wedding of the Century!

The Night Writer — 2009-05-18T23:05+00:00

We didn't have room or budget for all of our blogging friends and readers to attend the Mall Diva's wedding in person this weekend, but since Ben and Faith met as a result of blogging we knew we had to do something to reach out to what the Mall Diva calls "our peeps" in the 'sphere near and far.

Therefore I'm pleased to announce that our friend, the inestimable Mr. Dilettante (or "Mr. D" for short) has agreed to live-blog the event here at The Night Writer blog for anyone who wants to check in on the proceedings electronically. The wedding and reception are taking place in our front yard this Saturday afternoon beginning at 4:30. Mr. D will set up shop around mid-afternoon to bring you behind-the-scenes commentary and on-the-spot reporting as the ceremony and reception unfold (though you may have to excuse him while he cuts a rug or two himself).

So how, exactly, did we end up with a wedding to marry a future Lutheran pastor into a family of wild-eyed Evangelicals...while having the whole thing live-blogged by a devout Catholic apologist?

Can you say God has a sense of humor?

The whole story has played out here in bits and pieces over the last three and a half years, but the short version is that I met fellow blogger Ben back in the summer of 2005 at one of the trivia nights at Keegan's Pub that are so popular with the Twin City blogging community. Young Ben was a shaggy-haired, underemployed carpenter with too much education but we hit it off and teamed up that first night to win first prize. I thought he seemed like a nice guy, perhaps a bit un-focused, but not necessarily someone to whom I'd say, "You know, I've got this daughter..."

He didn't meet the Diva for the first time until that December when he came to my church for a service ordaining my wife (The Reverend Mother), followed by a graduation ceremony in honor of the Diva's home school and beauty school graduations. He may have thought he heard angels singing when he first laid eyes on her, but it was really just the Diva practicing with the church band. He may have even thought he was seeing a Vision when he looked upon her, which was immediately replaced with a vision of doom when she hopped off the stage to give me a hug. (Some of his thoughts were recorded on his own blog at the time). It's been a long, strange trip since that long-ago, strange beginning (you can get a lot more details here) but it is coming to a beautiful and welcome arrival in a very few days. If you're not among those with us in person feel free to drop in here on Saturday afternoon. You won't get any cake, but you also don't need to bring a gift!

Update:

Also be sure to check out the photos and the account of Ben's Bachelor Party, put on by his best man, "KingDavid" from The Far Wright.

A novel date

The Night Writer — 2009-05-18T01:05+00:00

I went through my archives looking for the post below in order to re-run it as we count down the last few days before Ben and the Mall Diva's wedding this Saturday, May 23. Once I found it I copied it and then checked the date when it originally ran. It was strangely familiar.

May 23....2007.

Novella

"Finishing a book is just like you took a child out in the yard and shot it."— Truman Capote

I don't have the experience, yet, of being an author finishing a book so I don't know if Capote's words are apt. It seems to me the writing-publishing experience is more like being a parent and having a child leave the nest. As the parent of a soon to be 19-year-old still in the nest but beginning to make her own way I marvel at how what I’ve “created” has taken on a life of her own; how the countless hours spent shaping and imagining and agonizing over just the right word has inspired dialogue with subtleties, nuances and complexities I never realized were possible, and how a true character has emerged fully-formed and bursting to go forth.

For years this book was mainly blank pages; pages that consumed my life and were never far from my thoughts no matter what else I happened to be doing. Day by day those pages were filled, and while there are things I’d like to go back and rewrite there’s no guarantee that the story would be even better than it is now; even so I wrestle with the temptation/obsession to continue to tweak and polish.

Will anyone else understand the humor of page 112, or appreciate how difficult it was to write Chapter 19? Certainly not at the level I do, but that knowledge is for my own book, the one written on my heart. Now, though, it is time to see this through; to be proud to see all the time, work and love realized in a tangible package; to admire not just the cover but the spine; to breathe deep the aroma of the fresh pages and the glue that holds them together.

It is good.

Kissing the butterflies in my stomach

The Night Writer — 2009-05-13T16:05+00:00

This song very nearly could have been the song for the Father/Daughter Dance at the Mall Diva's wedding. It's got the heart right and a lot that could have been lifted from our lives, and a lot of the things that I feel...but I've found something just a little bit better. I'll keep that secret for now, though.

Delving back through the memories and posts about my daughter brings me to a seminal essay very much in keeping with the "Butterfly Kisses" song, entitled Dad to the Bone. That post reveals a bit of my thinking, but if you want to know more about the Mall Diva's thinking you should read her account of our travels in Italy, On Holiday, or her enlightening responses to a meme, entitled If I Ain't Hip, Ain't Nobody Hip or perhaps her first meme ever.

Similarly, I've gleaned a couple of snippets of Diva talk, such as her response to a question in another meme:

Q: Seriously, what do you consider the world's most pressing issue now?

Well, since there are so many, I'll pick one that doesn't depress me too much:

So many people don't know how to dress themselves.
...okay *sniff*, I promised myself I wouldn't cry...

Then there's this little bit of dialog:

My teenage daughter, Faith, loves the Expedia jingle and singing the nasal-sounding phrase at the end of their commercials. A while back we were watching something on television when an Expedia ad came on and she belted out "DOT-COMMMM" in unison with the tv. I looked over at her and said, "Your life is just filled with simple, inexpensive pleasures, isn't it?"

To which she replied, "You wish."

Boy, don't I ever.

What's going on

The Night Writer — 2009-05-08T19:05+00:00

Wednesday night the Mall Diva and Princess Flicker-Feather achieved a milestone in their performing career — their first "booked" gig where they were actually requested to perform. Not only that, but they had to have enough material to do two sets; since they only have two "cover" songs in their pop repertoire they had to practice extensively on their original compositions to put a show together.

And it was a very good show, bolstered by a friendly audience, and they even worked a little patter into the act as they introduced each song. It looked easy and natural for them, no doubt because they've been lifelong friends and singing partners almost since they could talk. The show was hampered by some poor sound-mixing in the first set but things were worked out in time for a powerful and varied second set. They even got tipped by a woman in the audience! When it was over and we got back home and unloaded the equipment the two of them hugged in the kitchen in celebration of their achievement and ... perhaps ... in the unspoken acknowledgement of what may yet come.

As I said, it was a significant evening: their first real show and the coffeeshop even printed flyers with their names and faces to promote the gig. They worked very hard to prepare. Certainly the hope and the expectation is that there will be more performances, bigger audiences, even some money. Life changes, though, sometimes very dramatically. Faith, aka "Mall Diva", gets married in two weeks and marriage is very time-consuming (and worth it). One makes time for the things that are important, but working, family, starting a new life in a new church as not only the husband and young-pastor-in-training but the wife get to "intern" in their new roles and responsibilities ...well, it can be hectic. Perhaps even more hectic than trying to simultaneously plan a wedding and rehearse for a show, but I guess we'll find out. Wednesday's performance could be the first in a series of many that will take Faith and Casii to new adventures and exposure, or it could be the culmination of a creative and loving partnership. I don't pretend to be able to predict what will happen or even to know what's going on in their heads; all I know is I just wanted to freeze the moment in my mind as they hugged.

Then again, that happens to me often lately as we count down the days to the wedding. I think about the wedding a lot, sometimes deliberately and sometimes because it can't be helped. It usually makes me a bit misty to think of it, so my deliberate thoughts are in the hopes that I can get myself all dried up by the time the actual event rolls around. There are so many memories and so much to think about. It so happens that in the four-plus years I've had this blog my eldest daughter has appeared here dozens and dozens of times, sometimes as the subject, sometimes in passing, sometimes as the author (a partial listing of her posts here).

I don't know if my strategy for remaining dry-eyed will work out, but you're welcome to share in the process with me. Over the next couple of weeks leading up to the big day I plan to group various collections of old posts about Faith here; feel free to laugh and cry along.

To begin with, we might as well look at a reminisce of her birth and a subsequent Father's Day essay. Next, let's introduce the cast of characters that have become a big part of this blog — some of whom have become a very big part of the wedding — with a couple of short posts that generated tremendous amounts of comments, all set off by a rather benign affront to the Diva's honor (as if I would suffer any other kind): Opening a Can and Order in the Court.

More to come in future days if I can bear up.

A suggestion

The Night Writer — 2009-04-22T18:04+00:00

There has been some discussion around the Night Chateau about what gift young Ben should give his groomsmen. Literary sort that he is, and with an employee discount at the Seminary bookstore, Ben has been thinking of respectable tomes by Wichtenstein, or perhaps a daily Kierkegaard reader. These are noble and edifying considerations to be sure.

Philosophically, I'm thinking something like this might be more popular:

April showers

The Night Writer — 2009-04-21T04:04+00:00

I'm busy with a lot of behind the scenes stuff. Of course, I'm not the only one who's busy: we're on the cusp of the countdown to the last 30 days before the Mall Diva's wedding. That means bridal showers such as the one held for her Sunday afternoon at church.

I need to find out what they were putting in the punch bowl.

Science!

The Night Writer — 2009-04-18T02:04+00:00

The Mall Diva and Tiger Lilly still like to hang out on the bed with the Reverend Mother before bedtime, though the RM goes to bed a lot earlier than they do. There was a beautiful breeze the other night and a good time to open a bedroom window in the master suite of the Night. RM breathed in deeply and as the Mall Diva entered the room said, "Why does the night air smell different than in the day?"

To which the Diva immediately replied, "Because the sun is stinky!"

A few minutes later Tiger Lilly made her entrance and was asked the same question.

"Because it's black."

Well I've never been to Spain...

The Night Writer — 2009-03-10T03:03+00:00

...but that may be about to change. Over the weekend My wife, Tiger Lilly and I applied to be accepted into the Pueblo Ingles program to help Spaniards learn to speak English. Pueblo Ingles is an organization that sets up week-long English immersion training for Spanish-speakers eager to perfect their English for business and social purposes. All we have to do is provide our own transportation to and from Madrid and any personal travel we want to do before or after the program. Otherwise the program provides all meals and accommodations during the week plus transportation from Madrid to the village where the instruction takes place. Oh, and we have to swear not to speak a word of Spanish while we're there!

This afternoon I received an email enthusiastically accepting me into one of the weeks, and we're hoping that the Reverend Mother's and Tiger Lilly's acceptance will be coming soon — I won't go without them! Our program would run from July 24th through 31st and would take place in the village of Valdelavilla, which is described as follows:

Valdelavilla is a small town in the highlands of Soria, just south of the wine-producing region of La Rioja. It dates back to the 18th century but it was reconstructed as a rural tourist complex after it was abandoned in the 1960's for demographic reasons. It is considered as one of the best-preserved natural sites in Spain with unique architectural and landscaping characteristics, a rich abundance of flora and fauna, and a quite magical atmosphere.

The village is nestled in a valley and even in its heyday, its population probably never surpassed 30 families. It has rustic feel to it with twelve traditional stone-walled houses, cobblestone streets and plenty of exposed brick and timber. Open countryside and beautiful panoramic views complete the quaint atmosphere and make this venue a favourite for volunteers who want that "authentic Spanish experience", and "to get away from it all". Valdelavilla arguably represents Pueblo Ingles in its rawest form.

Ok, so it's not exactly five-star accommodations (other Pueblo Ingles venues are more polished) but the site sounds beautiful and we can book more stylish quarters when we're back in Madrid after the program is finished and we continue our vacation. The images I've found of Valdelavilla show buildings and scenery very similar to the part of Tuscany where we stayed a couple of years ago (and loved).

The Rev. Mum discovered the program through an article in the Strib a few weeks ago. The Spanish-speakers pay to participate, but the Anglos are comped (a word I'll likely have to explain to the "students"). It's not exactly a free ride, however, as we'll spend several hours each day speaking English with the students in a variety of business and social setting, including telephone conversations, and the evenings are spent doing skits and enjoying long (and late) suppers — and talking, talking, talking (a challenge for me, I know). We're encouraged to talk about anything and everything in order to help the Spaniards acclimate to idioms and cultural nuances. I'm sure it will be tiring, but at the same time we'll be learning a lot about Spain and the lives of the people we're talking to and it should be very educational. Perhaps we'll even pick up some very useful details to make the rest of our trip even more interesting!

All in all it sounds like a great way to see a new country and learn about other ways of life — all while helping other people. What can be better than that?