WHY I DON'T BELIEVE THE BIBLE IS THE INERRANT WORD OF GOD


1. It doesn't need to be
There are plenty of people in the underground church that know Christ better than we do, are more passionately serving and more obedient to this will... they don't have Bibles.

Jesus is the full revelation of God's will and character.  The stories are in the Bible but the stories are not the Bible.  It is the story that matters not the pages and the binding.

The purpose of the Bible is to serve as a guide to God... TO SUPPLEMENT the revelation of Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

2. It threatens to compete with the authority of Jesus
I was at a youth camp in Carson-Newman TN and the director walked on stage cradling a Bible in her arms, she had swaddled it like baby.  She said 'until we get to heaven, this (holding the Bible) is the closest we will get to God.

'The Word of God' is a title that belongs exclusively to Jesus.  Calling ANYTHING other than Jesus 'the Word' is blasphemy.

The moment you say Jesus isn't enough, when you have to add something to make your faith work, you are no longer a Christian.  You can be like Christians, but you have to call yourself something else.  

*on a side note, I also have an issue with what Christians call 'holy'. From what I read things that are holy will melt the face of a seraphim.

3. It is an obstacle to our ONLY MISSION ON EARTH
Atheists are not stupid.  The idea that all the crimes against humanity outlined in the old testament are offensive not consistent with the true definition of love.

Religion is meant to comment on revealed truth.  Science is meant to observe the laws of the physical world.   It is only when these disciplines comment outside of their purpose that there is a problem.  The OT is filled with ancient near-east cosmology vocabulary (flat earth).  It is expected that writing reflect the it's cultural context... and social context.  Let's get over it.
*btw, just read an interesting study that sexual orientation did not exist as a phenomenon until the 1800s.  Maybe some of us have been reading the Bible in an erroneously modern context.

4. It is neither a spiritual nor rational doctrine
"all scripture is god-breathed"
'All scripture' doesn't mean what you think it means.
At that time there were more than Hebrew writings (the word 'scripture' just means writing) in circulation.  Ugiritic, Cannanite, Zoroastrian, Babalonian, Greek, Akadian... you name it.

So does that mean all of that other stuff was the word of god also???
'God-breathed' doesn't mean what you think it means.
Spiration goes both ways, one way is inspiring and the other inspired (subject and object).  Either way, inspiration or inspired, it's not that big a deal.  Artists inspire and are inspired all the time, it only affects their experience by degrees.  Granted when it is God inspiring or has inspired then it is different, but that doesn't make it something to be revered.  In fact reverence is only something we give to people with relational distance, certainly not for someone we would call 'daddy' (Abba), certainly not for someone who's spirit dwells within you.

WHERE IS IT GOING TO END?

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Bible, and whosoever believes in it (in addition to all the other required stuff) shall not perish but have everlasting religion." 

Whatever our 'non-negotiables' are in Christianity become equal with Jesus.  It seems like the conservative trinity is GOD the intolerant, the Bible, & Christians traditions (beliefs & culture).  

Nicky Gumbel says that our faith is based on the Bible, I thought it was based on the 'good news' of Jesus.  I guess it wasn't good enough.  

Everyone knows our religion has a consumer crisis.  The product we indulge in is religious self-affirmation. 

Question, does your God care more about religious legislation or people?  If your expression of faith about how you live, or helping others to become fully alive?  Is your church for Christians or pagans?  

If Christians NEED to come back to church every Sunday to get filled up again to face the next week then they need to plug their hole.  The church is not a business so we don't do 'work for pay', we are supposed to serve and be fulfilled by the idea that we are making a difference.   If you want to break the consumer culture in your church then start cultivating a fulfillment based environment.  Always be showing people how they have made a difference.  

If they are not making a difference then they are not following Jesus... show them how.  They will see a difference very quickly.  

A FEW RANDOM THOUGHTS STITCHED TOGETHER

In the movie Unbreakable Samuel Jackson's character speculates that if someone as 'breakable' as himself could exist then the opposite could also be true.  There could be someone as unbreakable as Mr. Glass was breakable.

This idea set me off on some profound speculations.

In the movie Contagion a pandemic virus evolves from passing from a bat to a pig to a human, each time taking a bit of DNA from each host to become the virus that changed the world.  This virus changed the world in a bad way, but perhaps another virus could change the world in a good way.  Fantasy could tell a story about a virus that enhanced human capabilities but what I was interested in was reality.  Instead of a literal virus I wanted to contemplate an idea-virus.  Ideas have been changing human civilization since there was such a thing.  The combination of Newtonian physics with gun powder influenced ballistics in a way that affected every human on the planet.  The world's most difficult problems must begin with an idea.  Somewhere out there are the components to an idea that when they come together will end human trafficking and genocide and starvation.

But it doesn't stop there.

I was just thinking about Westboro Baptist and what a bunch of scum suckers they were.  It occurred to me that if hateful people like the folks from Westboro or the sadly mislead people of Heaven's Gate could depart from Christian orthodoxy is such a bad way then it is also possible for some to depart from Christian orthodoxy in a good way... a way that leads closer to Christ.  The hesitancy to entertain such an idea comes from a misguided tradition or assumption that our finite orthodoxy is absolute... inerrant... divine... equal with God, that somehow we know all the depths of God and these depths fit into 3 pounds of grey matter and a leather-bound tome... because that is what makes sense to us.

and that's bullshit.

If we are going to deviate from the safety net of orthodoxy we still need something to make sure we don't go looney-toons.   Some look towards the Bible as their regulatory fence but we all know that the only real gauge is Jesus himself.  Last Friday a woman was telling me that in her youth she believed in God and thought herself to have a relationship with God even though she did not profess to be Christian or recognize Jesus as anyone of importance.  Then a friend of her's told her, 'If you don't know Jesus then you don't know God.'  Jesus is the full revelation of God's character and God's will.  Jesus is 'The Word of God'.

Let's start small.
The traditional view of Christian what it means to be a Christian is inadequate.  The amalgamation of the moment of free salvation, our resurrection as a new creation and the costly lifelong process of becoming a follower of Christ are actually 3 separate things.

It also seems to me that the traditional view of the crucifixion is also inadequate.  We minimize what Jesus achieved on the cross.  The significance of Jesus taking on the sins of the world is not fully understood to to an over emphasis on the sins committed by the individual riddled with guilt.  If Jesus took on the sins of the world then it would also include the sins committed against us.  All the humiliations and violations that we suffered could be nailed to the cross, buried and reborn.

Just a thought.

Hold on to your hat, I'm about to get religious.

In the name of Jesus Christ I rebuke our pain and despair, it is crucified with Christ.  I invite the Holy Spirit to come into our hearts and not just redeem what was lost, not just restore what was broken but glorify everything that was made ugly and shamed.  Amen.

bbow's modular system

here's what I'm building...

Plan B

I'm new to modular synths. I started building a system around May of 2009.

Eurorack is the format that I am going with. At first I thought I might build a 'frankensynth' out of multiple formats. When I realized the complexity of multiple power supplies and mounting rails I decided to ditch the idea and go with a straight forward system.

One of the manufactures that caught my eye was Plan B.

What also caught my eye very quickly was the warnings against purchasing Plan B modules.

I'm not sure what happened, apparently some people bought direct and didn't receive their stuff and some stuff didn't work and was returned to Plan B but never fixed...

I really wanted a vector joystick for my system, Plan B is the only company that makes a vector device. I bought one through Big City Music and had no problems.

I hope everything works out for Plan B. The designer and owner of the company has some amazing ideas and I really want to see them come to fruition. I know some people are very angry and feel personally victimized, I hope things work out for them as well.

here are some of the modules that I thought would have been really cool...

not only would they have been cool, but they look sexy as hell.

Bagger 288

LOST and Jules Verne

parallels between LOST and Mysterious Island

Cyrus Harding and Jack Shephard

Neb and Kate 

Pencroft and James Sawyer

Aryton and Rousseau

Lamay and Sayid

Nemo and Benjamin Linus

Pirate Bob Harvey and Charles Widmore

Jane and Juliet

Alex and Nemo's daughter

Li and Richard

orangutang named Joop (clearly an homage)

Island with strange properties

monsters

hot air balloon

pirate ship

submarine

misfit group of castaways

scientist people

pirate people

Nemo's weapon and the buried atom bomb

building a raft

beach refuge

I'm sure there are tone more parallels.

I suspect that LOST will end with Ben helping the castaways, Widmore getting killed by the island and then the island being destroyed (Ben going down with the island), leaving the castways lost again to begin their next adventure.

Surly MacLaine

I don't care how many times you spin around on the beach hugging yourself, you're not God.

Unless I don't understand what the word God means.  

If it means; a tripped out hippie playing dervish on the beach then... 

...I guess there really is a God... 

...and it might explain a lot of design flaws in the human condition.

sound/noise toise

Electro-static synth interface



Hamster ball synth

Tribbel Synth

Japanese typewriter synth

Rubber monster in a beaker synth vs robot synth


vocal annunciation synth

bible criticism

Helow agane.  

There have been a few funny things happening lately concerning me and people with very strong convictions.  So I'm doing what I always do... I'm plotting to take over the world.

Before for we get into this highly charged topic of religion and sacred texts let me just say this;

I'm nobody of consequence, I'm just some dude.

I've been wrong more times than I can remember and every time I was wrong... I thought I was right.

I've said the right thing at the wrong time... the right thing the wrong way... and the right thing for all the wrong reasons.

So there.

I am not a mainstream Christian or a Bible literalist.

I tend to believe that all religions are more than their sacred texts.

And I believe that spirituality transcends religion.

Now then, my first year Religion professor hated all religions except for Egyptology.

I remember him trashing the story of Jonah because archaeological findings suggested that Nineva was much smaller than the account given in the Torah (okay, that was his beef? What about being eaten and regurgitated?  No problem with that?)

I loved the guy, he was a great teacher, but he was no anthropologist or construction worker.  Experts in ancient South American civilizations will tell you that the old mezzo empires were vast, much more so than the sparse ruins that survived the ages.  That's kind of a cool idea, the metropolis consumed by the jungle.  Some anthropologists speculate that if modern civilization were to expire that the only thing left after 100 years would be hotdogs and super highways.

I find this very easy to believe.  Being a former construction worker I have seen first hand how poorly structures are made these days.  My house was sheathed in 1/8 inch foam and then covered in vinyl siding.  This plus my drywall is the only thing standing between a thief and my LCD television.  An archeologist digging around the ruins of America might suspect that the nation's capital was pretty small, after all DC is dwarfed by it's surrounding foam/plastic suburbs.  

Maybe the ancient Assyrian's had better construction than American contractors.  I don't know.  I've also been to Dandora, it is the largest slum in the world, it can be seen from space.  One good natural disaster and it's all gone.  The only thing left would be foreign embassy buildings.  

Then again, all my jewish friends hyperbolize every detail of every story... but they do make better stories.

I guess that's why all my other professors were always going on about 'context'.  

They all claimed to be teaching on religious texts from the context of 'phenomenology', well that was bull shit.  They were the most... never mind.  

From the academic context, the 'serpent' in Genesis is just a snake and nothing else (because the book of Genesis doesn't say that it is anything other than a snake), from mainstream Christian tradition, it is Satan.

Since my old friend Matt reminded me of a hilarious story about a bald prophet cursing 42 kids with death by bear attack, I'll use that one to crit in a few different contexts (in the tradition of the Talmud I'll start with minority and go more mainstream).

Phenomenology

Here's a weird story where Elisha gets mocked by some kids saying 'go on up bald head!' and Elisha calls for TWO! bears to kill the kids (42 are slain) 'in the name of the lord'

Sweet, apparently Elisha is bald.

What does this mean?  

Was 'Go on up bald head' a reference to something in the northern kingdom?  an urban/thuglife philistine song perhaps? Did Elisha see the bears first and then prophesy ex eventu?  Was the scribe of 1 Kings just a baldy child-hater that had an agenda to insert a turd squirting fear of God in those would be bald head mockers?  I know that there was a different dialect spoken in the northern and southern kingdoms, perhaps 'go on up baldhead' meant 'hey you, with the bald head, look out for those bears' or 'please kill me'.

Judaism

It's just a story.  

I'm only half kidding here.  There are dozens of different kinds of Jews.  They could be national, ethnic, orthodox, reform, conservative, mystic, whatever.  Most Torah literalists died out after Antiochus Epiphanes.  The few Jews that I have known in the U.S. don't believe in God or an afterlife, but might believe in a 'messianic age'.  

Christian Tradition

No one in the Bible makes mistakes, if it happened then it is good and we must conform our logic to these moral contradictions.  

God did it and the kids were asking for it, Elisha is just a vessel of GOD's will.

All have fallen short of the glory of GOD and the wages of sin is death... the kids deserved it... in fact we all deserved it... it's only by the mercy of 'Bald head' that we are not all eaten by two bears.  

Bowhayism

Who cares?  Is there anything of worth to take away from this story?

I would find it very comforting to know that Elisha was just a dick.  I mean, I'm a lazy selfish jerk, but I would love to be used by God.  

I don't know if I believe in bear curses, but if I did then I would think that Elisha was GIVEN power by God early on and may have used it well sometimes and not so well other times.

Either way, I think it's a weird story.  I definitely would not take it as a prescribed world view, reflection of God's will, or model of good character. 

Alright, so I'm like totally not mainstream.  But I dare any of you baldies to curse me with carnivores bears.  That's how I want to go out... but it would be cool if they were undead cybernetic bears with alien DNA.  

On a more serious note, I would encourage those who get really defensive about their religious texts to relax a little bit.  If your faith is so fragile that it can be shattered by a bit of textual criticism then where is your faith really placed?  

The best things in life are unconditional, if you have a NEED for your book to a little inerrant idol then you don't deserve to have your faith, what you are looking for is certainty and insurance.  

Okay my stream of consciousness hit some rough waters there, I'm tired, figure it out yourself.

Dirty Rooster

It's funny how different our prespectives are on the same things.
Maybe not. I'm so sleep deprived right now that I have no idea what I'm doing.

The doctors told us that we would have the baby last Wednesday. I've been on high alert for 6 days. Everytime I lay down to sleep my adrenaline pumps and my mind races. I stare at the ceiling for hours. M can't sleep because of her contractions.
guh...

Our daughter had her last day of daycare. The kids all did a little Christmas musical. Now she sings this song to herself all the time, but gets the words wrong. Yesterday I heard her say, "Baby Jesus in the manger, see him sleeping on the hay. Mary hugs a dirty rooster, see the baby run away."
That was cute. Since I've been reprogramed as a social worker every thing that I see is colored with a sort of welfare/human services tint. When I think about Christmas all I see is a teen pregnancy, the mom and dad in trouble with the authorites, and a kid being born in a cold dump surrounded by horse shit. I guess it is a little more profound than the crap on the Limetime channel. Do you think that those regal wise men really knelt down in manure next to a bunch of blue collar sheep herders? Damn I'm tired. Actually I really like my grunge revision of the nativity scene, it's much more punk rock, but not as marketable.
I do have one question about the angels that were seranading. Are these the same angels that make your face melt if you look at them? Cause, wouldn't that be really terrifying?
Christopher Walken was a pretty cool angel in that movie Prophecy. Eric Stoltz, not as much.

It's starting to look more and more like me and M are going to have a Christmas baby. So... yeah, Christmas.

Software Synthesizers

never mind all of this.

The only soft synths worth my attention are the Omnisphere and Alchemy.

(actually I own Absynth and it rules)

The fourier re-synthesizing of Alchemy blows my mind.

And the 'Steam Engine' of Omnisphere picks up my scrammbled brains and shoves them back into my skull.

I know there are a lot of quality virtual analogs out there, 

but I'm just feeling pretty played-out on that whole va sound.

There just needs to be new ideas in synth architecture!

Actually the Arturia Origin seems pretty friggin cool as far as originality goes.

hmm...origin-ality. 

If they could make additive, granular, and wavetable oscillator modules I would be all over them.  

I also wouldn't mind some good Oberheim and Prophet filter emulations... 

maybe even a formant filter... hell, an FS1R model while I'm at it.

Could you imagine Frankenstiening all those modules together?!?!?!?

It'll never happen though, Arturia is all about analog emulations.

I should make my own synth. It would totally be a keytar!!!

Additive, granular, and wavetable (true wavetable) is the way to go.

Actually the FM synthesis of the FS1R is still pretty friggin cool in my book, 

8 freq operators and 8 formant operators?!?!? Can you even believe it!

I'm in love

okay... I'm trying to catch my breath here.

My heart is pounding in my chest.

My family is asleep and I need to share my excitement with someone.

So here I am pouring myself out to the cold faceless interweb.

I was playing my Waldorf Blofeld synthesizer and I came across a ram patch called

"Choir Bells"

I held a simple C chord...

It was a nice angelic pad.

As the LFO swept through the wavetables I could hear droplets of rain like they were resonating wine goblets in a random and yet divine unearthly unity.

I just sat there holding that chord for about ten minutes.

It was ten minutes of bliss... pure untainted beauty just for me.

Presence Process session 6 & 7

Uhg, what can I say about these sessions?

It was brutal.

This description is going to sound cheesy and new age.

Just bear with me, I have an open mind, but I'm not Shirley McClain or Tom Cruise. 

Session 6 focused on ... finally resolving past issues.

Session 7 focused on feeling secure while dealing with really insecure things.

Sometimes I would remember a mistake I made or something embarrassing that I said or did and I would beat myself up about it.  My reaction was to do what ever I could to sedate the feeling, distract myself, whatever, anything but deal with it.

The session seven tries to trigger even the most deeply buried junk from our emotional history.

This is important because the unresolved issues in our past are the basis for our reflex/reactions in the present.  

The training involves a change of perspective towards yourself.  If a good buddy came to you bummed about something stupid they did in the past would you punch him in the gut and call him names?  I wouldn't, I would try to be a good friend and console the poor dude.  But, why don't I treat myself with the same compassion when I recall a past upset?

Don't judge your pain, 

just listen to it, 

feel it, 

and deal with it.

So here's where it gets weird.  

Each day I would sit in a tub of warm water for 20 minutes.  

My ears were submerged  and everything sounded funny.  

I closed my eyes and remained as still as possible.  

The idea is that in our hyper-culture we are constantly bombarded with sensory stimulus.  

It is hard to experience the peace required to listen.  

So this is a little like sensory deprivation/womb simulation... that's the weird part.  

The difficult part is that what is triggered is not cognitive memory information, but pure emotional memory without any personal historical context.  

It is like taking an emotional shit, a very dull agony.  

But this is what it takes to remove the metaphorical splinter, a deep and infectious splinter that makes your flinch and get angry when people bumped it or tried to address it.

End of metaphor. 

Custom Keytar Midi Controller

Who ever wants to build this for me, I will pay handsomely.

It needs to have velocity and aftertouch on the lower keyboard.

The neck keyboard should be very flat, like buttons, but more than just a printed plastic film. The neck wouldn't have velocity, but still needs to have aftertouch. The pitchbend bar is raised for the option to put a thumb under it or palm down. It should be pretty stiff.

Any extra standard midi controller functions that I forgot can go on the back of the body.

I was thinking that there could be either different styles or just a removable blank matte cover plate that you could customize.

Kinda like some cell phones.

My style ideas are:

Euro-Future, Rusted Cyber-Blood

Gloom Sexy. London Garage

57 Cherry, Mahogany Pearl

Rhyme & Bass, Blue Soul

Black Tie, Video Killed the Radio Star

There should be a contest for who can come up with the coolest designs based on these names.

Presence Process Week 4 and 5

THE SYNTHESIS OF OLD AND NEW

Okay, I've been pretty preoccupied with the acquisition of new synth gear so I haven't posted in a while.

btw, the difference between reacting and responding is important in these sessions.

Reaction is an unconscious reflex and responding is a calculated choice.

Week 4 was about being one with your pain and discomfort.

The idea is that pain and discomfort are not inherently bad, but we react with judgement towards our pain and discomfort.

Our P&D are merely messengers.

Our reaction is to sedate and control our P&D.

If we shoot the messenger we might be spared of unpleasant news but it is probably news that we need to hear.

If we have a physical injury, getting mad at it might have some negative affects on your recovery.  I haven't done any research on the impact of stress on the human body but my doctor tells me that it's bad.

Week 4 focused more in terms of physical discomfort and week 5 was more about emotional discomfort; shame, disappointment, impatience, etc.

Week 5 was about changing our reaction to P&D to responding to it the way we would respond to some one else that was hurting.  

I don't know about you but when some one I care about is hurting I try to be compassionate, but when it is myself I tend to beat myself up about it.

So this week a lot of things from my past popped up.  Things that I was embarrassed about.  When I would recall these things I would usually get upset and try to think about something else.  

The problem is that past traumas effect our present life, decisions we make and how we react to people.

So this time I received these resurgent memories and talked myself down as if I were talking to a friend that was dealing with their own issue.

In this case I was counseling my younger self.  Yes, that's weird, but people are weird.  

As a result I was finally able to put some old ghosts to rest and they won't have any influence on my present relationships or my self image.

The whole thing is very weird, it's like re-experiencing something familiar in a strange foreign way. 

Jam the Vote

the rhythm is gonna get me

I'm getting back into music... synthesizers specifically.

I'm getting rid of all my old avant-garde junk and hopefully just getting a couple a versatile and modern pieces that sound great.

Here's one that I'm looking at.  

The Access Virus, it's a virtual analog beast.

I've always loved the crisp euro sound.

All my favorite Progressive House programmers use this thing.

Here's another one that I actually just bid on and lost.  

This is the Waldorf Mircrowave XTK.

It is based on wavetable synthesis, 

something I've wanted since I was 18, 

about seven-teen years ago. 

I couldn't find a good demo of the sounds on You-tube, so here's it's little brother, the MW2.

I've always really like FM synthisis, 

but hated that the Yamaha stuff never had resonate filters.

So now they have this cute little groove box, 

it's like a DX7 with knobs, 

built in effects, and A FILTER!!!

It features a rhythm section with step sequencing.  All in all a pretty cool little toy.

I have the Korg Electribe series and some soft synth stuff like Reason and Absynth so I guess I'll be in pretty good shape.

My friend Jeff plays guitar and drums really well, he has some really nice gear and knows about three people with Pro-tools studios with a bagillion plug-ins.  One guy has a V-drum.  Who knows, we might make some cool junk.

The Grieving Process

You have to feel it to heal it.

I never really mourned the time when my Electro Harmonix Micro Synth was stolen.

I am sad.  Helios Creed put a wanted ad out for one of these things in a Sub-pop newsletter.  I was intrigued.  I saw one for sale locally, I only intended to check it out, see what it was about. When I played it I knew that it was made for me.  It made noises so offensive that the devil him self would blush to describe it out loud.  I had to own it.

Also, my Univox Super Fuzz was stolen in the same incident.

This video does not do it justice.  

When you think about the face-melting lead sounds on tracks like American Woman... 

that is what it did.  

I only got to play it once... 

it was like getting hit by a truck going 200 mph carrying velvet cups of butter.

But for some reason the dirty thief did not take my Digitech Whammy Pedal, 

Electro Harmonix Big Muff & 

Electric Mistress & Small Stone, 

Boss CE-3 & DM-2, 

Mutron Multi-Phase, 

MXR Phase 100 & Blue Box,

E-bow, or my Echo-plex.

Or my absolute most favorite pedal in the world, 

the amazing ACE TONE FUZZ MASTER 2.

So, I guess it could have been worse.

It feels bad to have someone take something from you.

Like a helpless victim... no one to grant me justice... never mind justice I just want my stuff back.

Presence Process week 3

bluh... week three is hard.

I'm totally depressed.

Depression is like a splinter.  

If it's deep you might not see it but you will probably feel it.

Whether you feel it or not, if it is festering, it is going to cause you some problems.

So, in week three I'm having a bunch of unresolved feelings that were buried deep in my mid-brain that are starting to rise to the surface.

Here's the thing...

There are many different kinds of love, the greeks had five different words for love that meant different things.  Then there are love languages, are people loving the right way and blah blah blah.  THe saddest thing is that there are a great number of people out there that are so out of touch with love that they don't even understand what the word means, they say that 'you can't define it', that 'no one can really know what love is.'  There is a real reason why some people don't know anything about love, they have been loved in some sense of the word but never been genuinely loved, truly and unconditionally.

Most of us probably did not get the love that we needed from our parents because people cannot give what they don't have.  Our parents probably did not receive the kind of love that they needed as children, and so on.

I wouldn't say that I had a crappy childhood, but do know that I didn't get what I needed.

I'm not going to judge my folks about it, they just didn't have it to give.  They did the best they could.  But, I think that for my whole life I've been depressed.  Most people from the old neighborhood would probably have described me as a hyper-spaz clown, but those behaviors were just my way of sedating and controlling... boredom... the empty, meaningless monotony of life.  Now, when I was a kid I would have never been able to articulate that.  I wasn't aware of it because I didn't know that there was any other way to be, I couldn't see inside people's heads to know how other people experience emotional health.  

One of the things that I look forward to each day is coming home to see my daughter.  I like just watching her play and walk around and spout irrational statements.  I don't think that I got that from my dad.  My mom told me that he never changed my diaper.  That makes me sad.  

It is hard for me to think about a father not having that kind of expressed affection for their own child.  Ravi Zacharias said that for some people despair is a moment and that for other people despair is a way of life with moments of emotional peace.  I wonder if my father was depressed.  

This morning I had a really hard time.  I was trying to get my girl ready for school and I was just empty.  I had no love to give.  I tagged out with my wife and went out on my deck and drank coffee.  I know that there is depression on my mother's side of the family, but my dad is from west Texas, they don't need shrinks.  

Well, that's about it so far.  I'm grieving unresolved emotions from my childhood.  I'm getting the splinter out and it gets uglier before it gets better.