We look down at the girl who
produced so many beautiful

babies over six years before
they threw her out in favor of

another beautiful baby girl
who would make lots and lots

of money for them. She is
gorgeous. Eight-years-old

and not a gray hair on her
muzzle. We say almost with

tears in our eyes, “You are
the most beautiful girl in the

world.” We don’t know if
she understands and then

we say over and over and
over, “We love you, sweet

girl. We love you, love you,
love you, sweet, baby girl.”

She looks at us and wags her
tail. We don’t know if it is

the words or the inflection
and it doesn’t matter. She

gets the message and that’s
all that matters.

The man walked out of the
house and never came back.
His son kept looking out the
window to see him coming

home. He wasn’t there. The
man’s mangled body was at
the funeral parlor. The parents
were pulled away and the child-

ren keep looking through the
spaces in the metal cages.
They are not there. She
felt a pain in her brain and

convulsed her way to the
emergency room while he
was out for a jog. She died
and he flew the body home

in a box. The women were
caged as sex slaves by the
holy men and the descend-
ants toppled the statue of

the holiest who attained saint-
hood. The commercial shows
dogs with cigarette burns on
their bodies. The man feels

an electric shock of shame.
Native Americans try to re-
group, survive and hopefully
thrive following intentional

annihilation. Japanese-Amer-
icans were put behind bars.
Black necks get squeezed under
white knees. Black bodies burst

under a barrage of police bull-
ets. We all (Red, Brown, Yellow,
Black and White) try to look our
best wearing smiles while we

all feel the stabs and jabs we
receive and we deliver — we
get and give — suffering through
this thing called life.

I don’t want to go back. No.
Oh, sure, there are the places —
hangouts, happy hours, a new
restaurant here and there and

some great traveling with my
wife — some with the Lab along
in the pretty little camper, some
catching a plane to an anniver-

sary destination. I still get to ride
a bike and go for a trail jog, watch
rerun after rerun of NCIS New
Orleans trying to keep track of

the changing characters from
season to season and great
homemade meals and experi-
menting with new gourmet

recipes and more time than
ever for reading. But I don’t
want to go back after a vaccine
is discovered and we all get a

shot to go with the flu shot and
the pneumonia shot but I don’t
want to go back to those viruses
we knew about while we were

living in denial along with Moses
— “Social and spiritual viruses
like racism, white supremacy,
human supremacy, Christian

supremacy, any kind of hostility
that is spread, based on prejudice
and fear.” Jesus, Buddha, Lao Tzu,
we all need a spiritual shot in the

arm to arm us against the prin-
cipalities and powers lurking in
the darkest places of the human
heart.

*idea and quote from a meditation
by Brian McLaren at Richard Rohr’s
Daily Meditation

“Looked upon from above, our years
on earth are not simply chronos, but

kairos—another Greek word for time
—which is the opportunity to claim for

ourselves the love that God offers us
from eternity to eternity,” wrote Henri

Nouwen, and I revel in kairos as the
chronos slips away, but I think of Dylan

Thomas and will “not go gentle into that
good night,” but I will not “rage, rage

against the dying of the light,” because
I will embrace the eternal light.

“He doesn’t believe in God because
he thinks he is God,” said the actress

in an episode of a British drama. The
viewer thought about the relevance of

that remark for America and then he
thought about another remark in the

episode, “He was craving a bit of
oblivion,” which, given the state of

affairs in America this Fourth of July
weekend, didn’t sound like such a

bad idea, although the line was a
clever British reference to suicide.

My wife said she was really,
really hungry for a good hot-
dog, so she googled hotdog

and read through all the lists
of the best hotdogs. She settled
on a variety of Ballpark Franks

even though it wasn’t in the top
five. She said she liked the ring
of it, “Hey, get ya hotdog here.

Hotdogs, hotdogs, get ya really
hot hotdog here. Get ya Ballpark
frank.” She has taken over the

grilling but she said that for this
Fourth she wanted me to do the
dogs on the pottery pig hibachi,

which sits on a table overlook-
ing the pond as decoration but
which hasn’t been used in years

to which the growing green moss
on the side of the pinkish pig
would testify. I said, “You want

me to do “all beef” hotdogs on
a pig.” She said, “It’s okay. I have
kosher pickles to go on the dogs.”

I said, “You could have gotten
kosher dogs.” She said, “They don’t
have the same ring as Ballpark Franks.”

“Dear, you don’t even like baseball.”

Shortly, I will be called upon
to leave the sanctuary, my
meditations, the poetry, my

wife and dog and go out into
the world of ever-growing
tension, anxiety, fear, anger

and escalating violence. I
will drive my car to my ap-
pointed destination hoping

to arrive at the designated
time having allowed myself
plenty of time to get there

on time, and almost immed-
iately I will be in the way of
someone who wants to go

faster than I am going. The
driver will invade the space
recommended in all manuals

of safe driving and I will feel
my blood pressure rise and
I will forget the message of

the meditations; I will forget
the beauty and pathos of the
poetry; I will forget the loveli-

ness of my wife’s face and
the faithful affection of
the Chocolate Lab and I will

join the world, be of the
world and not just in the
world. And so the internal

battle rages and my resolut-
ions and intentions dissolve
and wash away in a wave of

ever growing tension, anxiety,
fear, anger and escalating
violence.

The preacher pridefully and
piously proclaimed that God
didn’t create wretches as he

insisted that the word in
Amazing Grace be changed.
His congregation agreed.

The choir led the congregation
in the watered-down version.
They all smiled self-satisfied

smiles. That sure sounds better
they pridefully proclaimed. But
John Newton, writer of the hymn

and former slave trader, wrote
“Amazing grace, how sweet the
sound that saved a wretch like me.”

It was wretched to enslave
humans and he was a wretch to
have been a part of it. It’s like guilt

and shame. Guilt is getting off easy.
Shame is how wretched you can
be to the marrow of your bones.

Newton became a great preacher
because only grace could change
his shame into salvation. The

minister who changed the word
and the congregation that went
along were, like Moses, in denial

and purveyors of cheap grace.
Was it grace that saved the soul?
John knew. It was grace that saved

the wretch and God saved John for
the rest and the best that John
could and would ever be.

neck being crushed — mine.
neck being crushed — his and hers.
knee is on my neck.
my knee is on his and hers —
eternally horrified.

earth roars; sea rises.
animals move to high ground.
humans just stand there.