Last year, we twinned out toilet with another in Giharo, Rutana Province, Burundi.
They sent us a framed photo of their thunderbox, which I contemplate as I thunder on mine.
And apparently today is World Toilet Day, which I will celebrate by reposting this infographic, complete with details of how you can twin your toilet too.
Go on, it makes evacuation of the bowel so much more satisfying!
I have had a productive day.
This morning I wrote a piece for another website, for which I was paid £25. This afternoon I spent carving things out of wood. I have been selling about one or two pieces a month in a local art gallery- so this afternoon I might have made things to the value of say (for the purposes of a nice even number!) £75.
All of which set me thinking. How much money do we need? And how simple it seems to be able to link what we produce with this need in a direct way.
Regular readers of this blog will know that my current job- I am a social worker earning a reasonably high salary- is under threat. I was expecting to have a redundancy letter in the post by now, but this has now been delayed until at least next Spring.
One of the things about the kind of work I do now is that there is no easy link between what I produce (which is rather nebulous) and what I earn. Despite all the uncertainties of my future, I find myself craving this link more and more…
Sorry friends- but I feel a rant coming on…
You can’t escape them you see. They will be played over and over for the next two months. Each one expensively produced- mostly stuffed full of minor celebrities.
Yes- they are here in full force- the dreadful Christmas adverts.
The worst so far (in my opinion) are below.
By reproducing them here, I run the risk, dear readers, of subliminally pushing you towards the clutches of M/S and ToysRus (possibly the most irritating name for any shop the world over) but I will run this risk as, of course, framing is everything.
I confess (I know, I am a weak man) that I kind of like the next one. Perhaps it is the Morrissey song, or just the lovely ordinariness of the subject. Or perhaps it is just because of the joy of giving not getting.
Or maybe I am just as soft as treacle.
But perhaps the worst of all is this one. Watch and cringe.
Do you think adverts like this will be banned one day in the same way that cigarette ones have been?
Someone added up the cost of all these gifts- just under three thousand pounds.
I am just back from the island of Bute. It was one of the those white knuckle journeys after which you sink into the chair at home with the white lines still coming at you like machine gun tracer.
Not that there always are white lines on the roads I drive- the shaky shot above was taken on one of those half road-half hillside single track ‘roads’ we have up here. They can be dangerous, particularly if you take them for granted. Particularly if you are in a hurry.
Sometimes I take for granted just how wonderful the landscape is that I live and work in. Today was not one of those days as the power of the wind and the huge deluge of water falling was impossible to ignore. Here are a few shots taken on my commute home…
Had a lovely time at our housegroup this evening.
I had more or less come to the conclusion that it was time to stop housegroup- that it was time to do something new. But instead of stopping all together, people decided that they would like to continue to meet monthly. So tonight Michaela spent a little more time preparing some simple mediations, and I sat in the corner and played guitar. It was lovely.
You could say that it was a ripple made by the Spirit.
And something about our discussions reminded me of this-
The blocks might be seen to represent our theology- or our value system. The means by which we make sense of the vastness of the universe and our tiny place within it.
But even though the thoughts we have are woven into some kind of system of apparent cohesion and even certainty, there is always something else- something indefinable and difficult to lay hold of.
Something that at times we yearn for, without knowing what it is.
Something that is beautiful and whole- something hopeful.
Something dangerous.
Something that some of us would call- God.
So as we stare at our construction of solid blocks of knowledge, there dancing in the middle of it all- playful and full of Joy- is this other thing. The blocks might describe some of it, but it is not contained by the blocks. The spaces between might seem to be it’s place of dwelling- but these too are transient and transparent.
Rather this thing that we seek- this God- is not contained. He is in and through and without.
The question is how we might respond to this capricious and undefinable God? How do we follow?
I know my own answers to this question- and they are to found in community with my friends. We follow together. We build our (temporary) blocks of understanding with small stones.
We build humbly because our answers are only partial.
But still we build- because within this communal dwelling there is not just us- but something other. Something indescribably beautiful.
At least it does for 106 year old Hetty Bower.
I saw this clip on the news this evening. How wonderful it would be to sit down and talk to this remarkable lady.
Perhaps if we all lived to be 106…
Very few people write lyrics that catch in my brain like Bruce Cockburn.
I am sat listening to some old vinyl this morning, toast in hand, before we head out into the lovely Sunday morning, and was captivated by this song again.
It is an outpouring of images and words from the road.
Silver wheels
High speed drift on a prairie road
Hot tires sing like a string being bowed
Sudden town rears up then explodes
Fragments resolve into white line code
Whirl on silver wheelsBlack earth energy receptor fields
Undulate under a grey cloud shield
We outrun a river colour brick red mud
That cleaves apart hills soil rich as bloodHighway squeeze in construction steam
Stop caution hard hat yellow insect machines
Silver steel towers stalk rolling land
Toward distant stacks that shout “Feed on demand”100 miles later the sky has changed
Urban anticipation — we get 4 lanes
Red orange furnace sphere notches down
Throws up silhouette skyline in brownSundogs flare on windshield glass
Sudden swoop skyward iron horse overpass
Pass a man walking like the man in the moon
Walking like his head’s full of irish fiddle tunesThe skin around every city looks the same
Miles of flat neon spelling well-known names
USED TRUCKS DIRTY DONUTS YOU YOU’RE THE ONE
Fat wheeled cars squeal into the sunRadio speakers gargle top 40 trash
Muzak soundtrack to slow collapse
Planet engines pulsate in sidereal time
If you listen close you can hear the whine
Very Ginsberg. But Ginsberg never played the guitar like this…
Call me a groupie (I do come close to hero worship with this man) but I came across these clips the other day and could not resist re-posting. He is talking about an album that I reviewed here– and to be honest I was not very kind. By way of some slight redress, I offer these two clips…
Then a little more nodding to Ginsberg-
Here’s a bit of advance notice of a new thing we are doing next year. I would appreciate any help getting the message out there…
For many years now, along with a group of old friends, I have been escaping to wild places in order to recharge. Nothing unusual about that I suppose- but over the past few years, we have been ever more deliberate about the spiritual practice of retreat that can be experienced in wild places.
We have gathered ideas and activites, as well as developing lots of our own ideas, usually taking specific locations- caves, rivers, abseils down cliffs, mountain tops- and shaping thoughts, prayers and actions to the surroundings. We wanted to find ways to worship, and to wonder, and to share the depth of our experiences.
At least once a year we have tried to escape to a small deserted island- there is such a wonderful selection within reach of where we live in Argyll. Each one seems to have a different character and a different history. Many have ruins and remains left behind by the monastic gatherings of the Celtic missionary saints. We in Aoradh have been keen to share these experiences, and have already hosted a number of weekends with invited guests.
You can read about some of our previous trips here here and here.
However, in the spirit of seeking simple collaborative means to making a living, some of us are planning to organise a number of 3 day retreats on a slightly more commercial basis.
Two of these will be based at Sgath an Tighe– one of which will be more ‘adventure’ based, and the other for those of us who appreciate wild places in a more restful way.
The other two will involve wild camping on uninhabited inner Hebridean islands- in one of the most beautiful places in the world. This kind of camping allows us to appreciate wild places in a much purer way, and also allows us to be in places that few people ever visit, let alone linger.
Over the next few weeks we will be working on final destinations, costs and dates. For the camping trips we will provide boat charter, organisation, activities and leadership.
So- next year, ditch the package tour to the Costa’s. Go somewhere where few people have been before.
If you are interested, then we would love to hear from you…
My old friend Graham sent me some stuff about the theme of the teaching in our old church Calvary Christian Fellowship back in Preston. Graham is about to do a season looking again at making and forming small missional communities.
It is going to be an interesting journey for them, as they are starting out not as a disparate band who ‘find’ each other then start with all the forming and storming. Rather they are starting out as ‘Church’ and seeking to become ‘church’.
I wish them every blessing.
Graham shared this model which was their staring point-
This is not Graham’s picture though- this is from the middle of our table from the Aoradh meeting tonight. Because we had already been speaking about a similar dynamic.
We do this thing at our planning meetings that I like- we cover the table with paper, and the doodles and coffee spills and scribble become the record of our gathering.
Ok someone might need to pull out some action points and e-mail it round later, but we often do not take other notes.
Tonight I shared my sense of frustration that we were doing a lot of the inward stuff- the gathering and eating together and sharing (all of which is great) and also some of the upward stuff- in terms of worshipping together. But we were not doing so much ‘outward’ stuff- the uncomfortable business of ‘mission’. This is not really fair of course because we have been doing all sorts of things this year, but I am always longing for the next creative adventure.
Mission no longer means ‘evangelism’ for us. But I think it still means risk, vulnerability, and the deliberate connection with the other- in various kind of ways- seeking to serve, to make peace, to share art, to display love and to seek to be agents of the Kingdom of God.
Anyway, my friends pointed out gently that we all have different levels of need for this kind of adventure, and that the very fact of living our lives in the midst of all this messy humanity is always going to be ‘out’ there. And I said yes- BUT…
And bless them, we spent the rest of the night dreaming of missions we might adventure on. Art in the hillside, quiet gardens, meditation benches, trips away together, retreats etc…
Let the Spirit call us out.
But let us also be blessed in the togetherness.
As we worship.
this fragile tent 