Even if X interferes with Y, preventing X doesn't lead to Y, and here's Why…

A recent news story on "why vitamins are bad for you" got me thinking: We too often assume that by preventing or stopping something otherwise benign, we can encourage something beneficial.

Eg 1

Personal electronics turn children into antisocial beings.

Logic: Less time with earbuds and video games will create more time with people.

Clarence: Not unless you actively replace them with a different activity. Just pulling out the earbuds does no good by itself. When I was a boy, it was TV and comic books. We were encouraged to turn off the TV, put down the comics and go outside.

Very often that led to us sitting on the patio saying 'What do you want to do?" and "I don't know, what do you want to do?" over and over, which can't be any better than television.

Adults also find solitary ways to entertain themselves, don't they? Facebook, a Kindle, a ball game on TV. We just don't like to see the kids doing it, and if we're honest with ourselves, maybe we're just trying to get them out of the way for a bit.

The personalization of media will only get more personal, until interaction with real people is the exception. It's not too early to begin finding healthy ways to manage it.

Eg 2

Using your left foot to brake when driving is bad.

Logic: Because you might apply both the brake and gas at the same time; bad for your brakes, bad for your engine, and you can lose control in an emergency.

Clarence: Police officers are taught to drive this way. I presume race car drivers do as well. It's obviously not impossible and provides increased control at dangerous speeds.

F Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway
(looks like a doctored photo)

Eg 3

If you can't spell, you can't write.

Logic: Good writing depends on good spelling.

Clarence: A single counter example suffice, but two come to mind: Truman Capote couldn't recite the alphabet, and F Scott Fitzgerald couldn't even spell his good friend's name, "Ernest Hemingway."

The importance of being Earnest Hemminway, (or why spelling isn't that important) >

Most people who make a living insisting on how English ought to be spoken or written don't understand how English is spoken and written, or at the very least, have an uninspiring relationship with words.

Detail from Luca Signorelli,
‘The Damned Cast into Hell’

Eg 4

If you think something besides a prayer of salvation saves you, you're not saved.

Logic: Salvation comes by faith alone. If you think works are part of it, you may depend on those works and never really have faith.

Clarence: There is no prayer of salvation in the bible.[1] How many people in the past few generations (in which this has become widespread among Protestants) prayed a "sinner's prayer" without believing it? And not only that, evangelicals teach that you're saved forever despite anything you do after, no matter how heinous.

What an unenviable task a lot of evangelists will have someday explaining their theology as millions they "led to the Lord" are thrown into hell.

(I cast that sentence in terms evangelicals can appreciate, but it's the set-it-and-forget-it easy Christianity that's really at issue, regardless of what/if judgement awaits.)

[2014-05-20]

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When we make such a big deal about differences of opinion, we don't just take a stand, we hurt each other in ways that last a generation and are inculcated into the next.

The ministry of Jesus was rarely anti anything. We just make it that way.

[2014-07-19]

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[1]

The Sinner's Prayer >

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Unconventional grooming brings unhappy consequences.

Clarence at the Black Rose in
Grand Rapids maybe 10 years ago

I’ve worn my hair long for most of my adult life. I cut it for funerals or important trips, but otherwise keep it long.

A former boss once told me (this was a long, long time ago, no one I work with anymore), “I don’t know what you think you’re trying to prove.”

A man standing next to me at the urinals in the office once said, “I thought you were a girl.”

A man in the cafeteria, unable to find his indoor voice, said, “He should get a haircut.”

Someone else thought I was American Indian, which would have made it acceptable to some folks (I’d be very proud to be an American Indian, but I am, alas, Anglo-Saxon).

Today a lady shopping next to me in a big box store followed me with her eyes, even though I never got within a few feet of her. When I passed (at some distance), she took her purse out of her cart and put it over her shoulder.

I’ll wear my hair long anyway.

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Q: Why would you do something that invites so much criticism?

A: Of what advantage is it to me or others to enable small-mindedness?

Q: Why do you grow your hair?

A: I don’t know. My toenails are doing it too. How do you get them to stop?

Q: Why do you grow your hair?

A: So children who can’t, might  feel good about themselves. (Locks of Love >)

Q: Why do you grow your hair?

A:

[2014-02-25]

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How many kids can I remember from Vernondale Elementary School?

How many kids can I remember from Vernondale Elementary School?

Let's see…

Girls	Boys
Nina Donner Chrissy Dahlstrand Rosetta Lawrence Beth Williams Colleen Madera Crystal Flickinger Sandy Clutter Barbara Joe Allen	Andy Dahlstrand Rich Nickel Mike Guyton Jeff Hull Steve Schloss John Tushak Ricky Clouser Jim Segal Joe Campbell Jim Campbell Neil Chipoletti Jay Chipoletti Tommy Kahil David Sturtevant

In those days, grade school went from K-6. Nowadays most grade schools stop at 5th, some at 4th.

Not a lot of names for 7 years of one's life, is there?

Hey Crystal, wherever you are, you were my biggest grade school crush, a sixth-grade Beatrice and first canto in a carnal comedy of errors.

A post from last April on Vernondale Elementary >

Vernondale Elementary School in Millcreek, PA

[2014-07-10]

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Why does the Catholic Church have a pope?

Why does the Catholic Church have a pope?

Sometimes the best answer to a question is another question, since it puts what we think is a special case into a familiar context.

So...

Why does a school have a principal?

Why does a company have a president?

Why does a  church have a pastor?

In other words, the Church has a pope because all human organizations of any size require a leader, and religious organizations are no different.

And the bigger the organization, the greater the need for a leader and rules circumscribing dissent.

I'm not Catholic but I fully understand the need for a pope (and an Archbishop for Anglicans and a president for Lutherans and a pastor for Baptists).

The first response is often, "But our leadership is different from theirs." Perhaps on paper, but not in practice.

What is the response when a GARB deacon goes off the rails? Or a pastor? It happens. Even a loosely allied fellowship like the GARB will act quickly and firmly.[1]

Just because there's no one person at the top of the org chart doesn't mean there isn't a singularity in purpose, theology, and enforcement.

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[1]

General Association of Regular Baptists. Please understand, I'm not picking on them, I love them like family, but because I know them so well, I draw on them for examples.

GARB homepage >

GARB on Wikipedia >

[2014-06-15]

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Forty-Five years ago a hot school lunch was 40¢ and men walked on the moon.

(Repost. from April 2013 Today - Sunday July 20  - is the 45th anniversary of Apollo 11, the first manned moon landing.)

Floor plan of Vernondale Elementary School

On the right is a floor plan of Vernondale Elementary School in Millcreek, PA as it appears today. (Click to enlarge).

The red box outlines the school prior to 1971. My earliest memories are of the school inside that red box, perhaps through 2nd grade.

The blue lines are windows. I draw them here because I spent a lot of time looking out of them, especially as weather warmed with spring and we opened classroom windows and could hear lawn mowers and birds and other outside noises.

Here is a list of the rooms and teachers that I remember...

K - Kindergarten

P - Principal, Mr Luscheon.

Mr Luscheon's secretary was Mrs Nickel. Mrs Nickel was the mom of my closest friend all the way through 6th grade, Rich Nickel.

1 - 1st Grade, Miss Minucci (sp? pronounced min-OO'-chee)

I spent time in both rooms labeled #1. I like to joke that I flunked 1st grade. Actually, I was what you'd call a "young 5" today, but there were no provisions for kids my age then, and so I ended up going back to kindergarten for another year, which was fine by me. (There's a story there for another time. I still dream about being in those classrooms; strangely, in each dream, without fail, I'm a teenager in a 1st grade classroom.)

2 - 2nd Grade, Miss Leopold

3 - 3rd Grade, Miss Anderson

4 - 4th Grade, Mrs Budzynski (homeroom, math)

4b - 4th Grade, Mrs Southpaw[1] (reading and geography)

5 - 5th Grade, Mr Veith (homeroom, math)

6 - 6th Grade, Mr Locke (homeroom, science)

6b - Mrs Fuhrman (née Roslanowick), (English)

a - Before 1971, the cafeteria, after 1971, the library

There were two books I remember quite well in that library that I read cover to cover many times: Small animal life in a field, and the daily routine of a police officer. Rich Nickel and I wanted to get a couple acres someday and raise small animals like that. And we wanted to be policemen. I've lost track of Rich completely.

b - Courtyard; this was locked and unused the entire time I was at Vernondale.

This may be because a number of classroom windows looked out into it and activities would have been distracting.

c - The front of the lunch line where you picked up your food and milk.

The line sometimes extended down the corridor next to the courtyard, (b). A hot lunch was 40¢. Milk was 5¢ for a half pint. Chocolate or whole. Luke warm.

d - Cafeteria during lunch, otherwise the gymnasium.

There is still, as far as I know, a spot of mustard high on the brick interior, placed by yours truly when someone challenged me to smash a mustard packet with my fist. I did, and the end of the packet facing the wall exploded. I vaguely recall the lunch monitor (who was also the recess monitor) scowling.

This is the room in which I watched one of the Apollo moon landings. I reviewed the dates, days of the week, and times of day that each took place, and I don't think I actually watched any lunar landings; I think what I remember seeing was a telecast from the moon surface, which could have been broadcast any time during the mission.[2]

e - Music room

I learned to "play" the recorder in 4th grade in that room.

I was especially fond of Miss Anderson and Mr Locke.

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Theseus fighting the Minotaur, by Jean-Etienne Ramey;
marble, 1826, Tuileries Gardens, Paris

[1]

Her name was not Mrs Southpaw, but she had a delightful soft Southern drawl and a name that had an "s" and "th" in it (if I recall correctly) and "Southpaw" became an affectionate name for her. She was the gentlest, kindest teacher I ever had, though to this day I can't picture her very well, even though I can picture the others; I learned in her class that the alphabet had 26 letters in it. (She insisted I count them until I got it right.) She also taught us art and Greek mythology. It was in her room I first encountered the Minotaur.

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Crew of Apollo 16, L-R
Thomas K Mattingly, John W Young, Charles M Duke

[2]

As I recall, that day we were enjoying what we called "spring jacket weather" - clear, warm and breezy; I remember running all the way home from the bus stop to tell Mom I'd seen men walking on the moon.

The weather that weekend actually was unseasonably warm; temps started out around 70°F on April 21, 1972 in Erie (source >).

If my memory of the weather is correct, the moon mission I watched could only have been Apollo 16, which landed in the Descartes Highlands on April 21, 1972 at 2:23 UTC (source >).

Unfortunately, that's about ~9:30pm Thursday April 20 in Erie, PA, and the lunar module was only on the moon's surface for 3 days, so they would have lifted off Sunday about 9pm. That means I could not have been watching a live landing or live moonwalk in the Vernondale gymnasium in April of 1972.

John Young, commander of Apollo 16,
salutes the American flag on the lunar surface.

However, there are a few possible explanations that still make Apollo 16 a good candidate:

1) TVs were not as common as they are today and most homes had only one if they had one at all. TV networks (there were only three big ones - ABC, CBS, NBC) may have been broadcasting the moon walk on the next day, a Monday, when children had returned to school.

2) If I'm wrong about the weather, it could have been one of the other Apollo missions during the school year, but none of them landed during school hours either, so I'm faced with some of the same questions.

3) Vernondale may have taped and replayed it. There were no VCRs in those days, but there were reel-to-reel video recorders. They were very large and had to be rolled from class to class on wheeled carts. Vernondale had two. My best friend Rich Nickel was on the "AV Team." Everyone on the AV team had to have very good grades so they could be excused to set up the equipment in other classrooms when needed. Rich was very smart. I applied but was not accepted for the AV team.

I don't think #3 is possible, as I don't recall anyone from the AV team getting it started. Whatever we were watching, we were there on someone else's schedule, not our own.

[2013-04-08]

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God bless Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins.

[2014-07-18]

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