Culmination; Beginning in Earnest

"The demands upon God are even greater upon the Sabbath than upon other days. His people then leave their usual employment, and spend the time in meditation and worship. They ask more favors of Him on the Sabbath than upon other days. They demand His special attention. They crave His choicest blessings. God does not wait for the Sabbath to pass before He grants these requests."- Desire of Ages, page 207

There is something special about the going down of the sun on Friday night.

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Sailing Final Installment

So this is the final installment. I collected all the other photographer's cameras and uploaded the photos to Picasa. You can see it after the jump.

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Only if you want me to, Dad

That was the answer of the 4 year old young man, when his father told him, "E___, you're going to get two shots today, son."

What also amazed me was the calm interaction between the two, like they were adults leaning over a bridge, discussing how the fish were biting. As I questioned the dad, I watched the boy's reaction, and he was calmly sitting in his chair looking up at the father expectantly, with an expression of trust, knowing he couldn't answer my questions but believing full well that his father would give just the response I needed.

Just this simple interactions showed me what God wanted us to be like in order to enter into the kingdom of Heaven. How often do we, in any situation unfamiliar to us, try to figure out our way, or plan our way, or complain about the situation we're in. We love to murmur, because we do it readily, often, and unconsciously. We complain about what we have to go through, our heartaches, and trials, and difficulties, yet forgetting that Christ has gone before.

How much more at peace we would be, if we could remember where God has brought us from, knowing His strength and the power of His Word, and remember the cost of suffering He paid for us, and the work He is doing now in judgment. If we could just keep these in mind, then for each situation God leads us into, calling us to go through it, we can answer like Christ in Gethsemane, "Only if you want me to, Dad."






--
Elwyn Garaza
http://www.formspring.me/elwyng
photo.net/photos/egaraza

More Sailing Photos

Jennifer Penner and Brittany Brockmann Penner became sisters-in-law on May 31, 2010. It was good to see Brittany again, as she and her mom came to visit Maine last weekend for a short stent. Click HERE for the second installment of sailing photos. More after the jump.

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Call night

On call last night. Called in early for a 'section. Finished just in time to start rounds. It might be a long day.

Sailing through the S90

Still waiting on the other cameras. I brought the little guy instead of my usual rig. We launched off Dr. Losey's backyard, on Sabbath afternoon.

John Howe skippered us to an island name WhaleBoat. Not what you'd think of when you think of a deserted island. Only some sand, and no palm trees. If you click on the slide show on the right (those of you who get an auto-feed have to actually go to the website) can see all the photos in a slide show, of those that came off the S90 until I ran out of batteries. That's the reason I'm waiting on the other cams. Eduardo from Argentina was generous enough to lend me his camera to shoot to my heart's content, well until the card got full at least. Also look out for Lauren Lombard's shots, Jonathan Gerrans and Jennifer Penner's. I think David Gerrans snuck a few in there, too.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then we must be lacking in adequate vocabulary, because here are the equivalent of 34,000 words.

First Sailing Trip

Instructions:
- Review pictures
- Click to enlarge
- View John H's blog entry: Whaleboat for cartographical details and overall summary of the way we felt at the end of that day.
- Return frequently for anticipation of full post following collection of digital pictures from various other cameras.
- Leave comments.

Camerata Musica of New England - Benefit Concert Weekend

Weekend was remarkable. Rich and fulfilling, refreshing and meaningful. The music was elevating and inspiring. The friends charming and warming. Here are some photos from the weekend. Click HERE for the photo samples.

Click on the Title of the blog to see the website.

Falling in Love Again

She asked if I wanted to play. I thought it would be fun. So I said yes. And that's what brought me back.

When it arrived I opened it tentatively, and ran my finger across the now dulled nickel, and wondered if I had polished it often, would it shine like it did when it was new. I pulled each part out to inspect the wood, and its familiarity came back. It had been a while but I remember how my fingers were to sit on it. Apprehensively, I remembered the hours and hours adjusting tone, and embouchure, and fine tuning positions. I popped a reed in some water, and after some soaking, put it on the bocal. The sound was horrendous! I don't remember this. I tinkered and pulled and twisted, and looked down the bore, wondering if anything was hindering the sound. I did this for two days, and my spirits quickly plummeted. Was this what I was going to be playing in almost two weeks? The embarrassment alone would kill me! I tinkered some more. Finally I searched online and ordered some new reeds. Different choices, some were supposed to be the best manufactured, blah blah blah. They all say the same thing.

I ran into an obscure website. Not as professional as some, but it made an interesting claim. Additionally, this reed was hand-made. I ordered it up, along with some accessories, and hit the order button, hoping it would get here, not in time for the concert, but for me to get adjusted to it. I recalled breaking reeds in after about 2-3 sessions of 2 hrs rehearsals. The other pro reeds arrived in their snazzy padded cases, and I popped one after another on and still the sound just didn't have it. Juvenile squawk! Some thing out of a pre-beginning band. What was going on!! Weren't these $15 dollar reeds? My mouth felt somewhat familiar on the cane, and my lips went where they were supposed to, but the sound was just so ... mediocre. I dreaded the thought of plowing through several hours of rehearsing with THIS! Argh!

I had almost given up hope, and temporarily distracted by work. But that morning, one of the secretary's called the office with the announcement, you've got a package in the Augusta office ... from England. Simple, matter of fact. Hmmm. How surprising that it had gotten here so soon ... oh, yeah, we're on the East Coast now! 3100 miles from California!

But to look at this unassuming piece of cardboard was somewhat unusual. It was packed simply in a paper towel and taped together! Odd indeed. Completely home made! Amused, but not knowing what to think, I read the included slip. In it were instructions as if I had gotten a new puppy. Dr. Downing really took this seriously, you could tell the care placed on this mouthpiece. I looked closely at the thread and design, and it looked beautiful. The colors were, though not quite garish, still outspoken, not really brilliant, but completely different than any other reeds I had used. She had put together the reed by hand and the care was apparent: one reed at a time. There was a little special artistic charm in its appearance. If the other reeds were black suits with white shirts and spiffy ties, (especially the Heckel, which is synonymous with quality in terms of this instrument) then this reed from England was like a flamboyant sundress in the middle of a black tie event! At least it looked pretty.

But the image belied its value. After soaking it for 5 minutes as instructed, I firmly placed it on the bocal. Without any fanfare or pretense, the sound that came from that bassoon was so magical and warm and heavenly. It was just like I was twelve years old again, hearing the bassoon for the first time in an old run-down music room. The tone was full and husky, with languorous deep tones of the lower register, and the hypnotic singing tenor in the upper register. Without any effort, it was as if it was a new bassoon all together. What days before seemed as labored and tiring was now effortless and inviting. I played and played and played and time seemed to stop the way it does when a furtive glance catches the eye of a muse, and I wondered how this bassoon could have been left unused. I fell in love with its sound all over again. Not the kind of appreciation that is learned from something introduced by your parents or friends or advertised on TV. See, when I fell in love with the bassoon decades ago, I didn't even know its name, and I felt like I was the sole discoverer of this beautiful, magical, sound. No one else around knew what it was. And here I was, hearing it just like that first time and I was captured under it's spell all over again.

Mount Wheeler, Vermont

These poisonous mountain plants, Kalmia latifolia, are scattered along the region where Mount Wheeler stands. They were originally imported from Europe for their decorative use. Although pretty to look at, you wouldn't want to ingest them, unless your name was Shine or another one of various household pets, such as dogs and cats, which apparently are not affected by it.


We found these plants on the hike Sabbath afternoon, during my weekend jaunt to Vermont. The hike was easy going, and perfect for the day. A big slab of rock marked the south and west side. I wasn't thinking when I grabbed the telephoto lens (or maybe I was too excited to want to change lenses to the wide angle. So you all are stuck with these shots.

The guys I stayed with, Nick and Damon, share a house in Barre, Vermont. One can sit, as they have, on the rock slab overlooking the valley and see the whole east side of the Northeast Kingdom, with Lake Willoughby.

Below, the Eurbin family and Jim Warman were kind enough to find this hike for us, since we were in their backyard and didn't know any place to go spend the afternoon. So after a quick lunch, we took a couple mile trail up to these rocks.

The view was beautiful, and the valley seemed to open up wider than in other places. We didn't make it to the other side to see the Lake.

It made for a perfect working (speaking/teaching) vacation. Conversation was great, and nature was beautiful, and the food was filling, and the walk was brisk.

Shine and his human, Jeff.

Meet Shine. He's from Humbolt county. He was down and out, not getting walked, fed, watered or loved until he found Jeff.


After meeting Jeff, he made his way across the country. Since he didn't have any opposable thumbs, Jeff had to do all the grunt work to get them a ride across the United States. Shine took three weeks to get across the lower 48, and three whole days alone just to cross New York, sleeping among pine trees behind restaurants, whereever. Shine says that there is a science to hitchhiking like that; Jeff is his lab assistant apparently. I picked up Shine on the way out of New Hampshire, from a speaking/teaching engagement this Sabbath. Shine doesn't seem interested but he's following Jeff to a Grateful Dead concert in Oxford, Maine. That's where I left Shine to watch over his human after having he posed for me, while Jeff watched in the background.

Hmmm, meandering from place to place, job to job. Not really settling down, finding any place to sleep. Enjoying the trip. Sounds like a TravelDog to me!

Taylor

Sometimes picking up a hitchhiker gives your own drive an interesting twist.
Take Taylor for instance. I picked him up on my way to Vermont about 1 week ago, when I went to clean out my storage unit in Berlin. We talked (he talked) all the way there. He was tired of just seeing trees and insisted that one day he would be famous and he was headed out of Maine to make sure of that. So the five and a half hour drive from Augusta, Maine to Burlington, Vermont, was riddled with ideas and thought's of Taylor's ideas of self-agrandizement. Just shy of perfectly amusing (if he had a better command of the English language, instead of the vernacular that teenagers commonly use nowadays, it would have been a perfectly amusing conversation), it kept me entertained and virtually shortened the drive there.

I dropped him off at Church Street. And for those of you who know Burlington, I'm sure he found it quite entertaining. When he left I slipped him some cash (he didn't have anything, and he was working his way to New York City!!) and he surprised me by leaning over and giving me a hug. Imagine my shock. Any of you who know me that it takes some time before I'm comfortable like that. I had to chuckle to myself at his generosity of affection. After all he did let me snap this photo off my G9.

It made me think about the road we travel in this Christian walk. What happens when we run into someone who is simply coming along for the ride, not because he wants to go where we are going, but because he simply doesn't want to be where he is? Although a good place to start, it also means that when he's done, he won't join you.

"But the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto a perfect day." - Prov 4:18, if you've forgotten.

And if we haven't found a love for the Light for ourselves, if our destination isn't where the Way leads, we're doing what my hitchhiker friend did, and just hop out when the path isn't going where we think we want to be. It made me wish I packed my Jeep with some Steps to Christ, just in case. But it's rare to pick up people who'll go such a long way.

I don't want to be a Christian Hitchhiker. I want to make a decision to ride Christ's Word to the end of the line. All the way through Judgment Day.