CPR

So, you sit around for years and years thinking, “you know, I ought to learn CPR.” Then, you finally take the course, get certified and feel like you’re ready to help the little old lady across the street, or an aging parent, or someone at church.

Or a 30-year-old, 6′3″ North Carolina highway patrolman running at the beach.

That’s what my girl did. On our first day of vacation, Aprill says “call 911, there’s a guy laying in the road” as she runs out the front door of the house. I’m running around trying to FIND the phone and by the time I get outside, she’s finishing her second round. She said to me, “take a round, I’m tired.” But the results were already there. He was breathing, and we just kept him stable until Medic arrived.

He is fine. A night in the hospital, tests, and now he’s back on the road. And I’m living with a hero.

Learn CPR. Do it sooner rather than later. I will say – knowing that there was something we could do was a good feeling.

My favorite food.

I don’t know if I can remember the first pizza I ever had. I can tell you without a doubt it was a Chef BoyArDee. McMinnville didn’t offer a pizzaria. I did love the pizza.

Then, some years later, Roma Pizza Parlor opened. In Roma, they tossed the crust. Sure, it was middle Tennessee farm boys tossing it into the air. But it seemed so international. I’ve never thought of it until this moment, but it was probably my first “international experience.” I had no idea that pizza was really made this way. Tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, pepperoni, italian sausage – things I didn’t even know existed. Roma pizza was incredible.

It started a 30+ year love affair between me and pizza. It has always been my favorite food. I can eat it any time. We don’t eat as much pizza as we once did, but it doesn’t matter. I could eat it today, tomorrow and the next day. For me, it’s one of those foods that, if you smell it just after eating a huge meal, the aroma of oregano and sauce still makes you a little hungry.

It’s been my favorite food for years. But I have a new favorite.

A few weeks ago, I described a ragout that Aprill made. It has kale, white beans, diced tomatoes, zucchinis, sausage, onion, garlic, and some various spices. It is just awesome.

She made it again this week. We had it twice. I love it. I cannot think of a more perfect food.

I’m not ready to throw pizza under the bus just yet. Equity means a lot to me, and pizza has built up a lot of equity with me through the years. But ragout…ragout…it’s on the charts…with a bullet.

Charleston

OK, Charleston is really good.I have to explain this statement a little to all of you Charlestonophiles out there who have always extolled to us the virtues of Charleston (and whom we’ve largely ignored).Aprill and I have spent the last couple of days in Mt. Pleasant, SC, just across the Cooper River bridge (officially named the Ravenel Bridge – one of the prettiest bridges I’ve ever seen. Google it!) We’ve been with our good friends Joe and Stephanie Shuster who have been house-swapping here for about 3 months. Mt. Pleasant is one of the coolest waterfront communities in the Carolinas. Mainly residential, quaint. Of course, like all Carolina coastal communities, housing here has become completely ridiculous. A shack costs $750,000. Oh well – glad I don’t really want to live here.Anyway, we had only been to Charleston once before – about 16 years ago – and we just didn’t really have that great a time. So we haven’t been back. Our loss. Just walking around Charleston is a visual feast. To me, it’s New Orleans without the trash and decadence. The homes are gorgeous. The streets are picturesque. You can look into the backyards of the homes and imagine all of the events that have happened there through the centuries.There is amazing food. We had mahi mahi both nights! Sunday night we went to a restaurant near the beach, and last night grilled at the Shusters. Yummy. Love mahi. We brought Henry, and it’s been fun hearing Joe campaign to Stephanie all three days about how nice it would be to have a dog. We thought about renting him to them for a month, but I think we’ll go ahead and take him home with us today.The Shusters used to own “Java Joe’s” in Charlotte. So they have a really nice espresso/cappuccino maker. It’s hard to beat fresh cappuccino made by a professional when you get up in the morning.As if it couldn’t get any better, we spent both days here relishing in Tennessee heading to Charlotte to play in the Sweet 16 on Thursday. Anyone hear of any available tickets? (BY THE WAY…I have no idea why when I post on Aprill’s computer it doesn’t break paragraphs. Sorry!) 

Trouble in Paradise

Ever hear a song that you haven’t heard for a long time, and it brings back a vivid memory?

The other day, I heard the song “Trouble in Paradise” by Al Jarreau. (As a side, if you’ve never listened to Al Jarreau, or the only thing you remember him singing is the theme from “Moonlighting,” you really should take a minute rediscover him. And it is getting to be the perfect time of year to listen to Al – as this story will attest.)

Anyway, for the first 3 years we were married, Aprill and I lived in Schenectady, NY. It was a great time – cold at times, and under mounds of snow and ice occasionally. But the summers were festive and jam-packed with good things. One of those things was SPAC and the Kool Jazz Festival. SPAC is the Saratoga Performing Arts Center. It’s in Saratoga Springs (25 minutes north of Schnectady). It is an outdoor amphitheatre in the vein of Tanglewood (as opposed to the Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre). Built into a natural setting, serene and a very cool, shaded lawn.

All three years we were there, we would enjoy SPAC. We saw Dan Fogelberg, Bob Dylan, Kenny Loggins, Whitney Houston (it was her first concert!), Henry Mancini (with the Philadelphia Philharmonic), the Moody Blues and I can’t remember who else. We were able to see the New York Ballet on summer hiatus. And all three years, we went to the Kool Jazz Festival.

The Kool Jazz Festival was a 2-day all-jazz weekend. It was incredible. During the three years, we saw Spyrogyra, David Sanborn, Weather Report, Chick Corea (among others)…and Al Jarreau. Jarreau is such a great performer. Here’s a youtube clip of another of my Jarreau faves – Roof Garden – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X42UySfQTx8

It’s a long set-up to saying that when I heard “Trouble in Paradise” this week, I immediately remembered hearing the initial strains of that song at the jazz festival, jumping off the blanket that we had our picnic basket on, and dancing with my beautiful wife on the lawn. It was a warm evening in July, right around sunset. I can remember the rays of the sun breaking through the pine trees, the first crispness of a summer evening that you only get in the north, and Jarreau wailing in the background.

Good memories are a blessing.

Late Winter Days

I love late winter days like today. It’s about 68 and sunny. Tomorrow, it’s supposed to be 54 with a cold rain. Today, it’s beautiful.

My favorite time of the year is actually autumn – for a lot of reasons. I’ll write about in autumn. But late winter is great for a different reason. It tells me that the warm weather months are just ahead. We have some great patio nights on the near horizon. Dogwalks in shorts are coming soon. Breakfast on the patio. Doing work on the patio in the AM. (Can you tell I love my patio?)

Spring is just around the corner. Today reminds me of that.

Buttercups

Tomorrow, I’ll snap a picture of our backyard and show you what, to me, is one of the most beautiful things in my year.

Buttercups.

We inherited the buttercups in our yard. They were here when we arrived. We bought our home in July – so we had no idea that they were even there. Then, that first February as the winter faded, the backyard became covered with buttercups. They’re the old-fashioned kind – deep, green stems and bright yellow flowers.

It’s something to see. It’s good – all good. The buttercups make me smile.

Valentine’s Day

How can you top going to Knoxville and a University of Tennessee ballgame? Well, a trip to Gatlinburg, of course. At least if you’re the Joneses.

Two nights in Gatlinburg in February. Aprill and I grew up going to Gatlinburg. For you Carolinians, think “Myrtle Beach” and you know what Gatlinburg means to Tennesseans.

As crazy as Gatlinburg can be, we love it. We love the main strip with the space needle and the t-shirt shops. We love to get a block of fudge (or Karmelkorn). And we absolutely love the Pancake Pantry. In a way, our entire trip last week was built around arriving at the Pancake Pantry for a Valentine’s day breakfast.

Gatlinburg has a fascination with pancakes. Almost every restaurant not only serves pancakes, but promotes them extensively. And no one does pancakes better than the Pantry. In the summer, the line is long, stretching down the street. They have complimentary coffee while you wait. It was really cold Thursday morning – and there was no line, even though I kinda wanted a short line to enjoy a cup of coffee while my anticipation built.

We were lucky. We were seated with no wait – and we could contemplate what kind of pancakes we wanted. Strawberry? Boysenberry? Buckwheat? Or maybe Swedish pancakes with apricots and cherries? Cinnamon and spice?  There are so many choices – and you don’t want to make a bad one because you aren’t in Gatlinburg every day.

We made two good choices. Aprill got blueberry (with a blueberry compote syrup). I went with the tried and true Pigs in a Blanket. I loved them, but Aprill definitely made the best choice. (I hate it when that happens.) The blueberry compote was the bomb.

Next time…

The Eclipse

I’m not sure why lunar eclipses don’t get more press.

Last night, we were able to enjoy a full lunar eclipse in Charlotte. It was spectacular – nothing less. And it was perfect.

I had heard about it earlier in the week – but had forgotten it was Wednesday night. We finished rehearsal at church, and my friend Bill (one of the guys in the band) called me from his car and said, “you can’t miss it if you look up – but don’t forget about the eclipse tonight.” When I saw it, it was about 80% to full. By the time I got home it was 90%. Aprill and I put on coats and hats, went out on the patio, pulled up a couple of chairs and just watched.

The moon slowly disappears behind the veil of the earth. Once the eclipse is complete, it takes on a reddish glow. (How does it still have any light? We didn’t know.) We watched it, looked through binoculars at it, and even talked with our neighbor Stan for awhile when he came out to see.

Of all the things in the world and the universe that points me to God as our creator, it is an eclipse. The earth is the perfect size to cast a shadow across a moon that is 250,000 miles away from a light source that is 93,000,000 miles away. Then, that same moon is the perfect size to block the sun’s light and return the favor. That is amazing to me.

(For Aprill, her proof is that we don’t just fly off the earth with it spinning so fast

A Surprisingly Good Sunday

Today was Youth Weekend at church. We only have two “special” weekends a year – Youth Weekend, and Senior Weekend. (They’re weekends now because we have 5:21 Saturday!) What makes them special is essentially a 5-minute presentation within the context of the service.

But one of the things that I’ve committed to is giving our youth worship team the platform in the Cafe on Youth and Senior Weekends. I always play the role of lead worshiper to keep the flow, manage the transitions, etc. Since this was only my third time doing it since becoming worship pastor, I had moderate expectations. They’re always zealous, but not always focused.

This year, big difference. I really, really enjoyed myself. The team was amazing. These kids led one of the best worship services that I’ve ever been a part of. The vocals were stellar. The musicianship was professional. These were 16- and 17-year-olds, and the music was spot on.

For any of you who have the chance to work with the next generation’s leaders, I encourage you to do so. I don’t do it enough. But here’s what I see when I look into the future. I see adults like me sitting around a restaurant talking about things, and one of them says, “when I was a kid, we tried to have a worship team in our youth group…” Then, he or she will say one of two things. 1)”…but no one really seemed to care. We didn’t get any encouragement.” or 2)”…and there was this guy named Chuck Jones, and he really encouraged us and helped us.”

I don’t always make it – but I sure want that conversation to end in #2. If you have the chance, make sure yours is #2, too.

I’ll try to post an mp3 of a song from today. To Brad, Brian, Hannah, Madeline, Julie, Anthony and Daniel, it was incredible.

Agility

This morning I took Henry to his agility training class. Awesome.

Henry is so funny in his class. He loves it. Truly loves it. Aprill and I call him “the deputy.” The first part of class is just socialization and play time from whenever you arrive until 9:30 AM (when the class starts). Henry spends that time checking every dog out. He doesn’t play a lot – just runs around and greets each new dog who enters the area. He’s just keeping the peace.

Then comes the class. That’s when things get fun. He’s been at it long enough now that he does all of it off leash. We walk around, pass the other dogs, sit, stay, come, all the basic commands. We take another play break – then comes the agility.

Agility is Henry’s strong suit. There’s the A-frame, the jumps and the tunnels. I have no idea which one he loves the best – but it’s between the jumps and the tunnels. He gets so pumped up going through the tunnel that he usually goes BACK through the other way (which would be a definite deduction in agility trials). The jumps? He just nails the jumps. He can take the 4-foot jump without a hitch.

And we’re surrounded by some great dogs and happy dog people. There are golden retrievers, doberman pinschers, stafordshire terriers, labradoodles, boxers and lots of mutts.

Great dog. Great time.