A Welcome Breath of Fresh Air

Exhausted after a long day of work and allergies, while driving home through a torrential rainstorm tonight, I was refreshed and encouraged by an interview I heard on NPR.

Terry Gross -- on her "Fresh Air" show -- was talking with Dr. Francis Collins. I didn't know much about Dr. Collins. Knew he headed up the Human Genome Project. But I had no sense of his faith.

Can I tell you how pleasantly surprised I was to hear him speak about the wonder, the awe, the God he finds in DNA. In the 3.1 billion pieces of code found in every human cell. Frankly, it did my weary faith good.

In a time that finds atheistic scientists like Dr. Richard Dawkins basking in a generous media platform, spouting about the irrationality of God, it was wonderful to hear Dr. Collins speak and enthusiastically reconcile science and faith -- and how the two coexist peacefully in his scientific pursuits. Fresh air, indeed.

Listen to the interview here.

And recall the words of the psalmist from Psalm 139:
"For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body."

The Bracket of Life

What would your life look like if you laid it out in a tournament-style bracket?

Yes, the thought was inspired by March Madness – and The Enlighted Bracketologist. (Brilliant idea.)

But it was truly sparked by a recent breakfast discussion, talking about success. Specifically, financial success. Who is rich? Moreover, why? Did they become millionaires because they are brilliant and shrewd visionaries? Or is it a case of timing and dumb luck? Whatever. They were in the right place at the right time. Said another way, they made a series of decisions that put them in the path of a financial windfall, whether or not they knew that would be the ultimate result of that decision.

Money doesn’t have to the yardstick here. Could be contentment. Happiness. Just happened to be the focus of our discussion.

Which got me to thinking about the decisions we encounter in life.

And that if you were to lay out your life in a linear, chronological format, you’d chronicle thousands, maybe millions of decision nodes.

You’d certainly show the major decisions – like who to marry, who to work for, where to live, what college, church, associations to belong to (or not). To the degree they’ve impacted your life, those minor decisions might also be chronicled: where to have lunch, what movie to see, what book should I read. (Not sure paper or plastic qualifies.)

Regardless, these nodes visually remind me of a tournament bracket.

Of course, the bracket analogy doesn’t totally work, for a few reasons like these:

1. If money is the determining factor, not everybody starts out in life at the same point. You don’t get to choose the socio-economic bracket you're born into.
2. The tournament bracket pits winners against each other while banishing the losers. It's a a zero-sum proposition. Our life is a bit more complex. Here, the winners and losers define who we are.
3. The tournament bracket suggests two choices. Life’s decisions aren’t so black and white, offering multiple options.
4. In life, you have more control over the outcome. The tournament/sports example limits your involvement as a detached spectator. (Unless your name happens to be Pete Rose.)
5. Nobody organizes an office pool around your life.

But as I sit here, disenchanted and discontent with my lot in life on this particular day, I reflect on the choices that landed me in this place. At this time. Somehow I can hear David Byrne wailing, “How did I get here?”

Reviewing my life and its decisions, bracket-style, provides some clarity.

Because as I review this imaginary, massive bracket, I see similarities between those life decisions – both major and minor – and how I picked my unimpressive bracket for this year’s NCAA tournament. Sketchy knowledge. Scant research. Precious little understanding. Didn’t consult the experts. Did a few of the picks just to be different. (If I would’ve picked, say, North Carolina because I thought it would make others happy, that would really have made this analogy sing.)

Guess I’m just glad life’s bracket isn't a single-elimination tournament. For now, you can find me fighting to stay relevant and alive somewhere deep in the NIT-like consolation round.

Pinewood Pressure

My son’s Pinewood Derby car kit sits in my garage.

Frankly, it intimidates me.

Which partially explains why we haven’t started building the car for the big race.

The larger part of the explanation is the big race was three weeks ago.

So what went wrong? I’m still sorting it out. I can trace some of it back to my own unsuccessful Cub Scout career. That unspectacularly brief Scout stint was rooted in a low-hanging fruit approach. You know. Quickly grab all the activity badges for things I’d do anyway. Sports activities. Baseball card collecting. Eating. The occasional bath. Whatever.

In a clear case of the low-hanging fruit not falling far from the tree, my son appears to be adopting the same strategy.

Back to the Pinewood kit on my garage workbench.

(I should note the term workbench is a bit of a misnomer in our garage. Technically, this space is not a bench, nor does it host much work. It’s more of an oversized coaster for drinks, paint, and antifreeze.)

The good news: the kit is in mint condition and could yield top dollar on the open market. Or it could serve as a bittersweet souvenir. One that, in the years to come, could allow my son to recall the carefree days of his youth.

Really carefree. As in “I don’t care about the schedule for the 2007 Pinewood Derby.”

I mean, the whole thing just got away from us.

OK. There’s more to it than that.

Like the fear of woodworking (FLASHBACK: To 6th grade woodshop and the overlacquered, Bunsen-burner seared planter I crafted that my mother dutifully displayed at home). The fear of engineering and physics (FLASHBACK: To that unfortunate egg drop in high school). Heck, even a mild fear of decals, paint and graphite lubricant kept me from diving headlong into this project (FLASHBACK: Some other time. It’s a long and dicey tale.)

Given this checkered past, I wasn’t ready to relive it by building a car. And I wasn't quite ready for my son to feel the shame of the proud pack, who might just expose his dad as a sham. (I don’t think he reads this blog.)

But honestly, I couldn’t even visualize success at this event. The best my mind could conjure was showing up with our entry: a clumsy car resembling a Dutch clog designed by American Motor Cars (AMC), circa 1974. A colorful yet poorly-sanded entry that barely passes muster at inspection, thanks to a parent-unconstitutionally-deputized-as-judge who gladly welcomes a shoddier entry than his son’s into the contest.

My imagination did allow me to see our entry starting the race well, even taking an early lead. At this, I could see the smile spread across my son’s face as our car zipped out of the gate, a good car’s length ahead of the others as it harnessed the glorious momentum of gravity.

But as this played out in my mind, before he could reach me to share in an enthusiastic father-son hug, our car would shudder to a stop on the track halfway to the checkered flag, quite possibly due to three of the car’s tires flying off the axle-nail, the fourth left on the rainbow colored wooden shoe to smoke uncontrollably from the intense friction generated by a heinously calculated wheel to body ratio, which the resulting noxious fumes call unwanted attention to.

As we both watch this in open-armed, slack-jawed horror, the shrieking over-vigilant den mother sweeps our smoldering uni-tired monstrosity from the track and gets four painted pine splinters in her right index finger.

Maybe I’ll just toss the kit . . .

The Good, The Bad, and the Buzzkill

Caught three band last nite at Nokia.

Silversun Pickups
OK Go
Snow Patrol

The good:
--Silversun Pickups. Those guys unleased a massive wall of sound that was absolutely glorious. They were tight and played with ferocity and power. Kind of reminiscent of Smashing Pumpkins and Catherine Wheel "Black Metallic". Next time they come to town, go see them.

Unless they're opening for two lesser bands.

Which was exactly the problem with this multiple act show. The Silversun Pickups were alloted less than 30 minutes and seemingly no props to crank out their genius. Didn't need the props. But a 25-minute set was criminally brief. I had to grab a live set from iTunes this a.m. to get my fix.

The bad:
--Nokia Theater. Another comfy, corporate palace a la American Airlines Center. Ads everywhere. Lots of space and legroom. Ideal for My Little Pony or Thomas the Tank Engine shows. But lousy for intimate and/or energetic shows. (And $15 to park? What the . . .)

The buzzkill:
--The two 20-something girls who must've taken 300 pictures of themselves enjoying the concert. I kid you not. Imagine that photo review session. "Here's us with our faces totally against each other. Here's us with only the top part of our cheeks touching. Here's us with a sassy, rock concert look. Here's how I looked during the encore. OMG!! See how surprised I look!"

--The 50-something woman with old-lady-wiry hair in front of us, shaking her moneymaker to Snow Patrol. Any notion that we were part of some hip scene was decimated then and there.

--Men carrying big, dumb drinks in hurricane glasses. This was a rock concert.

--Air drumming.

--Ballads and love songs. (Maybe this explains the frozen drink thing.)


Summary: Listen to Snow Patrol on CD. Enjoy the novelty of OK Go. And follow Silversun Pickups wherever they go.

Libby Lewis on Lewis Libby

Last nite I heard a news report on NPR. It was regarding the guilty verdict of Lewis Libby.

This report was filed by NPR reporter Libby Lewis.

What the . . . Libby Lewis?!? Lewis Libby?!?!? At first I did a doubletake, audio-style.

Then I realized the genius of it. Of how this clever naming convention increased my recall of the story -- and of the oft-forgotten correspondent.

Believing, then, that this is a trend, I look forward to future reports on newsmakers from the following NPR correspondents:

-W. Bush-George
-Obama Barack
-Cuban Mark
-NicolAnna Smith (job outlook: sketchy)
-Chris Luda
-Reynolds Burtt
-Oliver Erick