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Maile and I spent the last two weeks with her family in Charlotte, North Carolina. Every time we come down here I’m reminded that there is still a North/South divide – not because they’re still openly planning a revolt against the North (that’s mostly still done in secret), but because things seem so different.  Here are 10 things I love about the South:

1) Sweet Iced Tea – this sugar/caffeine combination is jet fuel for the human tank.  But if you order iced tea in the South, don’t ask if it’s sweetened.  I did this once, and the lady behind the counter looked at me like I was an escapee from the local asylum and began feeling for the under-the-counter alarm button. In their mind, all tea is sweet. I love this about the South.

2) Pulled Pork Sandwiches – I still haven’t figured out what about it is pulled, but it’s delicious.  My wife likes to pile on the cole slaw, which I think is disgusting, but she’s got southern blood in her.

3) The Local Spots – Maile and I grabbed breakfast at a little place in Belmont, NC the other morning.  The waiter came to the table and asked us what we wanted.  “Um,” Maile said slowly, “can we get a menu?” I let her do the talking – she speaks better Southern than I do.

The waiter looked at us in confusion.  “You’ve never been here before?”  We both shook our heads.  He shook his head in sympathy, pulled up a chair, and sat down at the end of our booth.  “We’ve got french toast or pancakes or gravy and biscuits.  Most people that order eggs get toast and grits and choose either bacon or sausage.” Maile and I still looked at him.  Then we realized – they didn’t have menus.  What a great idea – just order what you want.

4) They know each other – when we were eating breakfast at that place in Belmont, you could tell that everyone knew everyone else.  The waiter asked every single person that walked in if they wanted their usual – or sometimes he brought out food without them even ordering!

5) They love the heat – unlike in the North, where we complain about the cold EVERY SINGLE WINTER (c’mon folks, you know it’s coming – either move or learn to love it), they say they love the heat.  Do they really love the heat? I don’t know.  But everyone says they do.  And anyone who dares to even barely dislike the heat still qualifies their disdain: “It’s hardly ever this hot,” they say.  “Maybe one week out of the year it’s this hot.” Now, I know it’s hot most of the summer, but I like that they try to convince themselves that’s not true so that they can live in happiness.

6) Smiling people, even in the city – ever try saying hello to some random person on the sidewalk in Philadelphia? Of course not.  If you did, you probably wouldn’t be around to read this blog.  Ever try it in the South? Be prepared for a warm greeting in return.  And perhaps even a lengthy conversation – which might seem a bit unsettling to you Northerners.

7) Bridges Barbeque

8) Hush Puppies

9) Swimming Pools – they are everywhere.

10) The dirt is red.  I don’t know why I like this, but it seems kind of cool.

So what do you love about the South?

Sometimes we get glimpses of our true identity. We get to do something that suits us perfectly, something that seems to quicken our soul.

Maybe it’s playing music.  Maybe it’s writing.  Maybe it’s serving in a particular way or creating something or working on a specific project.

But then Monday comes.

And that thing that seemed so alive looks like a flower three days after full bloom, when the edges start to wilt, as if on fire, and the tips of the stem begin to brown. Sometimes it feels like life might be better without those glimpses of who we were meant to be.

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David is slowly becoming my favorite character in the Bible: passionate, intense, and yet sometimes a total screw up. This sounds familiar to me.  This “man after God’s own heart” was so many things: a shepherd, an adulterer, a king, a murderer, a worshiper.  an egomaniac. This gives me hope.  This keeps the hounds of perfection at bay.

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In one of my previous posts I wrote about how David’s knowledge of his identity as the next king of Israel probably gave him confidence to fight Goliath (The Day I Stared Down a Mack Truck).  But looking back at that story now, I realize I skipped something.  There was a monumental step that happened in David’s life, right after he was anointed as king in front of his family.

He had to go back to herding sheep.

How do you think that felt, the morning after Samuel poured the horn of oil on his head, to put on his dirty garments, pick up his rod and his staff and his slingshot, and walk back into the wilderness with the sheep?

Did he mutter to himself, “But I’m a king now”?

Did he mope on the hills and take backhanded swings at the sheep, wishing it was time for him to lead people instead of animals?

Maybe he just refused to go back out?  Maybe he just sat in his room, waiting to be king?

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I don’t think David did any of those things, at least not for long, because, only a few verses after his anointing, we hear King Saul say, “Send me [the son of Jesse] who is with the sheep.”

After being anointed as king, David went back to the flock.  Back to the humdrum life.  Back to work.

Back to the reality of a Monday morning.

And back to slinging stones.

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The stone-slinging is that one thing that’s part of his identity, that one thing that’s going to get him out of those sheep pastures and on to the throne.  He doesn’t even know it yet, but slinging a stone into the forehead of a giant will be the catalyst, the beginning of everything.

Such a small thing, slinging stones.  Protecting the sheep.  Yet he kept doing it, day after day.

What’s the one little thing you do? What’s the one, seemingly nonsensical thing you feel called to do every day, the thing that quickens your spirit?

Writing songs?

Playing music?

Telling stories?

Working on cars?

Building stuff?

Reading?

Taking care of your kids?

The little things, sometimes they take a lot of discipline, but do them every day. Keep slinging stones.  Some day, probably in a way you could never imagine, the seeming ordinariness of this everyday task will line up with the thing you’ve been anointed to do.  Some day the stone-slinging will lead to a giant slowly falling to the ground, and the thing you were anointed to do will appear, clear and real as a shooting star.

When that happens, will you be ready? Will you have spent your days preparing?

Or will you still be sitting in your room sulking, wishing away another Monday morning, wishing you were king?

What does your stone-slinging look like these days? What small thing are you doing, believing that some day it will lead to something greater?

I’m guest posting today over at Brett Harrison’s blog.  He’s got a cool story, so even if two blog posts by me in one day is more than you can handle, follow my link at the bottom of the page (it will be there as soon as I have it) and at least read about him and his wife and their current adventures.  I begged him to let me post there, and he said I could as long as it was about missionaries, so I decided to ask if missionaries these days have to leave their keyboards.  Head on over and join in the discussion.

In the mean time, here’s my post for the day.

I emailed back and forth this week with a guy I’ve met in blogworld.  His name is Josiah Bancroft, and he’s a poet.  It’s kind of cool, this whole thing of meeting people that ten years ago I may never have met.

Anyway in our email exchange he brought up the fact that my family and I have forsaken television for a year, and then he made a comment that got my attention:

“As an aside, I quit watching TV years ago, though there have been lapses. I found that the problem wasn’t the programming itself, but the thoughtlessness that resulted from sitting in front of the endless stream of shows and ads. That constant state of distraction is both depressing and addictive, I think…I find that watching (online or through Netflix) fewer shows less often and without commercials actually inspires me to work and write.”

Are we addicted to distraction? I know I am. I now use distraction as a motivational tool:

“Work for 15 more minutes and then you can get on Twitter.”

“Write three more pages and then you can check Facebook.”

“Write your blog post and then you can check email.”

When I found out the Wifi was not working in the cafe I had settled into for the day, I got out of there faster than Superman exiting a kryptonite factory. Why? I don’t need Wifi or the winternets to do 90% of my work, but the thought of going stretches of time without distraction freaked me out.

What’s your take on distraction as addiction?

Now, for my guest post over at Brett’s site, click HERE

I’m guest posting at The House Studio today.  As soon as I have the link I’ll put it at the bottom of this page.  Head on over and take a look – they’re a publishing house doing things in a new way, and the stuff they’ve come out with is challenging and insightful.  Don’t let the fact that they’ve allowed me to guest post on their blog lower your expectations of what they have to offer . . . I’ve never actually met any of them in person, but they seem like a fun group.  I’d especially like to attend one of their cyst-smashing parties.

Anyway, here’s today’s post.

Contentment is one of those words that can convey two, almost opposite connotations.

Some folks view contentment as the ultimate state of being.  If you’re content then you’ve decided to take what you’ve been given and be happy with it. 

Others view contentment as the enemy.  To them, being content is like giving in.  Giving up.  Nothing worth accomplishing, they argue, has ever been done by someone who is content with how things are.

I started thinking about contentment after reading Andi’s blog post the other day.  The way she talked about contentment reminded me more of perseverance.  I thought about how difficult it is to remain content with a piece of writing I’ve started, for example, how much easier it is to push it aside and start something new.

I think contentment as perseverance is very underrated these days.  We all want the newest thing, the iPad, the iPhone237, the next size up in televisions and houses and the car that talks (that’s my shout out for the year to Michael Knight). But what if we took a period of time, say a month, or a week, or even a day, and waited?

What if we were content?  What if we persevered in the task at hand?

Maybe the contentment naysayers would still argue that, unless we move on to the next thing, it will never be discovered.  But what about this thing?  This thing in the here and now?

What’s your take on contentment?

To check out my guest post at The House Studio on circumcision, all-you-can-eat buffets, and unnecessary burdens, click HERE.

This is an ongoing series of posts in which I share things my 7 year old son Cade says that makes me chuckle. Or cringe with embarrassment.  It really just depends on the day.

The scene: Maile is driving the minivan from one random place to another.

The people: Maile at the wheel, Sam and Abra in the middle seat, Cade and Lucy in the back seat.

The back story: Cade and Lucy are pretending they each have a super hero.  They begin one-upping each other in regards to the powers that each of their superheros has:

Lucy: My superhero can fly! (said with a smug smile on her face; after all, what could be better than flying?)

Cade (obviously flustered): Well . . . my superhero has the power of Home Depot!

Silence.  Neither one knows what to do with this.  It’s as if the power of Home Depot can silence even the noisiest of children.

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IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT #1: So far, three of the speakers for this fall’s writer’s conference have been confirmed – check them out HERE.

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IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENTS #2, #3 and #4: I’m still lining up guest posts for the next couple of weeks so let me know if I can come by and enrage entertain your readership.

Tomorrow I’ll be guest posting over at The House Studio about circumcision, all-you-can-eat buffets and unnecessary burdens (among other things).

On Friday I’ll be at Brett Harrison‘s blog asking if we can be missionaries without leaving our keyboards.

I’ll be posting links to these each day, once they’re up, so stay tuned and join in the discussion.

A few weeks ago I tried to write a Top Ten regarding Summer. You’d think that with barbeques and July 4th parties, it would be easy.

It wasn’t.

If you’d like to supplement my Summer top 10, feel free.  In the mean time today’s list is of a different sort: the reality is, it’s June.  The anti-reality is, it is December. And I love December.

The top ten things I love about December are:

1) The cold. I love the cold.

2) Coats and sweaters and jeans and wool socks and scarves and gloves.

3) Snow.

4) Christmas afternoon: helping Lucy and Abra put their toys together, working on Cade’s latest Lego acquisition, watching Sammy crawl like mad through the wrapping paper.

5) Early nights spent by roaring fires.

6) Snow.

7) Christmas lights (not my own, but seeing other people’s).

8) New Year’s Eve – even though I’m usually asleep by 10pm, I still like all the excitement.

9) Christmas music

10) Those red and green Captain Crunch and the cranberry ginger ale they only sell during Christmas time

So, what do you think? Am I a summer humbug? Or are you a winter-ite like me basking in anti-reality?