Category Archives: family

contrasting emotions

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Today has been a day of sadness when I have reflected on the events of the last couple of days.
Labour’s dismal performance in the elections and the election of Boris Johnson as the Mayor of London cause more than a little concern. I’m glad I don’t live in London at this point in time! A sad day for politics.

Today Gillingham were relegated to League 2. We’ve have not played at this level for some 12 years and I’ll be praying we cam move onwards and upwards quickly. A sad day for football.

These emotions of sadness have to be contrasted with the great joy experienced while spending time fixing and rebuilding a Guinea Pig run today with Joseph. W chatted, I measured, he sawed, we both hammered nails and in just a few hours we had a smart looking run for the newest members of the family to run about in. A happy day for family life.

Today I’ve remembered to live!

Beth’s in print!

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Today we got some great news … and of this I am WELL PROUD!

Beth’s school entered a poem she had written for the Young Writers Competition. We heard today that Beth’s poem, ‘Graffiti and Teenagers’ is going to be printed in a book of poems called ‘Talkin’ Bout My Generation’ on August 31st.

Obviously Beth is very excited and we are all very proud of her!
Way to go Beth!

Busy times … or just getting old!

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I’ve not blogged for a while.
This is not due to lack of inspiration.
It’s more a combination of inspiration / thought overload accompanied with a packed diary and being dragged around London for the day by my daughter.

The week seems to have been crammed with busyness but I have a sneaking suspicion that it is more to do with my faltering energy levels and the failure to pack everything in at the rate that I have been used to.

Currently I have a few challenges! I am struggling with an essay concerning the Christian theology and relationship to other religions. I am struggling with the balance of inclusiveness alongside the integrity of my belief in the finality of Jesus Christ (i.e John 14:16: I am the way, the truth and the life ….)I’m finding this assignment the hardest I’ve done and the mental energy seems to be quite exhausting.

Another ‘challenge is getting my head around ordination and the need to get my act together and order some fancy ‘vicary’ type gear. Sarah says I can’t but the PVC cassock from eBay (I’m sorry if I have just offended you all) and really should buy a real one. (The eBay one is certainly a lot cheaper … but probably less comfortable!) Again … this seems to be taking mental energy for some strange reason … mainly because I’ve never spent hundreds of pounds on clothes … and I will be on a dress!

Next week I am leading part of a retreat – so yet another challenge is spending quality time preparing stuff for the people coming. I think the retreat will be good – but I do still have a few things to do.

There have been great times in the busyness. I managed to catch up with good friend Sheena for lunch. It always saddens me that we never have the time for meeting with friends regularly that mean so much to us.

Yesterday was a highlight in that I spent the day with Beth as her school had a staff training day. We started at the Tate Modern where Beth enjoyed parts of the Duchamp, Manray and Picabia exhibition. We both particularly appreciated Duchamp’s Fountain.

Following a coffee in the members room, we had a pizza lunch and visited Hamleys before ending the day in Carnaby Street and The Sacred Cafe. As we sat and chatted I was amazed by the way in which my daughter cold comfortable move from great maturity in the Tate and Sacred Cafe while still maintaining childlike love of places like Hamleys. I’m a very lucky dad!

After that day I may have been lucky … but I was conscious of how tired I was too! It’s much easier working than wandering around London with your daughter!

Today it was back to normal … queues on the M25 as I traveled to Wycombe to meet up with Paul – a top guy with great vision and always a pleasure to drink giant coffees with in Costa (no one else really matches the size of their giant coffee!)

Anyway … the day is nearly over … I’m soon to go to sleep so that tomorrow I can remember again that I must not forget to live!

specialness of life

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The children have been very excited over the last 2 days due to the fact that Sarah and myself allowed ourselves to be talked into buying them 2 guinea pigs.

All three of the children have been seen sitting outside the hutch talking to the guinea pigs as they try to get them accustomed to us and used to being handled and so on. It’s quite interesting to watch the fascination of the children as they look upon their new family members (I’m not allowed to call them pets apparently!)

The light of fascination in the eyes of my children has caused me to think of the fascination of creation once once again. If I reflect it’s actually quite mazing that my three children who have grown up in a technological age and love play station, Wii, the computer etc can be fascinated by 2 little 7 week old guinea pigs.

The guinea pigs have held their attention yesterday and today much longer than any video game has done for ages.

It sees that there is something special, something fascinating, something amazing about life which my children are aware of and which I, and maybe other adults, have become de-sensitized to.

I think I need to reflect on the wonders of creation more than I do as today while I have observed my children from a distance while working on the laptop I have had this distinct feeling that I have been kissing out on something quite special.

a son’s respect

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My eldest son clearly has great love and respect for hs father that works hard to ensure he has a nice life!
I got home last night to find he has bought me a t-shirt with this design!
I will have my revenge when he’s least expecting it!

great weekend and job advert

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We had a great weekend. We did not make it as far as London as the rest of the family are suffering from whatever viral thing I returned home with, but we went to Bluewater to watch a film (Step Up 2 – which was a good street dance predictable but very watchable movie) before grabbing a meal at Tootsies and then returning home in time to chill out the evening with Dr. Who!

The weekend has been active – with the St Mark’s APCM yesterday and I’m glad to see top people got elected to the church council (something I won’t have to be involved in as a pioneer!) as I’m quite sure St Mark’s is entering an exciting stage in it’s life.

Below is a great job being advertised in Youthwork magazine at the moment working with Sarah and in the school I am chair of governors at – please pass it around your circles.

Church Youthworker/ School Chaplain
Organisation St. Mark’s Church, Gillingham
Salary £25k +
Location Kent
Closing Date Fri 9 May 2008
Description

St. Mark’s Church, Gillingham, Kent Are looking to appoint a Church Youthworker/ School Chaplain
(50% – 50%)
Starting in September 2008

– innovative post for an experienced and qualified Youthworker
– 25K plus for right candidate – 3 yr minimum contract
Contact Details Contact: The Administrator, St Mark’s Parish Office, The Old Vicarage, Vicarage Road, Gillingham, Kent ME7 5JA
Email: info@stmarkschurchgillingham.co.uk
Tel: 01634 570489
Closing date for applications 9th May 2008

Birthdays

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It was my birthday earlier in the week – 43 yet for many of you I know this will be so hard to believe due to my youthful looks and playful attitude to life! But … alas ’tis true!

The day started poorly as I was ill th night before and went to bed at 6.30pm only to wake up in the morning still ill enough to feel the need to go to the doctor.

When I opened my cards and presents, though, I was given a great incentive to get better quickly as they had secretly bought tickets for all of us to go and see Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Joseph in London that evening.

It was a fantastic show – a big thank you for my wonderful family and a massive RESPECT for being able to keep that so secret from me for so long – I never had a clue!

Prior to that on the Saturday before Tom had arranged for a birthday greeting to be given out over the tannoy at Gillingham’s home of football before the match started.

As well as Joseph tickets my wonderful brother and sister in law bought me tickets to see Lady of Burma in Maidstone – I’ll obviously be looking forward to that – what an amazing present!

And yesterday I was able to meet up with a good friend over a beer and opened still more cool presents!

As I look back I feel as amazed as Joseph must have when he received that coat – just hope and pray no one’s gonna pick me up and through me in a pit now!

19 years

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Today I have simply been considering how fortunate I am as today Sarah and I have been married for 19 years. This year is the first year we can say that we’ve been married longer than we’ve known each other (we met when we were 18).

Marriage, like any relationship, takes effort. My love for Sarah is not what it was 19 years ago; it goes deeper and it is more integral to who I am. Sometimes this deepness presents a risk of it becoming taken for granted. I can’t imagine life without Sarah and I can’t remember life before Sarah.

Relationship with God can be similar to marriage in that as time moves on we forget life before we were in relationship with God. The effervescence of the early relationship dies away and something deeper and more beautiful emerges. Some relationships fail at this stage as they interpret the change of feeling as as ‘falling out of love’. In fact the change of feeling is due to a deepening of love and to a growing understanding that love is about concern for the other persons feelings and not ones own emotions.

I guess the early effervescence needs to die away as maintaining that intensity would be all consuming and alow little time for anything else. Interestingly for me I’ve known God 8 months longer than I’ve known Sarah and so can reflect on the past 19 years with both my creator and soul mate.

19 years seemed to have zipped by – the joy, the pain, the annoyances (mostly caused by me)and the grace and forgiveness (shown most by Sarah)all seem to flow into one long interestimng journey … long may it continue!

good weekend

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The weekend has been one of highlights only.
This weekend my brother, Steve, joined us and it was great to catch up and have a laugh. He also acted as my good luck mascot as he came to watch the Gills and it was our first win in ages. Sadly, he does not seem keen to come to more home games.
The sports results all seemed to go the right way this weekend – and BIG congrats to Spurs fans (sorry Jonny!)
A weekend of good beer, wine, whisky and curry (shockingly my first curry of 2008!)- what else do you need?

Diorganised creativity

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Last year I did not take up all my holiday and so I have 5 days that have been added to this years allowance, but need to be used by the end of March. So, the last 2 days I have been using some of that time up to take some time off with the family as it is half term in Medway.

As well as going to London yesterday (Imperial War Museum, Hamleys, bus rides just for the sake of bus rides, National Gallery, coffee)and visiting Howletts today I have also been able to catch up on some reading, particularly in blog land.

I have found some good podcasts over at Moot, and some great thoughts on creativity by being disorganised here and by planning regular interruptions here.

The thoughts on creativity have been quite inspiring – particularly the ideas around play and using some form of ‘randomizer’. Mark McGuinness defines a randomizer as ‘a device or game that acts as a randomizer, throwing up new combinations that can spark your imagination into life.’ McGuinnes uses magnetic poetry but there are plenty of other things and I like to use google and word games.

I also liked the idea that being creative was taking time off or skiving. Tomorrow, I’m going to skive some more and see what happens!

(love this pic which I think sums up a type of disorganised creativity and brings a smile to my face! If you click on it you get a bigger version)