Clarification

To clarify, it was my sister who took organ lessons from Mark Thallander at SCC the year she was there. I never took any lessons from Mark. I vaguely remember seeing his face around campus but I don't think we ever met. If I really wanted to take organ lessons from Mark I am sure that would have been a good time to do it but anyway I was never interested in learning organ. All those foot pedals and switches and bells and whistles, it's not really my kind of thing. Organs are nice in their places but you cannot pack an organ like that in a suitcase and take it with you. Those things are attached and go with the building.

Connections

Am I just dreaming this or am I remembering Joanne Keller, the secretary at Lockman Foundation in La Habra, Calif., telling me that she had some connection to Dina Knox of Yuma, Ariz.? Her husband is Dina Knox's father, a second marriage of elderly people obviously. I don't really remember this but maybe there was a connection.

Let Them Eat Crow

Maggie Brass was a Native American of the Crow tribe, living on the Crow Reservation in Montana. She and two other ladies made the trip to Los Angeles to visit the Azusa Mission in about 1909. Mrs. Brass did not speak English, but the ladies were mightily touched by the revival and brought Pentecost back to Montana. Today Maggie's granddaughter is married to the pastor of Arrow Creek Christian Center in Pryor, Montana. (borrowed from AzusaStreet.org)

On Stephen Speirs Craig

Who is this Stephen Speirs Craig who wrote for Trust magazine in 1910 and 1911 and thereabouts? He was originally a Canadian pastor, Presbyterian who is thought to have worked at Zion Congregational Church in Toronto, Ontario, some time around the turn of the century. He apparently turned Pentecostal later and  emigrated to the United States in 1915 and worked some time for the Duncan sisters in Rocheter, New York.

Interestingly, my great-great-great-grandmother was Ana Eliza Speers. Well, you know, spellings vary widely on these ancient census documents so who's to say how her name was supposed to be spelled? Anyway, Ana Eliza Speers was a Canadian living in Ontario. She married John Levins and had many children there in Canada, one of whom was the father of my great-grandmother. However, whether she, and thus we, ever had any kinship connection to this Stephen Speirs Craig is nigh impossible to say for sure, and even if it were so, it would not explain how my great-grandparents became Pentecostals all on their own living out there in California within easy driving or walking or bus or tram distance to the Azusa Street church where things really got rolling.

Anyway, the only Craig persons I know of here in Florida are definitely NOT related to me, thank heaven. Nor would they have a clue about the Speirs, as neither would I, come to think of it, not that it matters in the least.

The fact remains that my hand was pierced by an actual African spear that my sister and I were fighting over in San Bernardino, moving into a house formerly occupied by missionaries to Africa who had left behind some artifacts, not that I remember anything about that. There is obviously no connection there to Pentecostal Canada for those of us who know how to spell.

On the Prince of the Air

The article by Stephen Speirs Craig is an interesting take on "Satanic Strategy" and how the Prince of the Air is strategically opposed to Christian revivals today.

To clarify, Craig says: The word 'deep' should be Abyss." (Obviously he is not saying that everything must be superficial or that everything 'deep' is hellish. This is a specific reference to Luke 8:31 in which the original Greek word apparently does mean hell or the bottomless pit or Abyss or something like that and is sometimes translated more specifically. The demons cast out of the Gadarene man are the ones who are afraid of the "deep," in case you had not noticed. The demons are the ones always looking for something new and novel to keep them entertained. Craig makes the following points:

1. Satan's new brand of fanaticism aids his quest to injure the cause of Truth.

• a. Intellectual fanatic: Obsessed with new interpretations and novel doctrines.
• b. Emotional fanatic: Revels in manifestations.
• c. Spiritist: Persons with an affinity for evil spirits or demons.

2. Denominational resistance to the Holy Spirit and the Pentecostal movement.

3. Individual resistance to the Holy Spirit and the Pentecostal movement. 

"Alas! What shall they do when they stand before the 'Bema' face to face with the ten thousand whom the Great Shepherd has gathered into the fold from India, China, Japan, Africa, and the round globe as the fruit of this movement?.... And how will they conceal their astonishment and remorse when they see the jeweled crowns placed on the heads of the Pentecostal overcomers? Let the curtain fall for the present and let that Day of Days give its own answer. Methinks there will be sorrow in Heaven that Day."

Stereotypical Pianists

Yes, Geraldeane "Dina" Knox is one of those church pianists who fits the stereotype that is being bashed by those little boys who are trying to reform the Pentecostal reality. She is a worst-case scenario to them, being extremely overweight, single, and sort of obnxiously overbearing in a way so that obviously people are just going to leave her be. She actually was a very nice sixth grade teacher and a good piano teacher for that level but, anyway, not someone that I personally would want to emulate or to be like in the future of adult life, thanks anyway, not that I would ever say this in real life. But, anyway, the Pentecostal reformers have kicked all the single women church pianists to the curb to make room for young guys with drums and guitars. I am just saying the facts. It wasn't really my plan but sometimes one just has to go with the flow when these little boys are axing the furniture because obviously they have been programmed to think that old-time music is boring and that everything has to be electrified to the hilt, lots of screaming and bluesy. Sad that there is no music appreciation in church these days, just boring repetitive chanting of the mind-numbing variety. Maybe eventually we can get our brains back into the mix and get some real music that is not just a lot of pumped up robotics but I might not live that long so I am not going to hold my breath.

Danny Boy

Truth be told, there is not much place in my life for second or third cousin Daniel. He has his place in Pasadena and he does not need anything from me. I fail to understand why I should pretend to be connected to Daniel just because we met once or twice at family funerals. I vaguely remember that at the funeral he talked about seeing his redheaded distant cousins, my sister and I, when we first met as children on some occasion that I do not recall, and it made him feel better about being a redhead because he saw that it was not only him. There were quite a few of us in the family tree, including three Butterfields not to mention other occurrences. It's just one of those things that you never know. It doesn't appear in every generation, only now and then. No one can say whether their children will be redheaded or not. But if you do have them, you should not make them feel like they are from some other planet. I vaguely remember Irene Cool, a co-worker at Lockman's, mentioning that her niece was a redhead and got way too much attention from strangers, and that something needed to be done to put her in her place. That is the usual treatment that redheads get from certain people and it is hard for others to understand what this does to your head but whatever. It's just who you are, it's not like you are trying to dye your hair red. If you are like Daniel, you are just a truck driver who works for a plant nursery or something like that. You could have gone to college and done a lot more but you took it too personal when people put you down and you forgot something and started thinking that making money was more important so now you'll never catch up. But at least it's better than being a blonde like Geraldeane Knox who plays piano well by ear and yet weighs maybe 500 pounds by now and has to wear a tent, I would imagine, because she always did eat voraciously.

In the Kitchen With Dina

Geraldeane Knox of Yuma, Arizona, was my piano teacher when I was in sixth grade and she also taught at the little school. We used to sing that song of her although the pronunciation doesn't really fit. That was nice of her to stop by the college when I was there and take me home with her for a week to Yuma, Arizona, during Easter Week. An interesting drive across the desert and then a few days there at her house meeting the girls who were her foster daughters in a way, a visit to the local fair at which the person in charge of the sort-of-like-a-ferris wheel forgot to turn off the machine, then finally returning by bus to downtown Santa Ana from where I had to call the college to see if someone could come and find me because in those days I had no idea how to get around. Overall a sort of blah and depressing time and we have not heard from her since then. Sorry if I sound ungrateful for the vacation experience but things just weren't the same in Arizona. Or was I visiting Yula-land? I am starting to wonder. I never had any idea of the existence of Samuel Longwell's daughter so I can't really comment on that point. I just don't fit into the Arizona picture, only passing through.

The Grace Of Patience

And just because the lady in the article "The Grace of Patience" said that she had no joy in the Lord later  because she was not willing to obey the Lord and let her reputation go, that does not mean that losing one's reputation is a joyful and exciting experience or that there is any reward for willfully dashing one's reputation on the rocks just to prove some stupid point, quite the contrary, not that I had ever heard of this publication until recently. Losing one's reputation is not a joyful thing at all, as I can personally attest. And yet if the Lord wants to take my reputation, I suppose that there is nothing I can do about it and neither do I see any joyful fruit at the end of this exercise in futility carried out just so that, too, you can make some mysterious point about "Trust" magazine or something like that, although it is actually "Voice" magazine that great-grandmother mentions reading in her dairies, not that all of this makes any sense. I am just saying.

Blackmail Charges

And who exactly can I charge with extortion and blackmail? I have received the message that I must conform to the collective or be destroyed. And yet what they want me to do is entirely destructive of my own self interests, which sort of goes contrary to the U.S. constitution. Do I have no inalienable rights? I must do whatever they want in order to keep the peace. Whatever they want is not exactly clear. It is a secret path to the temple of mysteries. Yet mine is not to question why. Mine is but to do or die, as the saying goes. So just because on the airplane some man sitting next to my sister asked if I was the appointed chaperone, as if I were only the maid, that does not mean that I was the maid originally. It is my sister who enlisted in the Freemason club and has all these weird people working everything her way. Just because my cousin David, at maybe age 12, and myself were improvising and not going by the appointed script in the children's book selected by my sister, that does not mean that we are both queer. This later elaboration and embellishment comes from my sister's Wicked Witch Whiners who have devoted all their energies to making my life as miserable as possible. Just because they hate the Beatles music, that does not mean that I must remain unaware of the culture around me and let those little brats tell me everything, as if their ignorant opinions were the only thing that mattered in this respect. Just because you have the power to destroy me, that does not mean that you are right or that your opinion is true, only that you are cruel and despicable beyond belief. That is the only thing that all of this proves.

Data Analysis To Paralysis

I vaguely remember Sharon Turner telling me about how Mark Carpenter (or was his name Mark Brown?) was fired after it was learned that he had wired the entire building and was eavesdropping on telephone conversations. That was shocking news. I imagine that Mark's name is now MUD everywhere and I will never again have to listen to his whiny tirades over lunch in which he complains about everything and takes on way more than he can rightfully chew. I would not want to be trying on his icky shoes, that's for sure. It just goes to show that just because a guy is smart enough to wire the entire building, that does not mean that he has the emotional maturity and intelligence necessary to properly analyze the data gathered. I would not give two cents for Mark's idiot opinion about me or about anyone else so I imagine that telling Sharon that I knew nothing about it is all I would ever need to say about that. The evidence of their incredible stupidity speaks for itself. There is nothing more that I would need to add to that.

Doc?

I don't remember ever meeting my uncle but I did know my cousins and I feel sorry for them. They are so ignorant and yet completely unaware of their own ignorance. Although their Dad was nicknamed 'Doc' he was not really a doctor, only a dentist. Of course, when one is trying to keep the peace among family members one is unable or extremely reluctant to describe these relatives in full detail, not that I would know anything about Doc. It's just that the evidence would suggest that nothing of value can be ascertained from exploring the Doc connections or trying to tell them anything. They have to figure it out for themselves because they won't take it from me, obviously. My Andrews cousins, bless their pathetic little hearts, spent way too much time reading books about how Martians built the Egyptian pyramids and other bizarre and unexplainable theories of science fiction. Yes, I enjoyed watching the occasional episode of Star Trek and Wild Wild West together with them but Ray Bradbury had a lot of problems. "Chariots of the Gods: Unsolved Mysteries of the Past" by Erich von Daniken is not a book that I actually remember reading. I do remember listening to David talk about it maybe and saw the movie. So while the Andrews cousins might have some good things to say about dental care, it is not like they would have a clue about reality just because they all happened to live in the Bay Area at about the same time. My Dad was the ordained minister, not Doc, so obviously my Dad would know a lot more about Christianity than Doc, not that we are trying to stage a contest on this point. It's just that you are not going to reach heaven by flying saucer. Life is short. Make your peace with God while you can because it won't be long.

Piano Lessons

I wonder what makes all these piano teachers think that I would still angling for more piano lessons? Even if I could afford it, I wouldn't really enjoy it. I would just hate it and find some excuse to quit and get lost trying to find your tiny little Bellflower house again just to be beaten on again because I cannot stand it anymore. I want to scream. I hate making stupid mistakes and getting screamed at. I want to do something that I am good at for a change, something where I have the upper hand, something at which I would be successful for a change. For all of these reasons, I never want to see you again. I lost your phone number and I forgot your name. How did I do that? I don't remember. And anyway, just because you can play piano, that does not mean that you can have a coherent thought about me. I could try to explain but you would never be able to understand.

Tithes

I fully agree that I should always pay my tithes and catch up later if I fell behind. Nevertheless, I do not agree that tithes must go to the televangeliests. It is my decision to make but I tend to think that the local church is the place for tithes assuming that you attend a local church. If all tithes are paid to television then there will be no local church for you. You are just a mass media believer of the generic variety. You will not get anything more than the basics from TV. For the masses of ignorant couch potato cash machines it really does not matter what you do. If you so like, the TV ministries will do all of your Christian charity duties for you and all you have to do is mail the check or pick up the phone and contribute or something like that. However, if I prefer to own my own life and make my decisions, then televangelists and/or Hoskins have no reason to be smashing my brains on the pavement to try to wring some dollars and cents out of me. They already have entire vaults crammed full of the accumulated wealth of millions of people so there is no reason for them to have any interest in the tithing choices that I might make as an individual. The televangelists always say those things every day on TV about contributing money because what else would they have to talk about otherwise and also it is true as a general principle that you should tithe off your income but you don't necessarily have to give it to them. You could also give it to the local church or some other non-broadcasting parachurch ministry. It is your decision to make. I am not telling you where to mail the check. If you have a lot of surplus money to burn you could also donate money to TV if you want to but it is your decision to make. It is not like the money belongs to me, or even to you. All good things come from the Father in heaven anyway and you can't take it with you. Life is short.

Copyright Issues

Who can I sue to collect for damages from all of these copyright infringements? Take for example the misuse of great-grandmother's diaries. All kinds of bizarre theories have been taken from facts that did not warrant much of anything. So that's nice that great-grandmother gave Pop's ring to my Dad's Uncle Joe so that he could have a keepsake of his father. Uncle Joe had a lot of problems and great-grandmother was just trying to be nice and comforting. So I don't see anything wrong with that. However, it does not mean that Uncle Joe ever spent any time in China. The Hawaii years (1930s) mean nothing to me. I have never been there and will not be buying a plane or boat ticket anytime in the near future. We have no contact with Uncle Joe's family. They have a lot of problems. Smoking causes lung cancer but that is not my problem. So who am I going to be able to sue to get all of this mess straightened out when nobody will talk? Everyone just plays little games that mean nothing to me. Obviously, in this family of syndicated criminals everyone is guilty of something and nobody wants to admit it. Everyone is complicit in having twisted the truth so badly out of shape that no one remembers anymore what really happened. The Lord was supposed to rescue me and right now, this very day, would be a very good time to do that, but everyone already knows that nothing good is ever going to happen to me. I don't deserve anything. I never did what I was supposed to do. I never did anything right. I made too many excuses. I made too many mistakes. Therefore I don't see why there is any more need for me to explain this obvious point. If I had a hammer maybe I could use it to kill myself because that's about all I would be able to do with it.

Art Work

We recently were invited to go to a home and destroy their idol god. They had him in a little house in the corner of the kitchen. I pulled this dead god down, house and all. There were three tin cups in which they burned incense for this god. They also had a cup of wine beneath this paper god. We poured the wine out and gave the woman her cup and took the god and his house into the front room, where I stamped the house to pieces before the heathen company that was gathered together to see what we would do. We tore the god up in their presence, then we preached to them the true God and Jesus Christ our Lord. The woman in this home had already turned to God. Yet after they are saved, a relic of fear often remains to destroy these gods themselves. One more, a worshiper of the moon, has also turned to the Lord, now worshiping the true God.

This incident reported in 1914 is probably not referring to any work of art. I seriously doubt that this "paper god" torn to pieces by my great-grandfather is a reference to my aesthetically pleasing resume printed on the recommended quality paper, dazzling white space separating the perfectly indented paragraphs, indeed such a lovely sight to behold even if my enemies would only trample it to pieces to serve their own political vendetta purposes. Incidentally, neither is this a reference to Uncle Art. No, as some say, the paper "god" was probably just some cheaply produced, ugly thing marketed by some unscrupulous Chinese shaman. We are not saying that the shaman was not making a fortune selling these paper "gods" to the naive and credulously ignorant heathens of China. We are not saying that a massive number of Chinese conversions to Christianity would not seriously jeopardize the livelihood of said Chinese idol crafters and vendors. Still, your sick attachment to these paper "gods" is an infection of the culture, not a sign of health. Can you even imagine what a healthy culture would be like when you have never lived without idols crowding around on every side? And if these idols were aesthetically pleasing and artistically amazing creations, would that make them acceptable to Christians? No, not really, because this is not about art. It is about idols. I could say more about this but then I would just go on forever.

Killers

Speaking of killers, you are the one who defended the idea of knocking off Fidel Castro. I had never even thought of that when you were polishing hot guns. You are the Italian mafia hitman who knocked off Baptist missionary John Birch, not me. My great-grandparents were long gone from China when the events of World War II unfurled so it is exceedingly difficult, much more difficult than you had at first imagined, for you to try to dump me and my family into the same category as those mafia crime family members implicated in the John Birch Society scam. We do feel sorry for those Italian mafia killers but it is bizarre the way they so fanatically promote their own worthiness that it makes us want to vomit. I do agree on that point.

Copyright Permissions

I remember that while I was at Regent University a Christian newspaper in Atlanta, Georgia, reprinted my article from the student newspaper without asking for permission. At least they attached my name to it which was nice. I felt sort of flattered that they had liked my article enough to reprint it. Nevertheless, our editor in chief Katherine Pyle was appalled that they would reprint our stuff without asking for permission. She wrote a huge legal treatise on the subject and addressed this to the Atlanta newspaperman. I was asked to sign on to that so I did because back in those days I tended to imagine that editor knows best. However, knowing what I know now, I tend to think that Katherine perhaps overreacted a little bit. Sometimes it is better to exhaust more diplomatic tactics first and reserve legal action for the measure of last resort rather than burn all one's bridges in advance. That's my opinion but no one really asked me.

Talent Show Issues

Yes, I vaguely remember in college there was a talent show of which I remember very little. I don't really know those people. Just because we attended the same college, that does not mean that we were ever part of the same social circle. They already had their clique and no time or inclination to include other people like me. So just because I observed Ron Aguilera and Sharon Whetstone doing their Sonny and Cher act, that does not mean that I ever met them in real life. I fulfilled my assigned role singing in the choir and there is nothing more to tell about the talent show other than what Lynda said.

• Lynda said that Ron is from Riverside and that is all I know about him. I do remember driving through the rugged terrain outside of Riverside and seeing many large rocks on which people have engraved all kinds of graffiti. However, we never paused to ponder the significance of "Kilroy was here" and similar messages. We have other place to go and other things to do so. I imagine that someone will do that but it's not my job.
• Lynda said that there was a lawyer in the audience who created a huge fuss about copyright issues. Admission was charged and yet they had not paid a fee to the agency that collects artist royalties, ASCAP or something like that, to make sure they are legally entitled to be singing all those copyrighted songs borrowed from TV and radio. I don't really remember hearing how that was resolved, just that there was some kind of fuss about it. I was never involved in organizing the talent show so I really don't know anything about that.

Black vs. White

Yes, that is so weird the way they are trying to pretend that all white Pentecostals are from Kansas and all black Pentecostals are from Southern California, as if there were not any white people present at Azusa Street and as if only the black part of it matters. Sure, the Pentecostal movement was very integrated at its starting point, shockingly so for Jim Crow days, but anyway it was mostly the white Pentecostals who went out as missionaries and rarely the black Pentecostals for various reasons, not that it matters now or not that we can rewrite history now in this regard. We can only look forward to what is to come, for example, the Second Coming of Christ. Back in the old days, those were different times. There might not have been an Azusa Street if there had not been a Kansas, and yet Charles of Kansas was not able to continue running the show later in Southern California because no single person or state can run the show, not even Missouri. If Kansas' Charles, a white supremacist of the extreme variety, had been in charge he would have dampened the Spirit even sooner, because Kansas obviously was not responsible for the increase. Anyway, the Kingdom of God is not a matter of geographical boundaries. We have no need of whiny Kansas prairie dogs to tell us where to go. The joke about Springfield being the Emerald City does not work, not only because actually Seattle is informally dubbed the Emerald City, and not Springfield, a city not located in Kansas, but also because Seattle was not really the crossroads of anything much in terms of Pentecostal missionary history, mostly just another city for people to pass through after unloading from their ships docking at the port in Victoria, Vancouver, Canada. Sarah Kugler, for example, the famous single-woman missionary who later married Daniel Sheets, not to be confused with my second or third cousin, and whose photograph appears in the family collection as an acquaintance of the great-grandparents, often docked in Canada upon arrival from the Orient but apparently spent very little time in that country, soon beating a direct path to the United States, which is home for a lot of American missionaries who obviously are U.S. citizens and not Canadians. In the age before airplanes, Sarah would have traveled by car, bus, or train to her home state of Kansas, a square block on the U.S. map through which I have driven only once, although she also apparently also lived some time in Arizona, another block on the U.S. map in which I have spent very little time only passing through. It is probably safe to say that Seattle was not an Emerald City for Kugler as it also is not the Emerald City for the vast majority of Pentecostal Christians who have never been there and don't know anything about it. Nevertheless, just because Kugler was a Kansas Pentecostal and acquainted with lots of other Pentecostal missionaries and mentioned in many books, that does not mean that she was later a minister with the Assemblies of God due to doctrinal confusions. Neither does this mean that Pentecostals have any use or need for an Emerald City of the Frank Baum variety. We all know that Frank was a Kansas atheist or agnostic or something like that and that his whimsical novel cannot be regarded as a textbook in the theological sense, just a sort of humorous and entertaining parody of Depression era migrations from small farm towns of Americana to big industrial cities. It doesn't have very much to say about Pentecostalism, at least not seriously speaking. This explains why these nasty Kansas prairie dogs Sharon and Sharon and Jan have nothing intelligent to say to us in any serious sense. Just as in days of old, we see that Kansas folks think they know everything but really don't have a clue about who I am and cannot be taken seriously without serious risk to the life of the Spirit which is the heart of the matter. Without the Holy Spirit at the heart of the matter, everything is just vanity of vanities, obviously, and there just isn't any reason for being. So obviously we have no need of this Bob to explain to us this glaringly obvious, basic point because everybody already knows this anyway. Shutting down the life to explain this point is sort of like throwing out the baby with the bath water. A dead life is just not worth living.

No Place For Me

There really is no place for me, not to be confused with that song "No Room in the Inn." There just is no place for me in this world and in society. Society is corrupt anyway, which is always the easy answer to literature questions, so it's not like I care very much about that anymore. In real life I was supposed to get married and be a wife and mother but my plans never go the way I want, obviously. Mr. Right never made his appearance in my life. Instead, someone else wrote a book in which I was cast, for some vague mysterious reason, as a high-powered single-woman evangelist. I have no idea who wrote this book or what they were thinking. God never called me to do that, nor does it fit my experience and personality. I don't think we ever met. So while I could try to pretend to perform this assigned role, I would probably just fail anyway because it is not really who I am. It would just be another joke that someone unknown person is trying to play on me. I do believe in the importance of the Great Commission, but also many are called and few are chosen. I wasn't chosen to be one of them so there is no reason to condemn me for that. There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, as Romans 8:1 says, which means all Christian, not only the high-powered televangelists and ministry gurus.

Risk Taking

Yes, I get really annoyed about Bobby and those guys harassing me and saying I don't take enough risks and should not be afraid, like it was OK for the Hoskins to run Vida Publishers into the ground financially to subsidize their personal ministry projects because as they say nothing is ever accomplished when playing by the rules, not that I would really know anything about that or what exactly they are trying to say. I was gone by the time the gang of lowly office staff banded together and sent some sort of letter confronting the Hoskins about the rumored secret money. No one has ever really explained to me exactly what happened or why I should care or what was the nature of the deal that they forged later and why I seem to be on the losing end of it when it doesn't have anything to do with me. I can't afford to take that kind of financial risk. If I did that I would just lose, probably be fired or something like that. If I borrowed all that money I would just be hung out to dry, left to forage for my dinner from the garbage bins, picketing for pocket change on the highway bypasses of the world. Only rich people can afford to take that kind of risk and obviously I am not that rich.

Literature Track

Notwithstanding all this enforced commentary about literature Spanish and otherwise, I am not very interested in discussing  whether the Christian University in El Salvador has a literature track or not. I am sort of get a clue that some people wanting to stir up some discussion on this point but I never really asked and it is really none of my business what they do. Within the limits set by their accreditation agency, in my opinion they are entitled to do whatever they want even if that means not having any literature classes if that is allowed, which might seem weird but lots of technically oriented schools are missing a literature emphasis so I think that is something they have to figure out for themselves. Even if they had a Spanish literature track, how would that fit into a Christian context when so much Spanish literature of recent decades is of a decidedly anti-Christian and Marxist orientation? It would be sort of interesting to see what they would do with that but it is not that would ever be my job, myself not being even remotely qualified and besides I have other, more important things to worry about like paying my bills and minding my p's and q's and having a life. So basically I am a little bit sympathetic to the idea of Christian Spanish literature but have no idea how they would do that. It's not my problem.

Sharon Deras' Favorite Song

Yes, I vaguely remember Sharon Turner Deras talking about how much she loves this song she heard on the radio, a song which I had never heard of, only of the group, and how when she was dating Leonel it was her inspiration to overcome her fear of men and get married. So that's nice for her. Personally I find the song a little bit too chilling for comfort. It talks about playing games of chance and crossing swords as part of a man-woman relationship but are they married and in lover or divorcing and hate each other's guts? I can't really tell. It is better not to think too deeply about poetry and what it means or it could get really weird. Besides, I'm really not interested in examining the inner workings of Sharon Turner's head. I don't really want to know anything else about that.

Song: Amor de Hombre
Performers: Mocedades (Spain)

Mafia Connections

It was actually not my mother who expressed concerns about the Hoskins' mafia connections years ago. It was Springfield that made a rule about Dave Hoskins not being involved in AG ministries because in addition to being completely immoral he is also involved with the Russian mafia, or at least that is what some people thought. I don't really know anything about that but the Hoskins sure do love to distract from their own mafia deals and I am available for that purpose, apparently.

The Hoskins Taunting

I wonder sometimes why the Hoskins and their representatives Italian mafiosi are always taunting me about not having the money. Do they have nothing better to do than taunt three-year-olds? Apparently not. Do I have nothing better to do than launder the mafia's dirty money? Apparently I do. At least I can agree that these gigantic parachurch organizations are probably better equipped to handle the job of scrutizining incoming mafia dollars. Individuals like me would doubtless just be left holding the bag. Actually it was Sue who was given a handful of cash from the mafia guy who was a recent convert attending the Bible study after she sought prayer for financial needs, but I never benefited from the mafia presence. It was somewhat shocking the way what's-his-name pulled a huge wad of cash out of his pocket and peeled off a few bills to help Sue pay her rent for the month but I personally never benefited from that. He was killed a few weeks later by the mafia hit squad so he is not available to explain, unfortunately. If you are looking for the money laundering brigade you would have to ask the Hoskins because I have no clue about that stuff. All I know is that they are the fundraising machine around here, not me.

Sheldon

Yes, I vaguely remember discussing with Carol Long that book, "A Severe Mercy," written by the British author Sheldon Vanauken in which he talks about his relationship with his wife, Davy, and how they met and married. They later met C.S. Lewis and under his influence came to study and accept Christianity. I do agree with Carol that there was something disturbingly weird about Sheldon's courtship and marriage to Davy. He expresses very little regret, even seems to excuse the fact that they did not wait until marriage when obviously that is not the right thing to do and real Christians who know better don't do that. It is also clear that Sheldon and his girlfriend were not Christians at the time so perhaps that is why they did not know any better and did not have any guidance of the Holy Spirit. Mr. Vanauken in his book purports to be an apologist for the Christian faith. In the sense that he is telling his story of transition or journey from being a pagan nothing to studying the Christian faith and becoming a Christian, I think that the book does have value for that kind of people who can sympathize with those who came to faith after being completely pagan in lifestyle and atheistic. Lots of people were not Christians when young and came to faith later in life so perhaps Vanauken has something to say to those kinds of people that people like me don't really need. We sort of understand his problem and enjoy his great writing style but we don't have that problem. The other weird and disturbing thing about their relationship is that they think they have to read each other's books in order to fully understand each other. That means that she had to read all the books that he had ever read in his past and vice verse. How ridiculous! It is no wonder that she died very young of cancer, because obviously reading all of his books was probably way too much to handle. I don't think it is necessary to read all your books. I have enough books rolling around in my head without adding all of your garbage, too. I just can't handle it.

Helen

Sharon Turner Deras is the person who knows all about Helen who was Bobby Bueno's girlfriend for a while during college. I don't know anything about that. I never met Helen. I was already gone from the college when Helen appeared on the scene and I only remember one thing that Sharon said about her and that's all I know about that. Sharon said something about how she didn't like the way Bobby acted when he was dating Helen, as if he were a different person. Personally, I don't have much sympathy anymore for Bobby's spiteful attitude. It was nice of him to invite me to his birthday party. I only took a humorous card without a gift, I think. He said the card really got him going trying to figure it out, whatever it said, although I don't remember. I am not really one of his close friends so I felt weird being there in the first place, like he really should not have invited me there, especially if he is going to be so weird about everything. I cannot be expected to keep track of all who his people are. I just don't care that much. I have to have my own separate life. In case the Buenos forgot I am not a slave attached to their retinue and/or entourage. I have the same civil rights as everybody else on the planet. Just because I am very familiar with Helen Reddy's song, "I Am Woman," which was very popular in the early 1970s and I vaguely remember perhaps maybe hearing it on the radio station there in El Salvador, Radio La Femenina, that does not mean that I ever knew in advance or foresaw that Bobby would some day have a girlfriend named Helen. I am just not that clairvoyant. It is ridiculous the way these Bueno brats imagine that everything is all about them. They really should not be backloading everything in this weird way when actually it was just a song and it did not mean that much to me.

Margaret

Oh, I had no idea these Italians were so well versed in the breeding theories of Margaret Sanger. I never read her books and never had any use for Planned Parenthood, speaking of course of the organization founded by Margaret Sanger. Just because I am white, that does not mean that I need Margaret to explain the facts of my life to me. I never had any great fondness for theories about abortion or eugenics or ever even think about that stuff very much. I would prefer to focus on normalcy and mostly ignore all of this distracting war whooping. These Italian-blacks would like to cast all white people as pro-abortionists who want to weed out Italian-blacks but actually that is not true. That is a bunch of political hoeey. Plenty of white people have not bothered to study the theories of Margaret Sanger and don't appreciate these hardball tactics. I was trying to have a life and don't really appreciate finding myself fighting against Italians on points on which we actually are in agreement. They are so subtle the way they cast me in the hotseat when actually there are also a lot of unanswered questions about their motives. However, by the time this is all sorted out it won't matter anymore. This country will probably be mostly run by Italian Catholic winers and we just won't have any choice in the matter. I don't really need to explain this. It's just a matter of time, apparently, or at least that  is what they would have us believe.

Firing Dumpy Dog Elizabeth

It would be sort of hard to fire Italian dumpy dog Elizabeth Iaturro, whose stupidly simpering whininess seems to permeate the South Florida landscape, because she is loaded with lots of money, her parents having left her well funded with a trust fund or something like that. I think that she may sometimes contribute her time for free to help ministries such as Angie's orphanage and possibly also contributes time and money to Jennie's whatever-it-is ministry as well as the church in Lake Worth. Yes, if only I had lots of money like Elizabeth, then I could do whatever I want and trash poor people all over the place and never have to worry about bouncing a check. Elizabeth doesn't want to get married because she thinks she was abused by her father so obviously she is not yet married that I know of. Still, Elizabeth goes to a different church now and anyway we never agreed about anything so it is pointless to try to talk to her. I remember at the 1996 reunion Elizabeth made pointed remarks about what a nice person Jennie is, as if some other people present were not so nice, perhaps myself, but I really could not care less about what stupid rich bitch Elizabeth thinks about me. I have a very low opinion of Elizabeth and her simple-minded stupid rich Italian control freak thought patterns, as for example her being impressed with Wicked Witch Jennie Cerrullo. I believe that Elizabeth might have been among those Italian girls who attended Jennie's speech at the (Leonard and Betty) Emory's house in which Jennie presented her particular opinions about love and marriage and waiting for future spouse. So that's nice but I think I was late or not aware of the right time or something so I missed that. Still, just because Elizabeth has a bank vault full of money, that does not mean that her opinion has any actual value in the bigger scheme of things. I am not interested in trying to find some orphanage to build or some queer mission theories to research just to get money from Elizabeth or to impress the many sloshed Italian winos and Hispanic-Hoskins Mcwhiner bitches that seem to live around here. They were perhaps expecting me to grovel and beg for a job there but as yet I have managed to avoid gratifying their base and vulgar plan to to cast me as the bitch in their rich man's "show." Still, my family's support alone is not going to be enough to withstand the onslaught of imposed by these trashy wicked Italians. Really, they should be ashamed of themselves. Shame on Italians!

NOT INTERESTED

I am not interested in listening to the idiotic opinions of Jennie Cerrullo. Just because she is an Italian with a Ph.D. in sex, that does not mean that I need her to tell me anything. She may have her rules but she does not rule me in any way. She is just another whiny Italian bitch who has not yet realized that it's not all about her. I know her from college so I know what she is. Someone was telling me that Jennie spent a year or more in Hong Kong as a principal of a school there in the 1980s and for some bizarre reason it was thought that I am supposed to be impressed by this and think of Jennie as my representative to China. That's ridiculous and of course Jennie will not get the job. I have no reason to hire anyone to represent me in China, for one thing. I have no reason to want to reconnect to the Christians or the church in Hong Kong which is not exactly where they were stationed part of the time anyway. Never would I ever have reason to contact the descendants of the first Chinese converts of my great-grandparents when they were there in the 1910s and 1920s. For one thing it would be impossible even if I were to try. And also,  it is thought that some of these early converts strayed into Mormonism or other cults which is sad but I can't help them now. I would not want the Chinese Christians there exposed to certain idiot relatives or to imagine that the descendants of my great-grandparents are anything like them now in terms of Christian values. One hundred years after the fact most of my relatives, with a few exceptions, do not remember the Azusa Street era or know anything about it. They are just typical California heathens now.

Strange Theories

Yes, one might reasonably wonder if Mrs. Studdert's shocking public revelation from her single days as a missionary in China would have any negative repercussions in her later adult married life after returning to her native Britain. One might also imagine that meddlesome voyeurs might appropriate the letter and twist it and use it to serve other purposes not originally intended by Mrs. Studdert, not that I would know anything about that. Nevertheless, she seems to have married as planned and had three sons as listed in the online peerage so perhaps she was a wealthy person. Nevertheless, this letter is of not much use to me as this is not among my research interests. I might have read articles about this in Sunday School literature or Christian magazines or somewhere. Also, I am not unaware that there are some professional academics who devote much of their time to developing queer theories about the possible secret sex sins of Christian missionaries working in China in days of old. However, I personally am not interested in pursuing this line of thought or in having any book or term paper written on this subject with my name on it. They must have me confused with someone else. All I can say is that although there might have been such anomalous cases in the field unbeknownst to the majority, still these are dysfunctional cases and not representative of the majority of missionaries in the field whether single or married. I am personally not interested in focusing on these dysfunctional cases that serve only as distractions to the central truth of the gospel and the actual purpose of the Christian mission to China which is mainly to preach the gospel and to build up a local church where none previously existed.

Sin and the Legal Presciption

Here is an interesting page here about secret sins that are difficult for me to discuss in a public setting, although I do remember reading the similar article on a similar or the same subject in Assemblies of God Sunday School literature that was sent to us free on the field. As we can see here, interestingly, these secret sins afflicted even missionaries in China more than 100 years ago:

Testimony of a Young Lady Missionary (c. 1900)

However, most people probably would rather not talk about these things publicly because the possibility of public shame and ridicule could be worse than the cure. I am like most people, preferring to discuss any personal matters with God personally and individually rather than in some collective and public argument.
 

Gloating

Yes, I vaguely remember discussing with someone about how dangerous it is to give any appearance of being happy about and gloating at someone else's distress. Maybe someday God will notice everyone's gleeful abandon at observing my sorrows and give everyone a taste of me or some reasonable facsimile instead of the other way around, always punishing my for everyone else's misfortune.

Affirmative Action

Yes, it's very easy for these Italians to set themselves up as the über-race of the next generation, bearers of the genetic markers of "Aryan" superiority and supremacy, when all of the affirmative action is flowing their way and nothing the other way. Did they not learn anything from World War II? Affirmative action is a program that can handicap the race for outsiders. Yes, we talked about affirmative action in that principles of law class taught by Herb Titus. Titus was later dumped for reasons unknown to me. I am not really sure what I think about that, but still I do tend to think that affirmative action does not do any favors to plain-vanilla white people of middle to lower class of no extraordinary achievement, just mostly average and trying to find a place yet required to pay full price or nothing. Perhaps nothing is better than trying to win a race I can't win anyway. If I do nothing and don't even try then I can't lose and thus will not be disappointed and humiliated later. That approach sounds sort of depressing but nevertheless it does make a lot of sense. Nothing wins.

Counselors

I don't need any counselors, especially NOT Jennie Cerullo. Even though she now has a Ph.D. in sex and an important ministry, I remember her from college as a whiny, screechy Italian "cheerleader" that nobody really liked very much. She is proof that winning the Teen Challenge talent show does not necessarily mean you are going to have a big-time music ministry. Jennie has her money and her big-time ministry so she doesn't need anything from me. There is no way that I can be required to kiss her putrid Italian butt. After all, she is not my mother-in-law so I don't have to.

Bill Bill Bill

Why all this focus on insignficant, uninteresting, utterly boring Bill? If I had lots of money I would never have to see bill's paper face starting back at me ever again. If only I could banish bills' memory forever from the planet. I am doing my best to ignore bill but obviously, like everyone on the planet, I will have to pay the bills eventually. I just wish I could pay the bill off now rather than later, if only I had the foggiest clue how to do that, but anyway, there is always hope that with time the bills will disappear. Hope and Bill go together nicely, a real match for Colorado. As long as I have hope I can continue to imagine that the bills will be banished eventually to oblivion so that is.

Hanging Up

Ok, maybe I did answer the phone a few times in Virginia and there was only the heavy breathing guy on the other end of the line. However, I don't remember having any extended conversation with him other than "hello... hello... hello." That was pretty much all there is was to say to someone who just isn't tuned in to reality. I might have had some of these calls elsewhere in the past also. I remember that once in Cooper City, Florida, a guy called and said he was doing market research and asked if I had a few minutes to answer some questions. I answered a one or two questions that seemed innocuous, then answered a very uncomfortably personal question, and then the next question after that was so bizarre that I hung up the phone. Since then, I have not had much time for these people who call on the phone. Like I usually say to salespeople, send me something in the mail. That way I can see what it is and throw it away forthwith, deposited directly into the garbage can. If you call me on the phone I don't know who you are and I can't trust you.

Dirty Phone Calls

I vaguely remember that one of my roommates, either the one from North Carolina or else Joyce, commented about the dirty phone calls with heavy breathing that were coming in every day early in the morning. The primary phone line was in her bedroom so she always picked up the phone first, the other phone being in the kitchen. She said there was some heavy breathing, mostly, and weirdness. She at first accused me of doing something to invite all of these dirty callers but no I did nothing. The previous roommate for the first year there, the counseling major, had always answered the phone so I really was not aware of those counseling sessions. Something was said about our phone number being posted in the men's bathroom at Norfolk University but like I said at the time I cannot imagine how that could happen. I don't recall even using the women's bathroom maybe a couple of  times I went along invited by some people, including Machelle Bush, to use the library over there to research term papers. I am not sure why they were so fascinated with Norfolk when CBN's library was quite well equipped by that time. I think maybe we had our phone number changed or something like that so that seemed to solve the problem although I really don't remember very much about that.

North Carolina

I don't remember the name of the roommate from North Carolina. After the roommate from Florida moved out, that is to say, the psychology major with the black boyfriend from Pompano Beach, I found a roommate from North Carolina. She was there for a few months and then she moved out and said she would not be paying rent for the month of November and could and would not say, nay, even I daresay refused to say for sure whether she would be returning to room with me again or not and in fact left a distinct impression that she might have other plans in the works. Being in that state of uncertainty in which I found myself, I at about that time met Joyce at church. Joyce told me that she felt that God had told her that I would be her roommate and could she please be my roommate until the time that she was scheduled to get married. I said OK since I really did not have any other firm plans and needed someone to be paying the other half of the rent. Some time later, I think more than a month, the other former roommate returned from North Carolina and confronted not me but Joyce, demanding that Joyce give her her room back. Joyce told me this and I said not to worry. I had not promised anything to the roommate from North Carolina. She was the one who left without paying rent and in a precarious financial state so I was under no obligation to her. With all of her North Carolina connections I am sure she had no problem finding some other place to live.

The Boys

That was sort of strange that Sylvia was living in the Buenos' house with a bunch of guys. I would never think of living that way. What a nightmare that would have been! There might have been a joke about that in college because in the classroom we can't help but overhear every mundane or humorous detail of Terry's strange life with the guys, sort of, so we almost feel like we live there but not really, just a joke. Really, life is complicated enough without compounding the confusion by living with a bunch of MK guys who can never keep their facts straight and can't really stand to have a girl tell them anything, as if girls don't have anything intelligent to say. Ha! Maybe they will grow up someday but it won't be my problem. I will never find the fountain of youth in Florida so I will just grow old along with everybody else, obviously. There is nothing magical about the sandy state. It's just a very big sandbar, nothing more.

Anyway, the main reason why it might have seemed weird is that there is the appearance of evil if a girl lives in a house with a bunch of guys who are not related to her. Danuta got fired after her book revealed she had longtime boyfriend who was black, so if he had been white would her career have survived? No, probably not because it was not the color that was the problem in this situation. I vaguely remember the roommate from North Carolina saying something about Danuta and her book which I picked up somewhere cheap at a used bookstore. I must have gotten rid of that book becuase I don't seem to have it anymore. Still, if I ever wrote an autobiography it would be nothing like Danuta's. Of that you can be sure.

Isaiah 5:20: "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter."

Romans 14:16: "Let not then your good be evil spoken of."

Ok, so years ago when I was living in California I remember talking to Sylvia Brooke and I remember her talking about how shocked she was when she came to the United States after living most of her life in Costa Rica and heard people using that colloquial expression, "Bad!" in reference to something good, in substitution for words like "Wow!" and "Cool!" That is so unbiblical and wrong to call something good bad or something bad good. I do agree with Sylvia on that point although I am not sure what to do about that. It happens all the time in English and also in Spanish, actually, in case she forgot or never studied Salvadoran literature perhaps, like for example that drama we were assigned, "Black Light," in which two disembodied heads carry on about whatever, as if there were something illuminating about consulting the dead. Wrong! This is a sin sick planet in which we live. On that point I do agree with Sylvia.

Working Days

I vaguely remember discussing with my mother the fact that we sort of feel guilty about not doing very much in terms of direct evangelism and Sunday School work when we were in El Salvador. When compared to some other missionary families in other countries, we did not do very much nor were we asked or expected to do anything. In contrast, in Costa Rica Sylvia Brooke and her mother Hope were known to be very active in planning Sunday School activities. In El Salvador I personally was not asked to do very much of anything and I did not initiate anything either. The local work was much more developed in El Salvador and there was not really any need of MKs to tell those people anything. They think they can do everything all by themselves and don't need any know-it-all America missionary kids to tell them anything so there was no reason for me to intrude into places where I was not welcome. Costa Rica, on the other hand, is a country with very few churches, much less developed, a place where the local people were content to let the missionaries pretty much run the show so there was a very different thing going on down there. I can't really imagine doing that in El Salvador. It just wouldn't be necessary.

Triplett Triteness

I am also trying to understand why I should care about the Tripletts? What have the Tripletts ever done for me other than make my life miserable in a very literalistic and legalistic sense? Nicaragua is far away and has nothing of interest to teach me about anything. I know all I need to know about Spanish culture and history without any help from Don, Mark, and Tim, thank you very much. I know everything I need to know about China without any help from Mark's wife Jeanette, who was an MK somewhere in Asia although I don't remember exactly which country. Ok, so I'll just say that I am not unaware and may have overheard somewhere that some people are very disturbed by the Tripletts' manorial obsessions and castle crazes of the feudal variety. They imagine themselves the lords of the manor commissioned for the purpose of beating pitiful serfs, in which class they have imagined myself included, into a state of cowering submission. All of that sour grapes about rules and regulations imposed by the bigwigs up there, do they really imagine that was all just an imaginary script? That the benevolent lords-a-leaping ever cared for a second about the hours of inconvenience, all the blood, sweat, and tears they imposed on the workers in the fields? No, they don't really care about us in any kind of personal way. It's just a business, after all, an international exchange of lifestyle commodities. Our ideas and thoughts will not even be considered. No, the ideas that matter come from themselves and benefit mainly themselves. So what if the middle gets squeezed out? It just doesn't matter in a feudal society. In a feudal society the Tripletts are sequestered in their baronial estate while the hoi polloi cough and wheeze and succumb to the pestiferous plague. So, like, why should I care about castles? If I had the money to travel, there is no shortage of ruined castles in Europe waiting to be photographed. But it's not really about them. So I'm just saying.

Blue Angels

Oops! Correction. I never saw any U.S. military personnel "boots on the ground" during high school but I do remember the Blue Angels flying overhead, piloted no doubt by U.S. military personnel of some sort, probably Air Force I would imagine although the other branches also have aircraft so actually I am not so sure. I really don't remember much about that.

Joseph

Oh, did I ever mention that I never know of the existence of General Joseph Stilwell until very recently? I must admit that I was never a student of the politics and history of China and never had a clue about who all those military people were in World War II nor did ever have much interest. It is not like Chinese culture ever interested me in the slightest with all their shrieky weird fingernails-on-a-blackboard music and strangeness. I only know that my great-grandparents were there for a while but not as military people. If their missionary experience was anything like ours, they probably never saw a U.S. military person their entire time overseas and never thought about that very much. There is not much connection between missionary and military. We might sing that song, "Onward Christian Soldiers," but the only purpose that mattered to us was the Great Commission. Military is a whole different matter and not something with which we should concern ourselves, as the military so often is fond of reminding us.

Marine Corp

Yes, that's so nice that Uncle Art served in the Marines some time back in the 1950s. It is so nice that the U.S. government takes care of the veterans who served in the armed services and who were willing to risk life and limb to protect the nation. The U.S. government gives them educational funding and medical care and all kinds of other benefits too numerous to mention. Yes, that is so nice although Uncle Art never served in China, a war that was never resolved in the most ideal way as far as America was concerned but at least we had Taiwan and its little toehold on China. Don't you know that "Semper fidelis" (Always Faithful) applies only to U.S. Marines in case we forgot? The Marines are faithful to themselves and to the U.S. in a general and collective sense but they have their own families to take care of and we cannot expect the Marines to be faithful to us or to care about what happens to us in the future in any kind of personal way. We cannot be expected to keep track of the U.S. Marines when we almost never see them and almost never hear from them anyway. Those military people watch out for each other and that's nice for them. It is nice to know that the U.S. Marines are there to do whatever they do but we cannot expect them to ever do us any favors or to ever say anything good about us because obviously they don't really care in any kind of personal way. Sometimes we have to find our own way in life because obviously they just don't care.