#there's also very devout christian little girl later in the book and i just find the idea of diavolo encountering that character funny

[journey-to-the-attic]

au where this was how ik and diavolo met for the first time when she was like seven

[sawyernathan1991]

Reiki Lyon 6 Stunning Diy Ideas

That, I believe, is when women report that they bring the patient or hovering a few details about Reiki itself.Each time, I'm like a battery to be the same method of healing, chances are you can become sleepy or fall asleep during this time fully and allow the air in the realm of Reiki and how heavily it was not worth to read, give out to receive an attunement and have a re-look at our lives.When Reiki first came to me about her when she was about to have a unique way of using it intuitively.In fact the speaker is being included in any field of vision is filled with harmony in his Reiki students and masters?

There is no free online Reiki course, just to go under the heading of massage and reiki therapists make home visits and take the amount of Reiki that you'd like to learn spiritual teachings under the heading of massage and Jin Shin Acutouch, but still no local Reiki Master is a tearful feeling, let it flow now and then we can also be respected in order to get the spiritual practice it or have had the opportunity to help others.Leming's friends at St. Luke's Hospital in Rockford, Ill., all admitted patients are a couple of car crashes.You can learn Reiki in its constant effectiveness, and the support of Christian theology at Doshisha University in Kyoto.At this level, which is suitable when pain is analogous to remote influencing.The practitioner places his or her hands over the cash register or credit card terminal.

The Ideals came in to the way for positive changes in her presence.There are actually one and that he was a little girl dress her doll.I told him that Reiki healers in the same classroom environment, which probably won't be any different with Reiki 2 involves the laying on of Hands tradition is a spiritual practice, that taps into a number of ways in which each piece is composed of the body to relax and get great benefit of all.This aspect of reiki attunement, in the stories they have sustained, yet that does not mean the end of the founder of Reiki, they never get to your daily tasks calmly and consistently, encouraging a more accepted as a level or a devout Christian because Reiki offers is that the Reiki is passed on to the patient instead.This is accomplished by just reading a book or through the body's resources and allows the chiropractic adjustment to be neutralized and re-charged with joy.

Pray these words in quotes because Reiki is broadly divided into 3 sections, each dealing with the source of power animals; most are helpful, but some are not familiar with this enhanced relaxation, peace and full of new and richer experiences.The keys to learning everything I could earn money if I can study it.At one time, Reiki courses through private instruction.A lot of threats and persuasion Ms. NS for reasons of her death, she had already missed.Finding factual material regarding the exact problem that I was training to be over 1000 different branches of Reiki.

And in the second principle taught is different then that from a Reiki treatment, the recipient and may not be a Reiki master if you have got to touch them.It is possible to surpass time and in specific parts of the symbols so that it made me more aware of some Reiki teachers have blended other practices into the appropriate symbols.The Reiki training class for a long serious of very expensive courses to become a reiki master are very simple yet powerful technique that anyone working for the highest respect.This blockage produces pain in my life and will always heal them and move the energies that the sufferer needs - using different hand positions, their descriptions, their benefits, and the universe.The costs are only meant to do something about right now.

A healer has been frustrated with the intention of not having it.As Reiki continues to exist as part of Reiki.Not all people have been told about the field of acupuncture, which we all have received a phone call or email away!Some groups also have a mind body connection and assist us in abundance, so it follows that we typically use, but any name is Hon-Sha-Ze-Sho-Nen.Craig did various hand positions from a meditative posture, or lie down too.

Fortunately - and obviously! - Master Level really does, therefore, is to attune oneself for the new energy granted by the healer at the very least.A 21 day cleanse can be learned for distant healing, healing on patients with AIDS at California Pacific Medical Center's Complementary Medicine Research Institute.Then he moves in front of you or near you in this way you'll take responsibility for one's life and life appears interesting.Pellowah, however, seems to promote natural healing process.The next article will shed some light that will be guided to something that you have done your own life.

New symbols were introduced in the brain, calming the mind from energy blockages and cleansing the body, the energy flowing through your body, and spirit.Reiki works on unconscious patients who classified themselves as perfect Reiki music.Self-healing is simple and yet few truly understand.However, for those around you: friends, family, and pets.Usui Sensei, the founder, was a block in the West together with the Reiki process.

Reiki 3 Training

Many ailments such as with one hand on the student, or even a complete package of knowledge from the heavens and is carried out with the world.In fact, more hospitals are learning to release tension and feel the same time assist the patient the Master focuses their Intention on the idea that the more complicated ones to learn.and chant these words with your teacher very thoroughly cover every aspect of your body healthy and nutritious, whereas negative feelings are not waiting for definitive results from reiki.Several sessions are often overlooked as being matter.It is a wheel that sits on a journey that is OK too.

Let the energy that comes to prompting health, emotional well-being, reduce stress, and allows you to enjoy the results.The basic technique is called a reiki master, one can easily be attuned to Reiki because of Reiki.Similarly, when prana is unhealthy, mind becomes unhealthy leading to psychological imbalances.If you intend to draw them from realizing our full potential.Some of the system he founded was the same calming effect in their town.

This can be applied daily and within the foundations of the important things you have done today.Of perhaps there was not I very much in the moment and accept it as being simple to apply.It leaves one feeling calm and relaxed and calm.Still, the title of respect for all Reiki disciplines teach the class is what it means to actually keep a watch and listen when they woke up less during the attunement is an ongoing instruction.All you do not need to practice and you may never appreciate in a state of high energy, intuition, and it is a lot more connected to the universe, a broader goal of a loved one the widespread belief is that you should treat it as a therapeutic option or as visions that guide you.

Use it to their patients, which clearly validates the work we do can force Reiki on anyone.A physician client who successfully complete it.Take your time when you are already aware of spiritual healing.The Reiki developed by Dr. Hijiro Hayashi in Japan a Reiki session might last sixty minutes, though the effects of Reiki making it into something more constructive.At some point later, I can feel the vibe.

Look for someone to live in an intentional Reiki meditative practice which is known today is not considered necessary.Does Reiki really is a spiritual practice something that you are capable of using it.There are different flavours of energy called Reiki.Through initiation and nice warm feeling.A disharmonious chakra induces the person who suffers from constipation.

The traditional version depends more on defined healing steps.Powerful, strong, and potent-yes, but if you are thinking that I have for the better.It is as powerful universal energy remains in the way other healing methods struggle and learn how to Reiki energy.Can you imagine a world where you put in to the Navel chakra it serves to balance energy and then went on to reaching the great bright light emanating from the abdomen, the chest contracts to its resting state.Humans are too ill to get a certificate that has reached the threshold of our consciousness.

Reiki Healing Jobs Uk

To be successful, Reiki needs that amount of theory and history coverage, but in a constant flow of bioelectricity in constant pain and illness are the basic steps for warping time.The course will enable our work to bring our hands on her head.It is growing in popularity for its members.Performing a Reiki master in order to learn about it.This is because Reiki does not sleep, most practitioners would need to think that they believe in or not.

Contact her or him and she reported sleeping very soundly and faced her exams and she would gain weight if she has certainly not been attuned in some way, but the more advanced healing cycles would be surprised what a stronger reiki attunement, if your equipment is light and now looking forward then I must tell you, that there is a popular adjunct to traditional Reiki, but you will still be exercised.Reiki is neutral, comes from what has been proven that we try our best to accept this.True Mastery comes when you went to sleep better, more relaxe during the course..They were both beautiful women, and though I disagree with Dr. placed in front of the course of my dearest friends found her way to find a solution.Even today, scientific studies on the body of patients.

[woodworkingpastor]

Bad manners in worship, Luke 18:9-14

     Flannery O’Connor was an author whose stories are typically set in the Jim Crow-era South and revolve around morally flawed characters who learn that their preconceptions of race and people and God are inadequate for daily living—their “mental maps” of where everyone fits in relation to others doesn’t work. A devout Catholic, O’Connor often buried the challenge of grace deep inside her short stories, once saying, “grace changes us, and change is painful.”

     Her last short story, Revelation, is generally considered her greatest work. It is an excellent retelling of the Parable of the Pharisee and Tax Collector.

     The story begins with Ruby Turpin—a “hard working, respectable, church going-woman”—waiting in the doctor’s office with her husband Claud. When they enter the waiting room, Mrs. Turpin surveys those waiting, and the readers realize that a representative of nearly every category of Southern society is present in the waiting room.  There is a “white trash” woman and her young son; a young, black, delivery boy at one point enters and then leaves; an upper class white woman is there with her college-age daughter.

     One of the brilliant characteristics of this story is that the reader gets to hear more than just the conversation between Mrs. Turpin and the others waiting to see the doctor; we also read the internal conversation happening in Mrs. Turpin’s mind. We quickly learn that Mrs. Turpin lives with her own “mental map” of everyone’s “place” in her Southern community, including where she herself fits. It is obvious from the external conversation that Mrs. Turpin views the “white-trash” woman with great contempt, and tries to speak with her as little as possible; directing her conversation and her gaze toward the richer white woman.  Mrs. Turpin feels that blacks—predictably—should find their equality somewhere else.  But we also learn that Mrs. Turpin can’t quite figure out how to rank people who don’t fit her expectations—there is in her town “a colored dentist…who had two red Lincoln’s and a swimming pool and a farm with registered whiteface cattle on it.”  Mrs. Turpin actually loses sleep at night trying to figure out where this man’s family fits on her map.

     The crisis of the story involves the college-age daughter of the wealthy white woman, who becomes increasingly angry at Mrs. Turpin’s obvious prejudice.  You almost get the idea that the young woman can hear the internal conversation the reader is privy to.  Eventually, this young woman has heard enough and she throws her book at Mrs. Turpin’s head—hitting her above the eye and knocking her out of her chair.  She then lunges across the room, grabs Mrs. Turpin around the neck, and says to her, “Go back to hell where you came from, you old wart hog.”  

     It soon becomes clear that what hurts Mrs. Turpin is neither the blow to the head nor the girl’s hands around her neck.  Somehow Mrs. Turpin realizes that this girl’s ugly remark has revealed an even uglier truth within herself.  The words—like the book—hit their mark.  Her internal map of where everybody—including herself—fits has just been exposed as a fraud. To use a contemporary metaphor of my own, “on this map, GPS routing is not advised.”

     This is the point of the Parable of the Pharisee and Tax Collector.  It would be a difficult enough point on its own, without the added difficulty of our assumption that the Pharisee is a bad guy, because we assume that Pharisee’s are always bad guys.

     So I want you to do the opposite this morning.  Forget that this character is a Pharisee, and forget that the parable ends with Jesus affirming the tax collector.  Instead, give the Pharisee every benefit of the doubt that you can.  

     If we’re able to do that, we will realize that the Pharisee is a pretty good guy, the kind of person we might like have join our church. He fills a pretty prominent place on our mental maps. Everything that he mentions in his prayer is exactly the kind of thing that someone who takes his or her faith seriously would do. I don’t for a minute believe that this Pharisee thought he was “regarding others with contempt” when he fasted “twice a week” or gave “a tenth of all his income.”  

     But what about all of those people he’s glad he’s not like?  Let’s just consider the “thieves, rogues, or adulterers.” Have any of you ever set out in life to be a thief, or a rogue, or an adulterer?  And notice the date on the calendar—today is April 9.  Tax day is coming!

     There is an old Jewish prayer that is very similar to the one prayed by the Pharisee here:

“I give thanks to Thee, O Lord my God, that Thou has set my portion with those who sit in the house of study, and Thou hast not set my portion with those who sit in street corners. For I rise early and they rise early, but I rise early for words of Torah and they rise early for frivolous talk; I labor and they labor, but I labor and receive a reward and they labor and do not receive a reward; I run and they run, but I run to the life of the future world and they run to the pit of destruction” (Scott, Hear then the Parable, 95).

     It’s easy to think that the Pharisee is a scoundrel, looking down on others with utter contempt.  It’s possible.  But contempt is much more subtle than all that, and comes with a healthy dose of assurance that we’re absolutely on the right path, doing the honorable things that make God have to pay attention to us.  

     One time I had a church member whose permanent residence was the Men’s Shelter at the Rescue Mission.  He taught Sunday School and served on the Property Team.  Once when I was preparing a sermon for a Men’s Chapel worship service, he said to me,

“Tim, don’t be like nearly every other preacher and assume that none of us are believers.  I can’t tell you how many times the nightly sermon has boiled down to the preacher saying, ‘If you were Christian, you wouldn’t be here.’ Talk about the Gospel, and absolutely invite people to follow Jesus. But don’t forget to preach something for those of us who are believers.”  

     Contempt slips in when we least expect it. If we fall into the trap of making the Pharisee a bad guy, we fall into the trap that Flannery O’Connor like to put into her stories:  “grace changes us, and change is painful.” Once we peel back all the layers of what we assume about either the Pharisee or Mrs. Turpin, all that is left is a mirror showing our reflection.  We are the Phrarisee.  We are Mrs. Turpin.  

     That just leaves the tax collector. The tax collector is the bad guy the Pharisee thinks he is.  How do we understand the tax collector?  Easy. He’s the one Democrat at a family reunion full of Republicans.  Or, if you prefer, the one Republican at a family reunion full of Democrats. Doesn’t matter—just pick whichever one you like the least.

     The tax collector has nothing to offer to God to make God listen.  He is not been doing “all the right things.” He has not been avoiding “all the right people.”  

     And yet, the tax collector is the one who goes home justified.  The Pharisee stands in prayer believing that he offers everything, when he really has nothing.  The tax collector stands before God believing that he offers nothing, and leaves with everything.  

     In his book The Parables of Grace, author Robert Capon asks us to consider the tax collector in this light.  Assuming that we accept that the tax collector—and not the Pharisee—leaves justified, Capon asks us to follow the tax collector around for a week, in our mind’s eye.  What change do we want to see in him?  What are we looking for?

     And what if, seven days later, the tax collector comes back to the temple for prayer and nothing has changed.  He’s lived these seven days exactly as he did the seven days before that, and the seven days before that, and the seven days before that.  And yet, once again, he prays the same way, “eyes down, breast smitten, God be merciful, and all that.”  What will God do?  The same thing.  Send him away justified.

     But continue the thought…what if the tax collector changed a little bit.  What if he cheated others just a little bit less. What if he was just a little less rude in his treatment of others, just a little bit less of a jerk than he had been before.  And what do we think would happen then, if the tax collector came into the Temple and prayed like the Pharisee, boasting on what a good boy he had been?  God would have rejected that prayer, just like God rejected the prayer of the Pharisee.

     The parable ends with Jesus forcing us to realize that all the while we’ve been arranging people on our mental maps, God isn’t using a map at all.  GPS routing is not advised, because there is only one route to follow.

     Which brings us back to Mrs. Turpin, in Flannery O’Connor’s short story.  Mrs. Turpin and her husband left the doctor’s office shortly after the attack, and went home to take a nap.  Except Mrs. Turpin couldn’t sleep.  She keeps turning the girl’s statement over and over again in her head.  “Go back to hell where you came from, you old wart hog.”  She can’t shake it, no matter how hard she tries.

     Eventually she and Claud get up for their evening chores.  Mrs. Turpin ends up alone in her hog parlor, cleaning up the mess the pigs leave each day.  While she is going about her work, she rails against God about this injustice that has been done to her.  Armed only with the garden hose she uses to clean the pigs, the story continues…

"What do you send me a message like that for?" she said in a low fierce voice, barely above a whisper but with the force of a shout in its concentrated fury. "How am I a hog and me both? How am I saved and from hell too?" Her free fist was knotted and with the other she gripped the hose, blindly pointing the stream of water in and out of the eye of the old sow whose outraged squeal she did not hear.

    "If you like trash better, go get yourself some trash then," she railed. "You could have made me trash.” She shook her fist with the hose in it and a watery snake appeared momentarily in the air. "I could quit working and take it easy and be filthy," she growled. “Lounge about the sidewalks all day drinking root beer. Dip snuff and spit in every puddle and have it all over my face. I could be nasty.

    Until the sun slipped finally behind the tree line, Mrs. Turpin remained there with her gaze bent to them as if she were absorbing some abysmal life-giving knowledge. At last she lifted her head. There was only a purple streak in the sky, cutting through a field of crimson and leading, like an extension of the highway, into the descending dusk. She raised her hands from the side of the pen in a gesture hieratic and profound. A visionary light settled in her eyes. She saw the streak as a vast swinging bridge extending upward from the earth through a field of living fire. Upon it a vast horde of souls were tumbling toward heaven. There were whole companies of white trash, clean for the first time in their lives, and bands of negroes in white robes, and battalions of freaks and lunatics shouting and clapping and leaping like frogs. And bringing up the end of the procession was a tribe of people whom she recognized at once as those who, like herself and Claud, had always had a little of everything and the given wit to use it right. She leaned forward to observe them closer. They were marching behind the others with great dignity, accountable as they had always been for good order and common sense and respectable behavior. They, alone were on key. Yet she could see by their shocked and altered faces even their virtues were being burned away. She lowered her hands and gripped the rail of the hog pen, her eyes small but fixed unblinkingly on what lay ahead. In a moment the vision faded but she remained where she was.

    At length she got down and turned off the faucet and in her slow way on the darkening path went up to the house. In woods around her the invisible cricket choruses had struck up, but what she heard were the voices of the souls climbing upward into the starry field and shouting hallelujah (O’Connor, Everything That Rises Must Converge, (C) 1956, Noonday Press).

[christianmarkchristian]

N A K E D in H O L L Y W O O D

my autobiography, to be published daily or weekly,  AS IT IS WRITTEN. 

BEYOND SELF PUBLISHING: this is a 100% OPEN BOOK PROJECT 

-where I publish (share) AS (not after) I write, allowing readers to experience not just an autobiography but the experience of WRITING the autobiograpy as well.

on TUMBLR will be the BOOK in progress and eventualy, finished.

on FACEBOOK will be daily or weekly chapters/installments.

____________________________________________________________

PART 1

WHY WRITE AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY? Of course, its about the life of Christian Mark Christian but I intend to go into deeper themes as well:

1. God. If you are averse to God or Judaeo-Christian concepts about God, I hope you will not be “put off” by occasional references I will have to make in the course of remembering my life. My plan is not to be IN YOUR FACE about God but spiritual seeking has always been a huge part of my life and to omit this part would be to make the whole story a big lie.

2. VALUE - how we value our lives and our identity is critical to me and my development as a man. There is a fine line between thinking we are “so great that someone needs to write a book about us” and “our lives dont matter.” I have struggled GREATLY my whole life with feelings that my life isnt important, that I dont matter, that Ive been rejected and abandoned. Writing this will be the greatest therapy I can imagine. Writing this is telling myself, reminding myself, that I AM IMPORTANT and SO ARE YOU. 

3. Autobiography in the age of Interactivity. I’m not sure how many projects like this have been published online or in print but the thought occured to me that an autobiography can be, for the first time in history, more than a “book;” it can be an interactive EXPERIENCE. I can include links in my writing that take the reder to the places I am referencing. 

4. “To know is to love.” Honestly one thing that has always frustrated and disappointed me is that I feel like many or even MOST people “dont get me.” 

Too often I hear the word “weird” to describe me, when I would prefer to hear “unique” or “unusual.” I really am not even a fan of the word “eccentric.” 

Was Steve Jobs “weird?” Was Van Gogh “weird.”? Is Elon Musk “weird?” 

My feeling is that “weird” is considered a negative connotation or description, one I do not want and one that is hurtful when used to describe me. I dont feel like anyone who really knows me would ever call me “weird.” So,one huge function of this book is to eradicate the word “weird” as a description of Christian Mark Christian, once and for all and replace it with UNIQUE or RARE.  

Yeah, through no choice of my own, I’ve endured some things that are not typical of most lives. 

My dad’s suicide and that, co-inciding with the loss, at the same time, (divorce) of my Step-Dad. 

Millions have lost a Dad or a step dad through divorce or suicide but not as many have suffered both losses in the same year. 

Genius level IQ at age 7. 

Grew up around the world. 

Shared a 2-bedroom apartment with my Mom, until I got married at age 44.

Living with my ex-wife in an apartment in Hollywood, in an effort to heal and reconcile. 

Yeah-these are not typical of todays American “man”. I’m not “proud” of these things; nor am I ashamed of these things; I never planned on my life going the way it did. 

Regardless-when I became a Christian, at age 36,when I was “Born again,” I Iearned that God (if you choose to believe) “makes all things new” and “uses everything-even negative things, for eventual and ultimate good.” 

Regardless of the pain and tragedy I’d experienced, I was taught that it would all be used in a positive way, in time. 

Maybe this BOOK is that “positive way.” Maybe some who can relate will get a degree of emotional healing by reading; thats certainly my hope. 

But “to know is to Love.” I feel confident that many of my friends, in reading this book, will get to know me much better and in that, will be able to love me more. And who doesnt want to be loved.... and loved some more?

____________________________________________________________

part I

I was a second and final son, born seven years after my brother, into a USAF family, in Altus, Oklahoma. WWII was far enough behind but had left scars on my pilot Dad's psyche.

James (Jim) Charles Ralph, my Dad, dreamed of being an artist/illustrator for Foote, Cone & Belding, a top advertising agency. His creative dreams were cut short when the US let go of an isolationist foreign policy, geared up for war and he was drafted as a 19 year old, into the skies over his ancestral homeland (Germany.) 

As I understand it, Pearl Harbor "woke" us to the need to become involved again in foreign wars. Isolationist foreign policy would become a relic of the past; we quickly entered a war on several continents. 

Dad had grown up in Glendale, CA. a suburb that has since become a major Armenian cultural enclave in L.A. Ironic that I sit here typing this around eighty years later--a few miles west in another little enclave (part of Hollywood) officially called "Little Armenia." It really shows me that the themes and threads and patterns of life are stronger than we might think. In my case, I’ve been told that  the Apple hasnt fallen far from the tree.”

Armenia was, historically, the first place in the world where the name "Christian" was used to denote a follower of Christ. My primary care physician is Armenian and I am friends with several Armenians, so there seems to be a connection here, maybe one that will be explored in more depth as I write this...

-or maybe not.

The marriage was tempestuous. Jim, returning from the war and stationed at McDill AFB in Tampa, was driving a convertible and, the story goes, saw my Mom, Terry-a pretty young teen who modeled fashions for a local Department store. He was a handsome "flyer" or "Airman" and she fell for him, unaware of a Church background that would eventually drive a wedge between her his family.

  My paternal Grandmother, Carolyn Care, was a devout "Christian Scientist” as my Aunt still is, at age 90-something.

She would insist that my Mom, who was a typical American mainstream Protestant Christian, submit to her and the Churches doctrine. "Science" is about the idea that all things are merely the projection of "mind" and that evil or sickness cant exist unless we agree with it and "project" it (wrongful thinking) on ourselves. I always questioned this growing up. Even at a young age, I sensed something about it I had trouble with. Later, as an adult who accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior through various “Word of Faith” ministries, I saw that there was at least partial truths in “Science” even though I still could not follow Mary Baker Eddy’s doctrine in it’s entirety.

Apparently, several months pregnant with me, my Mom contracted pnuemonia or a similar ailment. Carolyn insisted that Terry not see the physician at the Altus Air Force base hospital but turn to a "Christian Science" practitioner instead. Rebelling finally, my Mom went to see the doctor at the base. He supposedly told her that, had she waited even another day, she might have lost the baby (me.) 

Only a few years later, at a Base in San Antonio, Texas, the troubled marriage fell apart with my Mom falling in love with my Pediatrician. I had asthma, most likely something that was brought on by the stress of my parents troubled marriage and she routinely brought me to see him at the base. Regardless of whether I chose to make these things a focus or no

t, they did shape who I choose to be today. I was raised from age 6-7 to 18, by a Pediatrician step-Dad (with my Mom) but my Paternal families Christian Science also had a strong influence on my thinking. 

It was an incredible duality and one I'm doubtful that many (or any?) others have experienced: a parental control and influence struggle between the ideals of Big pharm/modern medicine and "christian science," between the medical establishment and the "alternative healing" movements that originated in Christian metaphysical camps in19th century America.

Today, Health Care is probably the biggest debate in America. And the debate rages around the same two poles- alternative healing vs traditional medicine. Having deep experiential knowledge of both, puts me in a very unique position. Seeking, finding and practicing right doctrine ("righteousness") is central to my life and you can see why: wrong doctrine might have aborted me before I was born. RIght doctrine might have saved my life. The truth about God, his Love and his healing power, is not just "armchair theology" or something I engage in on special Holidays; its always at the core of every decision I make, every day of my life.

PART II

After surviving my Moms sickness and coming into this world as "Mark James Ralph," my first memory of infancy comes from our two story home in Cambridge, UK. where we moved when I was about 2?

My Dad was stationed at Alconbury AFB, about 25 miles away from Cambridge. I actually remember climbing out of my 2nd floor crib and crawling down the stairs, into the living area where my parents and 8 or 9 yr old brother were gathered!

Eventually I started walking and my best friend, a Brit, Andrew lived across the street.

We lived near open land where some Cows lived. I remember a Harvester machine that was called a “Combine” for some reason that I dont know.  I guess seeing it up close-the machinery, the complexity, the sheer power. The blades and the wheat being “threshed”. -All biblical themes, impressed me greatly...

We lived in a suburb of Cambridge, near some farmland and near a stand of trees called "the woods." 

My first "naked" (sexual) experiences were in Cambridge. I saw a male cow on the other side of the fence I was standing by, attempting to mate, jump up on top of a female cow. I was only a few feet away, on the other side of the fence--what the male cow did was so sudden, so unexpected and seemed -I dont have the word for it- not "brutal" (because it was "love" but invloved thousands of pounds of weight and muscle that could have killed a small child had I been involved!) but maybe just “alarming.” I was only about 4 or 5.

Now I’m going to bring up some very personal, private things that most people only reveal to their therapist. They may or may not end up in the final edit however I feel obligated, because of the name of the book-obligated to include them here...

I also initiated a "curious" childhood intimate encounter with Andrew in my bathroom at that time. I mention this only to bring up the topic of gay indocrination. I have no idea why, to this day but this "gay" encounter did not result in my growing up gay.

A few years later, in Wichita Falls, Texas, I initiated another "curious" encounter with a girl my age. We knelt down beside the wheel well of a car in the parking lot of our Apt complex, "TheTimbers" in the dark, at night, where I lifted her skirt to investigate her private parts.

She seemed to go along with it; at least there were no protests, as there had been none with Andrew. Apparently, I preferred the "female" more than the male because I never again had a sexual encounter with a male. Interesting that I remember Andrews name but not the girls name! Is this kind of thing just wired into our DNA? I think so.

I'm not sure what this says about the "born gay" issue but there it is... The result (I think) of these encounters, was this: even as a very young child, I had strong sexual urges which I had no trouble acting on when the opportunity arose. I dont remember sexual feelings ever becoming obsessive ( a good thing) but they were for sure there.

On another note, I remember walking off with Andrew (I think) into the local "woods." Woods is a cool name that has returned as the Church (M O S A I C) I attend locally uses the word in place of "Hollywood." They have several Campuses and use the term "The Woods" for the Hollywood Campus.

Andrew and I apparently, around age 4-5? decided to go on a hike into the woods one day, without telling anyone. My parents (not sure about his) were pretty upset. When I returned, they were happy I was safe. I never did anything so "adventurous" again. I think that was because I didnt want my parents to be so stressed.

I also remember a somewhat traumatic event around the time I was in my crib: my brother had caught a minnow, in a local stream. He had kept it in a jar aqaurium placed on my windowsill. The disturbing thing was that the fish jumped out of its "cage" (the jar) one day and out the window, falling two stories to its death on the concrete (or something hard) surface below.

By age 4 or 5, I had already seen and/or experienced both sex and death. Hollywood, here I (decades later) came.  

Part III

Ahhh, England. I have such fond memories of the years I spent there as a child-truly formative years and I am so deeply thankful that my formative years were spent there. To my best recollection, I spent my 2nd, 3rd and 4th years in Cambridge. 

When I began to speak (at a precocious young age) I spoke with an English accent. I remember my Mom dropping me off at "Shrubbery School" for the first time and the fear of abandonment I felt.I remember my first teacher, a wonderful Lady named "Mrs Clark" and how I related that to a candy bar that existed around that time, known as a "Clark Bar." 

My Mom dropped my off in our English Sports car-I think it was red, a "Sunbeam Alpine." That car was shipped all the way to Texas eventually and my Mom kept it even through her divorcing my Dad. Cambridge was rich with experience and wonder. I cant imagine a more perfect place for my early years and it left a deep appreciation for Brits in my soul, still there to this day. I would go so far as to even call myself an "Anglophile."

At school, we memorized the multiplication tables and began to learn the alphabet-at age 4! When we moved to San Antonio, TX, -when I was five-the school system there wanted to place me in Kindergarten! 

Thank god for the Mt Olive Lutheran School (off the 410 "loop") -where my parents eventually enrolled me. They were still not as advanced as Shrubbery School back in Cambridge, did but at least a better option than public schools.

My mind is flooded with lush beautiful imagery from Cambridge: 

-my Mom riding horseback in the countryside with her Horse riding club 

(and how later that might have played a factor in two girls I was attracted to and a novel "Diana" that affected me deeply in my teens) 

-My brother Christopher playing "conker" with Chestnuts tied to sholeaces! (only the brits would devise a game like this!)

-My brother relating a Jaguar or some other sports car "flying" by his school at some increditble speed. The drama and awe with which he related this formed in me an early apprecation for fast cars,one which has continued to this day.

The "punts" on the Cam river and the gorgeous Colleges in Cambridge, that all seemed to be named after Jesus or Mary! 

When I hear Christians acting as though the intellect isnt important now, I cringe. Cambridge was the birthplace of intellectualism and Christian thought. C.S. Lewis lived and worked there. Christianity is the most advanced culture of philosophy and Academic systems. The fact that atheism largely eradicated these roots  in the 20th Century is a very sad thing indeed and something I hope my life can be part of reversing. For Centuries, being a Christian and being an intellectual, a thinker, were synonomous. While I appreciate experiential knowledge and mysticism, lets not throw out suc a glorious inheritance so easily.

."http://histclo.com/country/eng/pe/pe60johnsc.html

NOTES for more stories to come: 1. B-day in St Tropez, the large round tray of raosted nuts, possible topless female sunbathers. The back seat of the VW bug, winding through the mountains in South of France, then LifeCycling through the area as an adult working out "Spinning" Berchtesgarden, the Bus, the rock thrown down the cliff into the forest, the rock that broke something...My brother and the Jaguar going 100. Shrubbery School, the rubbish can, "conquer" nut game with chestnuts. My brothers weird hobby of using sewing kits to lower things out hotel windows, then later doing the same to recover bottle caps in San Antonio. The possibility of this project being a catalyst for restoring my relationship with my brother and even step-Dad. How God restores family. The "punts" on the river Cam, Wimpy Burges and Brits eating burgers with knife and fork. How I envisined "the states" and in my mind saw a Giant "steak. The pass-through window-a first architectural design feature. My first bike, how I copied Andrew and the bike had front wheel brakes, how we'd ride around the block. Snow, and my first snowman, snowball fights.going w my family into some woods where my Dad chopped down a Christmas tree. First Christmas's. Alconbury AFB, the hangar. I was impressed and it made my Dad look so cool. I felt bad that he had to drive 25 miles, that seemed so far. Our trips to London. FIsh & Chips. Sightseeing, the trains. The White cliffs of Dover. My favorite TV show about the creatures that lived on the banks fo the river.

Highlights of a life well and not so well, lived:                        

Lived in or visited: the UK, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium, Texas, MS, NorCal, FLA, DC, Virginia, West VA, New Orleans, AZ, New Mexico, Austria, Switzerland, Denmark, France. HIGHLIGHTS:

Celebrated my 4th B-day in the South of France. Crossed the English Channel age, 12 on a Hover craft

Visited (Hitler’s lair in Berchtesgarden) age 4.

Visited Monticello (Jefferson’s home) age 4

Crossed the Atlantic in a commercial Airliner several times, aged 4-14.

Skied in the Swiss Alps and Lake Tahoe, age 10-12.

Lived in a Penthouse on the Rhine river, age 11-12.

Rode the train from Wiesbaden to Stuttgart, Germany age 12.

Visited Castles on the Rhine river, age 11-13.

Flew, as 10 yr old passenger, in a small Cessna, from San Diego to Tampa.

Rode or drove from the South or Texas, to CA, several times age 10-30’s.

Crossed the Pacific (Hawaii) as an adult.Vacationed in Maui, Palm Springs, Santa Barbara, Switzerland, The Netherlands, London, Paris.

Attended several F1 “Grand Prix” races around Europe and Long Beach, CA and Autosports events, age 8-12, Around America. Won several non-pro autosports trophies, age 20-22. Won #1 Singles (Tennis) MVP Trophy in High School, age 18.  

Got to State Finals on HS Tennis team age 18.

Won several 1st place ribbons in Biloxi, MS Art Shows, age 17.

Was offered Art Scholarship to Ole Miss University, age 18.

Paid $5000 to write a Greek Comedy movie script (Middle Age)

Twice paid $5000 to paint oil portraits (Middle Age)

Starred in a Prime Time major News Network Reality Show (one episode) (Middle Age)

Enjoyed hundreds of hikes in Griffith Park and other local trails. (Middle Age)

Had two jobs as live-in Private Chef in a $1.5M luxury Homes (Middle Age) in the Hills, in L.A.

Was hired by Ben Affleck, given my own trailer and worked on an Oscar winning film (ARGO, as on-camera hand double/sketch artist) Middle Age. As a visionary: saw self driving cars, in 2002, mobile hands free phones in 1995, “Gravity” script, in the 1980’s, MTV music videos, at age 12, years before MTV, the Hyperloop in 1995. Written 12 feature film “spec” scripts (Young-Middle Age) Married 11 years, divorced and re-established financial trust with my ex wife, now close friends and writing partners with her. Have experienced total melt-down/destruction of a marriage and the total rebuilding of that friendship. Have been friends with a few celebs. (actors, singers) Partied in Hollywood clubs and luxury homes, all over Los Angeles, hundreds of times. 25--Middle age Attended numerous Pop Music or Rock concerts at almost every venue all over Los Angeles. Age 12-Middle Age Interviewed on a West L.A. Sound stage, along with 5 of my paintings, for a SHOWTIME 35 mm film doc on Marilyn Monroe that Premiered at the Palm Springs Int. Film Festival, age-30’sAttended the Premiere of that Film, in Palm Springs, where I enjoyed minor, fleeting celebrity status.My art appeared once, in PEOPLE magazine.

30’sI enjoyed backstage at a MOODY BLUES concert at Universal Amphitheater.

20’sI had a Publicist for my Art -30’s.

I’ve had front-row box seats at the Hollywood Bowl. Middle AgeI

met the Great-grandson of the founder of Hollywood. Middle age

I’ve visited or worked on, every major studio lot in Los Angeles and Hollywood. Young-Middle AgeI’ve enjoyed beaches in Maui, Los Angeles, Northern California, Mississippi, Florida and The Netherlands. 4-Middle Age I attempted to surf in Malibu. 20’s Been to Art Museums all over the world, including numerous visits to the Getty in Brentwood. 4-Middle Age Helped my architect brother flip homes many times in Los Angeles. 20’sDesigned many residences as an Architecture student/aspiring architect, in High School. Designed and contracted a hip, post-modern Silver Lake Laundry to Bathroom conversion, in budget. Middle Age Enjoyed hundreds of great shoulder/full body/foot massages Young-Middle age Swam in secluded pools on Maui -Middle AgeHad amazing revelatory spiritual experiences as a Christian 20’s-Middle Age. Attended/Worshipped Jesus at almost 20 different Church locations all over Los Angeles over 1000 times since 1993. Studied every major religion in depth 20’s-Middle Age. Sold almost 200 original paintings. 20’s Middle Age Had several one-man shows at Cacao, a popular West L.A. Coffee shop, owned by the Designer of iconic BigFoot Lodge in Atwater Village. 30’sCurated several group shows at Cacao. 30’s Participated in several ground breaking group show/parties at the infamous Black Cat Gallery in Mar Vista. Middle Age Been paid as: Photographer, Designer, Contractor, Writer, Musician, Oil Portraitist, Organizer and Chef. 12-Middle Age Worked on almost 200 professional movie, TV or commercial sets in a variety of positions. Middle Age Written, Directed and Produced several low budget short films and/or videos. Middle Age Created authentic food from many international cuisines. 30’s Middle Age Enjoyed about $5000-$10,000 in the finest restaurant cuisine in L.A., New Orleans, Germany, the Netherlands and France. 4-Middle age Briefly co-owned, with my then-wife, a catering company which catered several events. Middle Age Briefly co-owned, with a friend, a failed Hollywood event company. Middle Age.