The Steampunk World
I spent the weekend in Nebraska with my good friends Kim and Jeff. It was a much-needed relief from the ol' hustle and bustle. All that life and growth, all around, and the fresh air... a much needed respite from the concrete jungle.
On the train on the way to O'Snare, we stopped on the tracks and were informed by recording that "This train is experiencing technical difficulties. The operator has left the train to address the problems". I guess they didn't want people panicking when they used the intercom and got no response. Then, after about five minutes, we started rolling again... and the recording said, "This train is experiencing technical difficulties. The operator has left the train to address the problems." Zoiks! A runaway train!
Got to Omaha airport/cattle auction okay with the help of a Bloody Mary. Intellectually I enjoy flying very much but it still scares my gut. Jeff drove me to their place, which involves leaving the paved road and driving for an hour and a half into the deep Nebraskan cornfields. I never knew there were really houses like this: Their house, a church, another house, and a 2-classroom schoolhouse... and then corn to the horizon. Beautiful countryside, huge sky, fresh air. Ah, just what I was looking for.
Kim greets me on the porch in bare feet, pigtails, overalls, and a cowboy hat. Tryin' to look like a hick! I'm sorry, but the computer lab with seven stations kinda destroys that image. Their kids were quite computer literate. It was amazing. LeAnn and Bob were there too, I was pleased to discover. What great folks. We stayed up late into the night drinkin' beer and talkin' and playin' games.
Saturday, more chillin' and relaxin' was to be had. Jeff took me on a short trip around the Omaha reservation. So much tragedy. We stood on the bank of the Missouri and Jeff sang an Omaha spiritual and I looked at the river the Omaha had crossed 500 years ago, 200 years before any white people set foot there. Now they're living in poverty and have had their culture almost completely destroyed. It was unbearably painful to see, who knows how Jeff does it every day?
Kim and Jeff are Lutherans, and I am an atheist. To sum up our philosophical differences, I say, "There ain't no hell" and they say, "The hell there ain't!" ;) Our friendship has been very good for me, really opened my eyes to the good aspects of a faith that I had always seen as fully persecutors. They focus their lives on living it right as they see it, while many atheists fall into the trap of assuming because there is no god, there also are no morals or ethics. We need something to replace the church for secular humanists. Unitarianism does it for a lot of people, but that still assumes a belief in the supernatural. At any rate, I've learned a lot about Lutheranism from them. Every gripe I have about Christianity as an organized religion, they have too. We tend to agree on most (but not all) philosophies except the final caveat. Best of all, they've been very accepting of me and my ways and they've taught me to be accepting of theirs. We talked late into the night on Saturday, the highlight being Jeff's translation of a bit of Genesis from the Hebrew text. I also saw him read Greek. Astounding. I wish I'd used my college education to develop, like, skills and stuff.
Got the scope out for a bit of a glimpse at Mars and Andromeda. The night sky was beautiful, lots of shooting stars. I could have stayed for months, sitting in the lawn chairs, drinkin' beer. It was a nice little reset, and I returned to Chicago full of vim and vigor.
On the train on the way to O'Snare, we stopped on the tracks and were informed by recording that "This train is experiencing technical difficulties. The operator has left the train to address the problems". I guess they didn't want people panicking when they used the intercom and got no response. Then, after about five minutes, we started rolling again... and the recording said, "This train is experiencing technical difficulties. The operator has left the train to address the problems." Zoiks! A runaway train!
Got to Omaha airport/cattle auction okay with the help of a Bloody Mary. Intellectually I enjoy flying very much but it still scares my gut. Jeff drove me to their place, which involves leaving the paved road and driving for an hour and a half into the deep Nebraskan cornfields. I never knew there were really houses like this: Their house, a church, another house, and a 2-classroom schoolhouse... and then corn to the horizon. Beautiful countryside, huge sky, fresh air. Ah, just what I was looking for.
Kim greets me on the porch in bare feet, pigtails, overalls, and a cowboy hat. Tryin' to look like a hick! I'm sorry, but the computer lab with seven stations kinda destroys that image. Their kids were quite computer literate. It was amazing. LeAnn and Bob were there too, I was pleased to discover. What great folks. We stayed up late into the night drinkin' beer and talkin' and playin' games.
Saturday, more chillin' and relaxin' was to be had. Jeff took me on a short trip around the Omaha reservation. So much tragedy. We stood on the bank of the Missouri and Jeff sang an Omaha spiritual and I looked at the river the Omaha had crossed 500 years ago, 200 years before any white people set foot there. Now they're living in poverty and have had their culture almost completely destroyed. It was unbearably painful to see, who knows how Jeff does it every day?
Kim and Jeff are Lutherans, and I am an atheist. To sum up our philosophical differences, I say, "There ain't no hell" and they say, "The hell there ain't!" ;) Our friendship has been very good for me, really opened my eyes to the good aspects of a faith that I had always seen as fully persecutors. They focus their lives on living it right as they see it, while many atheists fall into the trap of assuming because there is no god, there also are no morals or ethics. We need something to replace the church for secular humanists. Unitarianism does it for a lot of people, but that still assumes a belief in the supernatural. At any rate, I've learned a lot about Lutheranism from them. Every gripe I have about Christianity as an organized religion, they have too. We tend to agree on most (but not all) philosophies except the final caveat. Best of all, they've been very accepting of me and my ways and they've taught me to be accepting of theirs. We talked late into the night on Saturday, the highlight being Jeff's translation of a bit of Genesis from the Hebrew text. I also saw him read Greek. Astounding. I wish I'd used my college education to develop, like, skills and stuff.
Got the scope out for a bit of a glimpse at Mars and Andromeda. The night sky was beautiful, lots of shooting stars. I could have stayed for months, sitting in the lawn chairs, drinkin' beer. It was a nice little reset, and I returned to Chicago full of vim and vigor.
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