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Sculpting in Time |
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Stumbling Into Grace |
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Teresa Kwon |
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| Who am I? |
49 year old, husband of Lissa, father of Emma (almost 8), visual artist, christian (episcopalian), operations manager at UT Performing Arts Center, native Austinte, current elginite, and chainsawweilder. everything on this web site copyrighted by
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January
2003
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November 2003
After my slot in the House of prayer Lissa, Emma and I met Danny Schweers for supper at Threadgils and enjoyed catching up on what's going on in his life in Deleware (the tiny state). We got crazy taking pictures of each other with our digital cameras. Above is one of Emma's pictures of Danny. He noticed that as he scans the crowds he is recognizing folks from Deleware not from Texas even when he is in Austin. A reversal of his experience when he first moved to Deleware of mistakenly identifiying people in Deleware as Texans. A sure sign he has transitioned. I remember when I moved to Iowa to go to graduate school one of the starngest things was not recognizing people when you walk dow the street. Even in a place as big as Austin there are people who have been around UT for ever and even if you don't know them or even know their name you get used to seeing them around. When you move to a new place you loose that sense of familiarity. 11:14:2003
David Taylor emailed this review of Mel Gibson's the Passion by Dennis Praeger which I found refreshing , thoughtful and insightful. check it out. 11:11:2003
One of the presents Lissa gave me for my birthday was a book that I saw in the Museum store in Houston but I figured I could get it cheaper on the web which I did (over 1/2 price). It came in the mail on Saturday. It is"Flemish Primitive Masterpieces" and has the work of 15 century Flemish painters like Robert Campin, Van Eyck, Deirick Bouts, Hans Memling etc. Truly beautiful work and very inspiring to me. I am going to try and find out some of the painting techniques that these guys used. Their colors are so jewel like. It must be the way they used glazing, something I have never done much of; I am mainly a scumbler.11:10:2003
We finally got Emma well and had the long awaited Halloween party Friday night. Peggy Jo and Bethany came out for a sleep-over. Lissa made cookies and the girls liberally decorated them with sprinkles while I got the treasure hunt ready. I made up a bunch of clues and one clue led to another until the finally got up in the tree house. The first clue was in the pinata. So once the pinata burst and all the candy collected the hunt began. Once they made it to the tree house I raised up a plastic pumpkin with three micropets (the new series three micropets). Somehow Emma had got it in her mind that there was going to be a plethora of micropets so when they realized there was only one a piece a collective cry went up, "WE WANT MORE".
Then the compaint turned into conniving for the one prized micropet, Nacho. I made the mistake of getting three different ones. So we spent almost an hour trying to sort out who got what micropet and trying to instill an attitude of gratefulness for what we have instead of complaining about what we do not have. As I have reflected on this I am aware of how the girls mirror my own attitude towards God. He has given me so much, over and over again and my usual response is not, "thank you God for giving me so much more than I deserve" but "I WANT MORE". And this is not just in matters of consumption but in matters of the spirit as well. Lord have mercy on us and our children. Teach us to have real hearts of gratitude and thankfulness. 11:10:2003
My old friend Danny Schweers has started a blog full of his wonderful photos and insightful writing. Thanks Danny for sharing your gifts with the world.11:04:2003
Poor Emma was sick all last week. We were planning a big Halloween sleep over with Peggy Jo but had to cancel it. Actually we are postponning it to this coming Friday. We were going to have a pinata, a treasure hunt, roast marshmallows around the campfire. It will still be fun but not the same as having it on Halloween. Halloween was my favorite holiday growing up. I loved it because as a kid you got to participate in a really creative way. I would have several costumes planned and made as well as help most of my friends make theirs. One year we went all out and made a creepy haunted front yard that was a group effort of all us neighborhood kids. It was a blast. It makes me sad to see the way Christian kids don't get to participate in Halloween and have to go to Harvest festivals. How Lame!! I think another reason I liked Halloween so much is that it made sense to me. It was the one day of the year that everyone acknowledge how scary life is and looked evil in the face. My life as a child was full of those feelings but my parents and everyone else just keep saying "everything is fine". Well, children know bullshit when they hear it and even though they get confused and learn not to trust their feelings, Halloween was like taking the red pill in the Matrix-reality. I think we as Christians should use Halloween as an opportunity to look evil and death and the devil in the face and laugh...because in the resurrection we have the last laugh. All that crap about Satanism and kids being lured into devil worship by Haloween is just another excuse to try and live in a sanitzed world where comfort and convenience is our primary goal. OK, I'll get off my soap box now.
My opening went well at EV Free. I went to the worship time before hand at their 11:00 service and the reception was afterwards. Thanks to all my friends who made the effort to come and support me. I really appreciate it. I had quite a few good and meaningful conversations during the reception.
For all of the flaws of the Episcopal church and their goofy theology and liberal agenda I have to see that after taking communion in a protestant church I am really glad I am an Episcopalian. It cracks me up that folks who make such a big deal about the bible and taking it literally can make such hash of the communion liturgy. Jesus said on the night that he was betrayed that he took BREAD and BROKE it. So what's with the tiny vaccuformed pieces of unidentified substance that is passed around. It looks nothing like bread and it certainly isn't broken. And grape juice in tiny plastic cups? This is my BLOOD poured out for you? Again it is so sanitzed and symbolically mixed up. Thank you Anglicanism for having a beautiful Eucharist liturgy that understands the symbols of Jesus body and blood.at least at 5:00 at St. David's. Boy! I just can't get off my soap box today. Sorry!11:04:2003