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NEWS

Each month I will keep a running list of news items, including info on my schedule, etc. It's in order from LATEST entry at the top on down to the OLDEST entry at the bottom. 

Here are the "News" archives, feel free to browse them for some interesting tidbits:

***This is the archive of the May  2003 news***

29 May 2003

I don't want to be too dramatic about this, but I'm pretty furious. 

What happened is, at the end of April my friends Chris and Michele lost their youngest son, Benjamin. In fact, you can read the post about his death below, from May 2 (if you haven't already)... Chris and Michele are doing their best to deal with the loss, some of you know exactly what it's like to lose a son like that, and everyone can at least imagine it a little bit. It's been hard, I know that, and I think it's only just now sinking in that he's really gone. 

Okay, fine. 

So, they did a cool thing at the day care center where Benjamin used to go (and where his older brother, Peter -- my godson -- STILL goes). What they did is, they planted a tree in Benjamin's memory, a yellow dogwood. Now that sounds cool enough, I mean, planting a tree in memory of a 16-month-old boy who dies. Sort of a new life in memory of Benjamin's life. 

But it's not that simple. 

Seems the "grounds keeping" office of Ohio University, the institution where Chris teaches and which operates the day care center, has a policy about people planting trees. The policy is that you have to pay $800 for THEM to come plant the tree. Guess what? They didn't HAVE the $800 to spend just on having those guys plant the tree (and then having to buy the tree, too) -- so they just went and bought the tree and planted it themselves. 

Trouble. 

I guess there was a big stink about it, obviously I'm not there so I don't know HOW big, but let's just say it was big enough that the day care center ended up having to "call in some favors" from the "higher powers" at the University to settle things down. 

That seems pretty stupid, don't you think? Unless I'm mistaken, those guys weren't going to make any "commission" off this gig, so why would they even bother noticing? I mean, grounds keeping guys gotta eat, too, I know -- but doesn't it seem really STUPID that they would have the nerve to actually complain and make a fuss in THIS situation?!? 

But that's nothing, that's just bothersome, that's all. 

No, the KICKER is that, okay, the big stink is over, things seem to have settled down -- but NOW Michele tells me that, only about 4 or 5 days after they planted the tree, THE TREE WAS STOLEN. 

?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

This is not a joke. In Athens, Ohio -- a place where I'd guess "theft" ranks about the same as "Biblical floods" in people's fears -- somebody went into that day care center's playground and STOLE the tree that was planted in memory of Benjamin Carl Hayes, a tiny 16-month-old boy who struggled his whole life and finally couldn't make it. They STOLE it!!!

I am a follower of Jesus, that's the way I try to live my life -- it may sound nuts to you if you're not into that, but whatever, that's where I'm coming from, personally. And as a Jesus-person, I want to be about love and peace and forgiveness and "do unto others" and "don't judge lest ye be judged" and all that cozy Biblical stuff. And did I say I want to be about LOVE?!? I do...

But this is a challenge. 

Who would steal a tree planted in memory of a little boy?!? I mean, go into the playground of a stinking DAY CARE CENTER for kids and steal a tree planted in memory of a baby who died?!? Who would do that?!?!?!?!?!?

Please pray for Chris and Michele -- I want you to think for a second, try to imagine, after the last few weeks they've had, trying to adjust to Ben being gone, trying to deal with their grief, trying to just pick things up and keep going -- try to imagine how it felt to hear that news. That someone had STOLEN the tree planted in Ben's memory. 

And please pray for the REST of us, as we try to be calm and not just hold anger in our hearts for whoever did this. Because that's my gut reaction -- to be REALLY mad at the guy or guys who did it ("hate" is way too strong, but on the other hand, the phrase "want-to-punch-their-lights-out" kind of describes my feelings, I'd say). But it's REALLY not "right" to feel that way, I know -- righteous, maybe, but not "right" -- so I'm fighting it with all I've got. 

Okay, and frankly I wish you'd pray for the bozos who stole that tree, that they would suffer the most tremendous guilt imaginable -- I think we Jesus people call it "convicting guilt"... The kind of guilt that ends up helping them not be the pitiful losers that they obviously are... (oops, there I go being all "non-spiritual" again)... But seriously, if I can have a "positive" prayer for those guys, I just want them to realize how horrible they've acted by doing this -- and I really hope that somehow, in a way that we can't imagine, it will start them "turning their life around" (or something like that -- however I might be able to say that without sounding like some high school guidance counselor). It's not easy for me to think in that "mature" way right now, but that's really what I'm praying, and I wish you'd join me, if you're so inclined.

. . .

By the way, they said yellow dogwoods are NOT very common in Athens, Ohio, which I assume is partly why they chose that as the species of tree to plant in little Benjamin's memory. So we're already talking about having a "Yellow Dogwood Search Posse" to canvas the whole town next spring when that sucker should be blooming. If any of you guys are free to join us, let me know -- but you'll have to bring your own clubs and torches... 

22 May 2003

Just returned from a birthday party for one of the girls from the Xi Lin Church. Quite nice, but at one point the kids (by "kids" I mean this girl and her friends, who are all in secondary school), well at one point the kids asked me how old I was. 

I grimaced, like I always do at that question, and I asked them how old they THOUGHT I was. "I think, must be thirty plus something," said one fellow in mildly broken English. 

Smiling, I said, "Yes, that's right, I'm 36." 

"Oh," he said, shaking his head. "Middle-aged..." 

(The butt-whoopin' he then received was only imagined by me -- I repeat, I did NOT actually whoop his butt, let the record show)...  

21 May 2003

I just took a nap. Pretty geriatric, huh? But I've not gotten a lot of sleep lately and so what? So sue me...

Anyway, I TELL you I just took a nap because DURING the alleged nap I had what likely qualifies as simultaneously the most stupid AND most strange dream I think I may have ever had. 

In this dream, which took place in a hospital waiting room (which looked suspiciously like my doctor's office back in the USA, only shrunk to half-size), I was hanging out with Sting, as in the pop-rock superstar. Sting was dressed in black, with a shirt with poofy sleeves, sort of a medieval thing going on, collar open down to his mid-chest, you know the look. In fact, I think Sting's actually done that look a bit, right? Anyway, he and I were just sort of hanging out, and talking about music, and he had his laptop computer there and he was using a program called Acid (an amazing music composition and remixing tool which I use) to just sort of show me some things he was working on these days -- giving me a preview of his next record, in other words. 

Well, in the course of the conversation, as he was playing for me this new version of Roxanne which he was doing, I asked him, "So, hey, Sting, where'd you get that drum loop?" -- 'cause it was a really cool loop and I wanted to know where it came from. 

So Sting suddenly gets all sheepish on me. See, he's sitting on the table, with his laptop next to him, and I can tell he doesn't really seem to want to tell me where the loop came from -- musicians are like that, sort of like if I tell you where it came from it's not so cool anymore. So I'm not SURE that's what's going on, but it SEEMS that's what's happening and why he's suddenly so shy about it all. 

Finally, he sort of lets it slip out that no, he's not so keen on telling me this secret -- but then again, at the same time, he kind of WANTS to tell me -- because the thing is, ole Sting, he's studying to be an OB-GYN. Turns out that once he becomes one (a licensed OB-GYN, that is), he'll need a new place to live (since he needs to go "under cover" for this new life he's planning), and -- wonder of wonders! -- he's thinking about moving to Louisville (where I used to live before moving to HK). 

You see, he didn't want to tell me where the drum loop came from because he was gonna move to my old hometown and didn't want people to already know everything about him before he even GOT there -- but at the SAME TIME, he was having fun hanging out talking about music, so he WANTED to tell me where the loop came from, too. It's like he was having a sort of inner battle over not wanting to spoil his future reputation in Louisville, but still wanting to be my buddy. 

Get it?!?

So I don't know if I'm explaining this all correctly, but the point is that I suddenly see that he's actually really opening up to me, right? And I'm really touched by that, somehow, and I tell him, "Oh, yeah, Sting, we'd LOVE to have you in Louisville, you'd be really popular -- but then the problem is you'll always be the rich outsider, you know?"... 

And THEN -- okay, this is interesting -- then I realize that he'd said "OB-GYN" by saying a WORD out of it, like instead of saying all the letters "O-B-G-Y-N" he turns it into a word pronounced /OHB-jen/ (with a long "o" and short "e") -- sort of like the way we say NASA as a word instead of spelling it, do you see what I mean? 

And so I commented to him, "Hmmm, that's weird -- you just said 'ohbjen' instead of 'o-b-g-y-n'"... And THIS in turn brings a really incredulous look from the middle-aged African-American woman who is behind the counter of the waiting room -- she's dressed as a nurse (with the old-time nurse's hat, right?), leaning with her elbows on the counter, listening in on our conversation... but she doesn't know that I can see her rolling her eyes at me, shaking her head, looking at Sting like, "Oh, dear, what a bozo!" -- all because I was saying OB-GYN as the letters, "o-b-g-y-n" instead of "ohbjen"... And noticing her reaction, and suddenly feeling like a goober in front of my friend, Sting, I responded that, "Well, in fact, I guess being a single guy who's never been AROUND an ohbjen, how would I know how to pronounce it?!? I just have always thought I've heard people say it by spelling the letters"... To which they all agreed it sounded like a reasonable excuse -- but I couldn't help feeling they still thought I was a rube for not knowing you should say it as a word instead of spelling it out... 

Then I woke up...

Miscellaneous Non-Freudian Post-Dream Comments:
1) First, I would give ANYTHING if I could remember what the new version of Roxanne sounded like in my dream. I think it was really funny, like it was a sort of disco-techno-polka thing, with horns and all -- but, alas, I just can't remember it. 

2) Don't you really say "OB-GYN" by spelling out the letters?!? The dream was so real I actually doubted this for a few minutes... 

3) Finally, I think my dream-self was pretty insightful in giving Sting the "you'll always be the rich outsider" comment. 

(Because he WOULD be, you know)... 

. . .

There's is a TV channel here in HK called "Star World" which shows The Simpsons every weekday at 6pm. It's a very surreal channel to watch, because they ONLY have commercials for shows that they broadcast. Seriously -- no products, no services -- ONLY commercials about their own shows. Which honestly drives me nuts, because they have a LOT of commercial time (if The Simpsons is any way to judge), and the only thing worse than watching a TV station that shows commercials every 5 minutes is a station that only shows commercials for itself!

Anyway, they have this one commercial for a show from Singapore about the arts. I don't watch Star World (or TV) enough to actually know the name of the show, but tonight while watching The Simpsons I saw this commercial (the one in question, about the arts program), and the first line of the voice-over TOTALLY made me angry:

"You don't have to be an artist to know art -- but you ARE as talented as an artist if you appreciate art."

Now that's just stupid. 

And I don't know why I'm even bothering to mention the whole thing, except that it's SO stupid that I just feel the world needs to know. "You are as talented as an artist if you appreciate art"?!?? 

"Yeah, you know, I haven't actually done much painting recently... I mean, actually I've never painted in my life. But yeah, man, I've seen LOTS of paintings, and like that one guy, Picasso -- whoa! I am TOTALLY into his stuff... So, yeah, I know I could do it."

. . .

Okay, late-breaking news -- one of our church members from the Shatin CP Church has accepted duty in the SARS "baby" ward (as she calls it) at the hospital where she is a nurse. Her name is Ah Ting, she is newly married (about 6 - 8 months ago), and it is clear that she is nervous but strong-willed about going in. The duty will last for 4 weeks, and during that entire time there will be constant danger of infection and/or spreading the disease to her husband or others she comes into contact with. If you are a Jesus-type person, please pray for her. 

20 May 2003

Okay, the way I see it, realistically I have about 3 options tonight. Option number one is that I can go directly to bed and not update this page at all. Appealing in every way except the "everyone is yelling at me for not updating" way. My second option is to stay up all night and just unload my whole head full of stuff on you. Appealing in every way except the "I gotz ta work tomorrow" way. And my THIRD option, which I am choosing, is a little thing that we in da bidness call "da sprinkling" -- it's where I just tell you, like, maybe 5 things only, and it whets your appetite (headline style), but then I can really go in-depth later when I have more time. Appealing in every way except the "they might be able to tell I'm just stalling" way.

So here's da sprinkling:

That just about wraps it up -- more later...

19 May 2003

I don't mean to give you any kind of cop out for not having written for so long. 

But if you can understand this, I just couldn't figure out what to write after my post below about Benjamin's death. How could I go from THAT, which has broken so many hearts, to just talking about a bunch of crap that no one cares about? 

Okay, so here. I've broken that silence. And I hope that just because now I'll eventually go back to writing about nonsense like what I had for lunch or other useless info, it doesn't diminish what we all feel for Benjamin. And I don't know why I feel I need to say all that, but it's been gnawing at me and I've put off updating this page for weeks, as you can see, just because of that. Every time I'd log on and get ready to write something, I'd just think, "Geez, I just can't follow Benjamin's death with this garbage." It's like, how could I sit here typing, looking at his photo below, and start talking about school or the weather? So I'd give up and erase it all and just close the connection.

But no more. I'll start back updating as often as I can -- like before, I guess. And I know it's stupid but I just want this little posting to somehow serve as the "notice" that whether I'm writing about him or not, Benjamin is still in my mind EVERY DAY -- I mean it, every single day...

So I've got that off my chest, and I don't feel "better" but I hope you can at least see where I'm coming from... 

2 May 2003

Benjamin Hayes       December 28, 2001 - April 30, 2003

I got the phone call this morning telling me that little Benjamin Hayes -- son of my friends Chris and Michele, and younger brother to my godson, Peter -- passed away on Wednesday night. 

Ironically, just YESTERDAY I mentioned them in my posting here (see below) -- I had been thinking of Ben a lot the last few days, but I wasn't really "worried" about him, per se. For the last several months there had been what felt like good signs in his development, maybe I just "imagined" that, but I had been thinking that maybe he was getting BETTER (bigger and stronger) -- and so I don't think I (or anyone) was quite prepared for this. How can you ever "be prepared"? -- I know... But I'm just saying that despite the tremendous health problems he's had since birth, this still sort of feels like it came out of the blue. 

Chris told me that on Wednesday morning they discovered Ben having trouble breathing -- and using the equipment they have, they were able to see that his blood oxygen level was only about 60% what it should be. So they gathered all their things and prepared to head off to Columbus, Ohio (which is two hours away but has the nearest big hospital with top pediatrics). But after hearing their description of Ben's condition, their nurse suggested they should not delay by going all the way to Columbus, but should instead rush on to the local emergency room there in Athens.  

It was good that they did, because just as they got there Ben's heart stopped. That was Miracle #1, as Michele put it -- if they had not gone to the local hospital there in town, then his heart would have stopped with them in the van, out on the interstate. 

So the doctors set about trying to revive him, and things were in mild chaos when Miracle #2 happened -- their family doctor came walking into the emergency room. This was really a miracle, no one had called him -- he really just happened to be coming by at just that time...  

Immediately their doctor took charge, according to Chris, and within a few minutes Ben was "back" and things were more under control. They explained that their doctor felt it was just an "episode" -- but that just to be safe they should airlift Benjamin to Columbus for further care. However, before they could get him on the helicopter for transport, he "crashed" again, and he was only revived by another serious effort. This time their doctor was more concerned. As Chris put it, "I think at that point the doctor realized it wasn't exactly what he thought it was at first"... 

They stabilized Ben, and put him in the helicopter, but they said that by the time they got to Columbus they could tell that he was already no longer "there" anymore... The machines and medication kept him alive for several more hours, and despite the tubes and ventilators, they were able to hold him, and kiss him, and talk to him, and sing songs to him.

Finally the nurse came over and told them that his heart had stopped a few moments before, that he was gone. And they unhooked the tubes and the machines -- and it is beyond my ability to understand the grief they felt there, holding their tiny son who just never could get better, the whole family there, gathered around him, telling him goodbye...

It was Wednesday night, April 30th. Benjamin was 16 months old. 

. . .

Chris told me their families will gather in the next few days and they will have a memorial service for Ben at the local Methodist church on Saturday. 

If you are a mutual friend of Chris and Michele, please don't call them -- not yet. E-mail them if you want, that would be GREAT (contact me if you don't have their current address).

But don't call them now -- it's not really time for that yet, if that makes sense. 

For now, just PRAY for them... 

1 May 2003

My friend Michele sent me a message two weeks ago where she talked about her sons and their Easter egg hunt. Her oldest son, Peter, is my godson, so I am always really interested in this kind of news. Her younger son, Benjamin, has lived a life FULL of difficulties and challenges from DAY ONE, and that little guy is ALWAYS on my mind -- I mean ALWAYS. 

Okay, so I quote from her e-mail without her permission, hopefully she won't mind:

(That KILLS me)... 

. . .

The weather here has been so great that I am not sure how to respond. The weather is the one thing about HK that I love to hate. I have only had to empty my dehumidifier (which I thank God for every day) about one time in the last 8 or 9 days. And the temperature has been quite mild for HK at this time of year, too. Very pleasant. 

Aren't you glad you know?

Now, if it just weren't for this deadly disease floating around I'd be telling you guys to come on over...

. . .

OH, I got some new photos of my niece, Madelyne:

EASTER SUNDAY 2003 From L to R, this is Bob (my brother-in-law),  Madie, and Lisa (my sister). Pretty cute, huh?

They say this is Madie making her "Grenn" face.

Okay, I'm not sure what it means to say she's making her "Grenn" face -- but seeing that photo made me wonder what she would look like if she REALLY looked like her Uncle Grenn, so here she is with MY eyes and mouth:

(Maybe it's good she doesn't look TOO much like me)... 

. . .

Okay, well, I just re-read my post of a few days ago (see the April news archive), where I joked about calling down the wrath of a judgmental God on some kids that were talking during my "sermon" last Sunday -- and I realized some people might be offended by that. Sorry if that's you, I was only trying to make a joke but I'll try to not be so flip about lakes of fire and eternal gnashing of teeth in the future. 

(Note to self: "hellfire and damnation" = not so funny, really)...

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