Good News and Bad News

So this falls into the category of good news/bad news, delivered to me by the United States Postal Service yesterday when I received the latest edition of Down East Magazine. On the cover of this fabulous periodical was a picture of Main Street of the winning town in their annual contest—Best Places to Live in Maine…

When Pam and I go to Maine, there are two towns we spend a lot of time in mostly because they are both roughly the same distance from the lake where we live. These two towns are both wonderful, quaint and endlessly charming places to spend a morning, afternoon or evening and they are both on the ocean. One is Camden, the other is pictured in this photograph—Belfast, Maine.

 

The good news is that this award is well deserved. Belfast is a wonderful place filled with great shops and restaurants and a variety of quirky co-ops and breathtaking views around every corner. The bad news is that with this added publicity now more people than ever will want to move here, which will send real estate prices skyward—the very last thing you need when you’re trying to buy a lake house.

Just in case you’re curious, I have circled below all the different lakes we have rented cabins on over the years. The one with double circles is our beloved Quantabacook.

Our crack real estate agent, Tiffany Ford, sent me a text this week saying, “I’m feeling like we’re going to find your lake house this year.”  When I asked on what she was basing this optimism her answer was, “Because I feel it.” This is in sharp contrast to my feeling that I have never been more discouraged about our chances, to which she cracked in that quintessential Maine way—“Stop being a pessimist!!”

What Guts Looks Like

And now for your daily dose of bravery. This Ukrainian women delivers the goods…

She walks up to this random Russian soldier and demands to know, “What the f**k are you doing here in our land with all these guns?” The soldier then tells her to move along but she persists, “You’re occupants, you’re fascists.” The soldier responds that their discussion will lead to nothing and once again tells her to leave. Then the woman puts some kind of Ukrainian curse on him and hands him a small bag of sunflower seeds—the national flower of Ukraine—and drops the mic with this, “Take these seeds and put them in your pocket. That way at least flowers will grow where you die here.”

I nominate this amazing woman for the Nobel Peace Prize.

What Was Old is New Again

The images of tanks streaming into Ukraine this morning is a visceral reminder that what was old is new again. These were the images that our fathers grew up with. Back then it was grainy black and white news reels between shows at the movies, screaming headlines in dark black letters splashed across the newspapers. Now, my Apple Watch buzzes me awake with the notification that war has begun in Eastern Europe. I come downstairs and see the live stream from the border, rows of military vehicles, spent missile fragments in town squares cordoned off with police tape, long lines of Ukrainian men signing up for military service, silver streaks across the sky then a flash of orange in the distance followed by billows of black smoke. I listen to some official at the UN holding a live press conference talking about solidarity, contingency plans and a virtual summit meeting scheduled for later today.

I read of the denunciations coming in from all over the world, from practically every country I’ve ever heard of including my own. My President calls it an “unprovoked and unjustified attack” that will result in “catastrophic loss of life.” Leaders of Europe are talking about severe sanctions and economic isolation, to which Vladimir Putin’s reaction so far seems to be communicated clearly in this photograph…

Now we all will get to see what happens when the New World Order meets an Old World strongman with nuclear weapons. Maybe Putin overreaches. Maybe the Ukrainian military surprises him by their fighting spirit. Maybe he has vastly overestimated his strength. Maybe the sanctions eventually prove too much for his backwater economy to handle. Maybe he pulls back. But, there’s another possibility. Maybe he succeeds and within months or even weeks, Ukraine falls. Will that be enough to assuage his appetite for conquest? Or will he then turn his eyes towards other former Soviet client states like Lithuania, Latvia, or Georgia? Then what?

Whatever happens, we better get used to seeing photographs like this of a woman injured by an air strike in Kharkiv…

Knowing exactly what to do in moments like this is far beyond my education, training and experience. I wouldn’t know where to begin in crafting a response. Geopolitics is beyond my pay grade. All I know is that I don’t want to see pictures like this one where the bloody face is an American Marine. But still, the heart goes out to the innocent civilians who will absorb the brunt of Putin’s ego trip. My heart is with the Ukrainian military who will muster their defense against an overwhelming, hostile force. And my prayers this morning are for the leaders of my country that they will find the wisdom to make the right call in response.

My Wife Saves the Day

Here we go…

Russian tanks enter Ukraine on Tuesday, 2/22/22, the very same day that my wife celebrates this numerically significant date by wearing a tutu to school.  

Something tells me I will never forget this day and what I was doing the morning that Vladimir Putin launched his campaign to reintroduce Russian power and control over Eastern Europe. I was worried, concerned about the impact of events on the markets and my clients. I was consumed with reading everything I could find about the situation on the ground in Donetsk. I was checking out the overnight numbers from Hong Kong and Japan, the early morning movement in London and Paris. Then, Pam came down the stairs…

Ladies and gentlemen, there are times in this life when the day is saved by the serendipitous. One of the founding pastors of my church, Pete Bowell likes to say, “You go nowhere by accident.” Well, this morning it was no accident that my wife came downstairs looking for all the world like a blond sunflower. I went from existential angst to whimsical delight in an instant. A verse I just read from Psalm 30 came to mind—Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes in the morning. Then, from this morning’s reading in Ecclesiastes, “There is nothing new under the sun…”

There have been Vladimir Putins in the world since the dawn of time. Naked power grabs by the strong against the weak are practically a proverb. This too shall pass and when it does, the lasting memory I will take from it will not be of a Russian tank silhouetted in the predawn mist, but of my amazing wife creating for her students a very special day.

Who Won?

What follows is from a text conversation I had with my daughter yesterday. I was attempting to explain to this child why all of her many wonderful traits were bequeathed to her by my superior genes. She countered with the assertion that many of her best qualities probably came from her mother. As an example she brought up…poise.

Who won this argument?

A Very Jon Thing

The women in my family have a Marco Polo account that the men are prohibited from participating in—a blessing of incalculable worth. Everyone knows that the quickest way to ruin any social media tool is to open it up to men. Anyway, Pam let me watch my daughter’s most recent contribution this morning in which she told the following harrowing tale.

At two o’clock in the morning, Jon and Kaitlin were awakened by the shrill piercing sound of sirens, several of them coming from somewhere very close. Soon the house was flooded with blue flashing lights. They both stumbled out of bed only to discover that their culdesac was full of police cruisers and their own driveway was blocked by a strange Jeep. Jon opened the front door and walked out onto his front porch. It was then that he noticed one of the police officers approaching the Jeep with his weapon extended! Suddenly my daughter’s peaceful culdesac looked like a scene from Criminal Minds.

For the next two hours the drama continued to unfold. A canine unit arrived unleashing bloodhounds into their backyard! Apparently, there had been a pursuit of the Jeep-driving suspect which had ended with the driver stopping directly in front of Kaitlin and Jon’s house, after which the suspect fled the scene and according to the neighbors security camera, made his escape through their backyard, jumping the fence twice and disappearing into the thick woods. The police were never able to find him, soon after jumping their fence, the trail went cold rather quickly, suggesting that he may have been picked up by an accomplice.

But as crazy as this story is, this isn’t the purpose of this particular blog post. No, the best part of the story was a small detail that Kaitlin shared that actually made me smile. During the midst of the drama playing out in his yard, my son in law did something so typical of him, so uniquely a Jon thing, that I have to share it. With police officers crawling all over the place outside, Jon quietly made his way back into the kitchen. There he prepared a tray of freshly brewed coffee with containers of sugar and several flavors of creamer, walked outside and presented the tray to the grateful police officers at 3 am in the morning, in the middle of an active investigation. Who in the world does that? My son in law, that’s who. This dude can always be counted on to disappear in the middle of a crisis and reappear with help in his hands. I could tell you one story after another of times where something like this has happened. He has a knack for it, a natural proclivity for thoughtfulness. We have a word for it in my family…clutch. 

Ladies and gentlemen, Jon Manchester is clutch.

Sometimes You Need a Little King James

So, the other day I finally made it to the book of Psalms. On that same day I had an appointment with a client down in Charles City, so I was in for a 55 minute drive down and another 55 minutes back, an excellent opportunity to use the audio book feature and knock out a couple days worth of reading. As soon as I got on 295 I hit play and the voice of a 20-something guy began reading Psalm 1 to me from the quite enjoyable translation called The Message…

“How well God must like you. You don’t walk in the ruts of those blind-as-bats, you don’t stand with the good-for-nothings, you don’t take your seat among the know-it-alls…”

Ok, here’s the thing—I like The Message. It has been an enjoyable read. It’s modern, conversational and easier to understand. But, something about this passage clicked something in me that said, “wait, wait…what?” There are some parts of the Bible that don’t sound right to me unless they are in the old King James Version. The reason is simple, it was the translation of my youth, the version of the Bible from which I memorized scripture as a child. Consequently, when I come to familiar passages like the one in Psalm 1 anything else sounds weird and not altogether right. So..because I’m a weird dude…I pulled over to the side of a busy highway so I could change the translation to the King James Version for the rest of my trip. When I hit the play button I was blown away. Instead of the nice kid who had been reading the message in his freckle-faced monotone, I was greeted by the deep baritone of some Shakespearean actor with a rich and majestic British accent…

“Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, Nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.”

A big smile appeared on my face as I thought, “Now that’s what I’m talking about!”

For the rest of my trip I was treated to all the elegant words I’ve been missing, spoken to me by a guy who sounds like he might be God himself! 

“For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous: But the way of the ungodly shall perish.”

You bet it will! And hearing this guy tell me, I have no choice but to believe it!

“Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?”

Why indeed??!!

Look, as soon as I get through Psalms, and thanks to that road trip I almost am, I will go back to The Message. It has been a pleasure reading it so far. But, sometimes man…you just need yourself some King Jimmy, baby.