I love Sea World. It's a happy place for me. I love going. I figured that I have had a season ticket every year since 2002. I like the walk, the smell of fish, the scenery, the families, the happiness of it all. I like that the girls love to go and don't get tired of going.
I love seeing the animals. I love watching my kids watch the shows and animals with excitement and amazement on their faces. I love that we get to talk about the awesomeness of God when we see these magnificent sea creatures. I love hearing people around me gasp with awe when they see Shamu, the beluga whale, the dolphins, the otter, the walrus, or the acrobats for the first time. It makes me smile to hear them, to hear the excitement in their voices and know they love being there too.
I cry at the Shamu show every time. I tear up when they have past and present military stand up to be applauded. I love having the opportunity to explain why they are standing and why we are clapping. I cry when they talk about living out your dreams. And I know that I am living out mine when I look at Justin and our precious children.
Can you see the whale on his shirt?
We went with Andrea, Mikayla and Ethan for the first half of the day. They had to leave early and we stayed for three more hours. The girls did SO good with it just being me and them. I am so proud of Jones, Georgia and Annie! West too, but he's not Sea World mobile yet. There was a trick or treating area and pumpkins everywhere. West grabbed some cotton candy. He liked it! Of course, so did everyone else, it was a fun treat.
I've been working quite and I've written a lot (with pen and paper) on trains and in hotels, but haven't had time to put them on the blog. I'll try to do better.
What is my culture? It don’t think it’s easy to define, but I know what it is when I’m in it
On a return trip from spending a week in Canada, we stopped in Oklahoma. As I walked into the store, I saw a good ol’ boy wearing a faded NASCAR t-shirt getting out of a beat up pick-up. Now I’m not a racing fan, but seeing that guy made me realize that I was getting close to home. Back to where I felt comfortable.
I remember being at Heidelberg castle in Germany and hearing a group of women speaking to each other in English, but it wasn’t just English I was hearing, it was Texican. I approached them and asked where they were from, and it turned out that they were from Lubbock, the same place I was living at the time.
Is a Texas drawl part of my culture? I’d say yes, but I’d also say that the Spanish language is part of my culture. I’m nowhere close to being fluent, but upon each of my return trips from Europe, I remember how comforting it was to hear Spanish spoken.
However, even within Texas there are cultural divides. Austin is weird, East Texas is hillbilly, West Texas is tough, Dallas is big city, San Antonio is Mexico, and El Paso is still as rough and violent as it was that night long ago when Marty Robbins saw the “blacker than night eyes of Felina”.
Waco claims to be the Heart of Texas, and it is, demographically. Brady also claims to be the Heart of Texas, and it is, geographically.
The slogan for Amarillo’s convention and visitor’s bureau is “Step into the Real Texas.” What do they mean by that? There are no native blue bonnets and no native pecan trees. It is 10 hours away from the Alamo, and its Palo Duro canyon was still unknown to gringos when Texas was an independent Republic. Do they really mean that the Texas that existed all of those years prior to Amarillo’s incorporation was an imposter?
I remember Social Studies lessons from elementary school about different Native American cultures. We were taught that the plains Indians were excellent horsemen, living in teepees as they followed the buffalo. We were taught that they used arrowheads made of flint to kill the animals and knives made of flint or obsidian to skin and butcher them, and that the coming of the white man destroyed the Native Americans and their culture.
What we were not taught was that tribes like the Cheyenne and Comanche had no horses before the Spaniards brought them, and by the time they evolved into a horse culture they also had iron and steel from Europeans and used that for their arrowheads and knives. The truth is that there were no Plains Indians, and therefore no Plains Indian culture until the Europeans came and gave them the horse and steel that made a plains culture possible.
Did you know that in the early part of the 19th century, after fighting two wars to separate from Britain politically, Americans sought ways to separate themselves culturally as well? One of the ways they did so was to change the spelling of some words with Dan Webster leading the way with his dictionary in 1828. That’s why we have color and shop, and they have colour and shoppe.
Did you know that we “arrogant” Americans were not alone in this strategy? When Mexico gained independence from Spain, its leaders reached back to medieval Spanish and threw out the j’s and put in x’s so we ended up with Mexico and Bexar instead of Mejico and Bejar.
There is more to come, but I'll end here for tonight.
I’ve been thinking a lot about culture. And most of the ideas I’ve had for posts lately have centered on culture. What it is, where it is, the effects it has on us and how we can affect the culture around us.
This line of thought began last month when I read a couple of Francine Rivers novellas. One was based on the life of Aaron, the brother of Moses, and the other based on the life of Caleb who was one of only two Israelites who came out of Egypt as an adult and lived to see the Promised Land. When we think of the Exodus, we generally think of the escape from Egyptian bondage, but these books reminded me that the Hebrews were not only slaves to Pharaoh, but also to the culture of Egypt. It only took a few chapters of Exodus for the Lord to deliver them from the land of Egypt, but forty years of desert wandering to deliver them from bondage to the culture of Egypt and transform them into the nation of Israel with its own distinct culture.
The Bible shows us that they continued to struggle with their cultural identity through the centuries as they entered the Canaan Land, when they demanded a king so they could be like the nations around them(1 Sam 8:5), when they were taken into Babylonian captivity, and on into New Testament times when Rome and its Hellenistic culture ruled the world. Paul and Peter continued to address the issue as the Christian church took root, dealing with cultural issues in all of their epistles.
I think I’ll try to do a series of posts on the topic of culture and what I think about it, so stay tuned. In keeping with this subject matter, this week’s song is the Hag’s anthem from the culture war years of the late 60’s.
Disclaimer: I am not from Oklahoma, I’m a native Texican, and I usually speak of Okies in a derogatory manner, but I like this song.
Jazbo and Mimi came to visit on the 9th. Mimi kept the girls while I went to Ladies Day. They had a day filled with activities and projects. They made a Happy Birthday video for Granola, made caramel apples, a sticker project, went to the lake and met Justin and Jazbo for lunch. That afternoon, Mimi and Jazbo kept West, Annie and Georgia. Jones went to a birthday party and I went to a toe painting party. That evening, some rode bikes and some walked around the blocks and to the park.
On the 11th, Justin and I had our first parent/teacher conference with Jonesy's teacher and received her first report card. She did great! All A's and E's! Georgia has chosen a treasure out of treasure box every time these past two weeks. Annie has not had any potty accidents and is riding her scooter. West has discovered his toes, that he can sit at the big table for Bible class, and that he likes rice cereal.
Granola and Papa came to visit on the 16th. We had an afternoon of bike riding. Then we had an enchilada dinner and a German Chocolate birthday cake. We went to church and then to Backyard BBQ for lunch before they headed back to Amarillo.(All the pictures are on Granola's camera. I'll post some at a later time.)
I have several posts in the works, but my computer time has been limited lately. I hope you'll be contented with this week's song.
Dedicated to my brother-in-law and all of those miner guys in Chile, it's "Big Bad John" by that late great sausage maker from Plainview, Jimmy Dean.
Here is what has been happening in the Brown house.
Jones: *has been doing any job to earn money for her part in a new bicycle *can ride her (too small) bicycle without training wheels *has a third tooth loose *still enjoys school *earned the Spotlight on Learners spot for the next couple of weeks *enjoys daddy or mommy taking her to eat breakfast at school *only wears one or two headbands now :(
Georgia: *can ride her bike *bought roller skates at a garage sale and can stay up on them *has been to the treasure box four times!(out of six) *is a fantastic dishwasher *loves holding West and making him laugh *can get dressed from head to toe all by herself. Bows and headbands included.
Annie: *has a blonde streak in her *makes us laugh constantly *wears her clothes backwards and her shoes on the wrong feet *can almost do the monkey bars by herself (you can check out her video on FB) *can fold the towels and wash cloths *puts away her panties, socks and pants *can still throw a 2yr old fit :)
West: *he and I have been struggling with thrush for the past seven weeks *rolls over both ways *reaches for your hands or objects *has slept through the night since he was 8weeks *gets upset if you walk past him and don't talk to him *likes baths and story time *4 months=12lbs 13oz, 24 1/2 in long *the headbands have made their way to West. It took four months.
Annie took the pictures of me and West.
Gentian Violet is messy. I (sorta) french braided my hair myself.
