Watching "Chariots of Fire" on New Years Day

Yesterday was a great beginning to 2026.  It was a cold day, so we weren't interested in some of the outdoors things we might have done on a milder day.  My parents had been planning to watch Chariots of Fire, and I like that movie, so we decided to have a movie day.

We've all seen the movie before, and we were all surprised by how much we've forgotten.  I thought I had seen it in the years since it came out, and I saw it in the movie theatre.  But now I wonder.

I did remember the main characters, of course.  But I had forgotten how principled both men are.  Eric Liddle stands out, of course--his decision not to run on a Sunday, even though it means he won't actually get to participate in the Olympics, is the part of the movie that many people remember.  The other main character is also making a principled stand by working with a coach to get even faster, even though he's already one of the fastest students ever.

I had forgotten how wonderful the other aspects of the movie are.  What amazing costumes!  What wonderful settings!  And that soundtrack--I hadn't forgotten how wonderful the soundtrack is.

As always, the movie made me think about trying to run again.  Or maybe it's just the soundtrack that has that effect on me.  The running I want to do is not the 100 or 400 yard sprint.  I want long, rambling runs, and I've always run at a very slow pace.

For now, I just need to get back to walking, which I will do, once we get back to more of a semblance of regular life.  My arm is healing nicely from the melanoma surgery, so I can soon return to some weight/strength work.  Let me use the movie as inspiration for 2026, as I look for ways to regain good health.  I'm not far off from good health now, but I am carrying some extra weight--probably another pound or two since early December, but what a wonderful holiday we've had!

Intentions for 2026

Here we are, the first morning of 2026.  We did not stay up until midnight, but we did have champagne after watching my dad's alma mater, the University of Michigan, lose to some school in Texas.  We did some coloring on coloring sheets we made ourselves.  We did not talk about resolutions.

This morning is the time for me to set intentions.  I have four.  Careful readers of this blog might say, "Didn't you have three intentions that you couldn't keep for 2025?"  

I appreciate the power of New Year's Day intentions that tug at me all year long, even if I'm not entirely successful.  This year, I'll have 2 writing intentions and 2 health intentions.  

Writing Intentions

--I'm going to keep one of my intentions from 2025.  Here's what I wrote last year:  "I am not feeling OK about how many poems I am not writing. I do a good job of writing down fragments and inspirations, but I'm also aware that I have fewer inspirations and fragments in the past year or two than has been usual. I want to end the year with 52 poems written, finished poems. They may not be worth sending out, but they need to be finished. Fifty-two poems gives me space to catch up, and space to have a white hot streak that sets me ahead."

--Always hopeful about having a book of poems with a spine, I also plan to create a new collection of poems, with the title Higher Ground.

Health Intentions

--I can no longer find the article that recommended taking a walk after dinner, even a short walk.  I wanted to doublecheck the benefits that the article discussed, but no matter.  For four or more days a week, I want to take a walk after dinner, in addition to the other exercise I get through the day.  It can be a very short walk (the article talked about how the benefit was in the going out and doing it, not in the distance covered)--the goal is to get out of the house and get moving before settling into a chair for the evening.

--I thought about having 2026 be the year I gave up alcohol altogether.  But I realize this about myself:  if I tell myself I can never have something ever again, I often end up consuming more of it.  So, in 2026, I want to have 300 days of no alcohol consumption.  That gives me 65 days where I could drink.  And to be sure that those days aren't days of excess consumption to make the most of them, which often happens when I give myself a splurge day of any kind, I'm going to say that if I limit myself to one drink, that day counts as a half day, not a full day.

So, let's see how I do.  I'm excited about these intentions.

A Look Back: 2025

I've been thinking about my approach to the new year; I have been keeping a blog since 2008, so I also have a fairly easy way to see what I do each year.  Some years, I set intentions or adopt resolutions.  Some years I have a word/phrase.  Most years in the waning days of December, I look back.  So, for today's blog post, let's look back.

My Intentions for 2025

On January 1, 2025, I wrote a blog post where I had three specific intentions for 2025.  Up until the moment that I wrote that post, I had no plans to adopt these intentions.  Let's start with these intentions, as I look back on 2025:

--"I want to do strength training 20 days out of every month, 10 minutes over an exercise session."  Most weeks, I did a day or two of strength training, either with weights, or with the weigh of my body.  That means that most months, I did 6 days of strength training, not 20.  

--"I want to end the year with 52 poems written, finished poems. They may not be worth sending out, but they need to be finished."  I did much better with this goal during the first three months of 2025.  I did end up with somewhere between 15 and 25 finished poems, which is more than I would have had without that intention.

For both of the above intentions, the good thing about those intentions is that I remembered that I had the intention, and throughout the year, the intention called me back, tugged me back to the behavior I wanted to cultivate.

--"I want to concentrate on faces (both from the front and profile) and hands, and not in isolation, but as part of the figures that I draw."  Here, too, I did much better with this intention in the first months of the year than in the last 9 months of the year.  I drew much better faces, when I was concentrating.  I still have trouble drawing hands if they're connected to the rest of the body.

Other Aspects of 2025

--I continue to enjoy teaching.  It was great to teach literature survey classes again.  I revisited some classic texts, which is always interesting, especially as I revisit them at very different times of my life.

--I finished my MDiv degree at Wesley Theological Seminary.  I find it interesting that when I thought about the high points of 2025, the teaching was what came to mind before finishing the MDiv degree.  I'm not reading too much into that.  I finished the MDiv in May and my brain tends to work back in chronology--so since I've been teaching more recently than finishing the MDiv, that's what came to mind first.  It's also because I had such a good fall semester teaching such great students and classes.

--When I went back and counted my non-drinking days, I've been very successful.  I still drink, but I did have a long stretch in the summer where I drank no alcohol.  Stay tuned for my 2026 intention in terms of health.

--I haven't read as many books this year (only 50, if my list can be believed), but at the end of the year, I've been on a reading binge, and I'm always happy to find my powers of concentration still allow me to read a book from beginning to end.

--I finished a quilt top, which I used with an old quilt that I created twenty years ago to create something new.  The old quilt had a back that was in good shape, so I quilted the new top to the old quilt and created a binding/border.  I've continued to put fabric together in ways that delight me.

--My job as a Synod Appointed Minister continues at Faith Lutheran in Bristol, Tennessee.  They like me, and I like them, and although they've tried to find a full-time pastor, those attempts haven't led them to a viable candidate.  Periodically, I remind us all that if the congregation finds a great candidate and decides to offer them a job, I'll understand.  Similarly, we don't know what my Candidacy Committee will decide at various stages.

--In terms of candidacy, I have made some progress on the road to ordination.  I finished my MDiv which some people might think would mean I should be ordained by now.  But I went to a Methodist seminary, so that's not the way that ordination works at this point in the ELCA, the more progressive expression of Lutheran churches in the US.  Over the summer, I did the required CPE training at the Asheville VA Hospital, but I have had to wait until Spring 2026 semester to take the Lutheran Foundations course that I need.  Will I need more classes?  Will I also have to do an internship?  Stay tuned.

Going to a Magic Show

Last night, we did something completely different:  several generations of family went to a live magic show, at the Wagsters Magic Theatre in Williamsburg, VA.   It was more a Vegas style show than a birthday party magician kind of show.  But it's a much smaller space, with 126 seats, than most spaces in Vegas (I assume, having never researched the size of theatres in Vegas).

It was a sold out show, and the audience was more engaged than almost any audience I've seen, outside of my congregation where I'm the minister.  We may have been the only audience members who came without small children (the youngest members of our group are 18 years old).  Every child in my vicinity (I had a seat in the middle of the back row) leaned forward, had gasps of surprise and delight, and the one in front of us said "Wow" every so often.

It was great to be in a room of people who put their phones away and watched the stage.  Because of the small size of the theatre, though, it felt much more interactive--as the performing duo, Brandon and Hannah Wagster prepped the audience to be at the start of the show.

The energy level of the duo and their attention to detail kept me awake, which is saying something these days.  My spouse has studied/watched magic shows for many more years than I have, and he was impressed by their skill in illusion.  It was a great way to spend an evening--much easier than trying to find a movie we would all enjoy.  And it was wonderful to support local, live performances.

The theatre is part of a newer shopping development, an outparcel of shops and restaurants.    My spouse and I have done theatre work in college, both onstage and as part of tech crews, and we were impressed by the lights and the sound, by the way they took a retail space and transformed it into a small theatre.

For a brief moment, I felt overwhelmed by nostalgia and grief, thinking of the small, local theatres in south Florida that have all gone away as their founders moved out of the area or real estate developers swooped in.  I saw some of the best performances of plays I ever expect to see at the small Sol Theatre in Ft. Lauderdale.  It seated about 60, and last night's venue felt similar.  

Happily, the show started, and my nostalgia melted away into gratitude that people are still following their performing arts dreams--and that audiences are still willing to seek out this more specialized kind of live performance.

Reading in the Waning Days of 2025

It's been a great month for reading--less so for writing, but I'll get back to a more regular writing schedule in January.  I've found myself wishing I could go back and repeat some of the reading, most particularly Ian McEwan's What We Can Know.  

Would I wish that I could reread it if I hadn't heard this New York Times Book Club podcast about the book?  Probably.  I knew at the time I was reading it that I would want to reread it.  I zoomed through it the first time just to find out what happened, and I knew I would want an additional read to appreciate some of the other aspects of the novel, outside of the propulsive plot.

My last read of 2025 will be Kristin Hannah's The Women, which I found in the community library where my folks live and where I'm visiting.  I had heard such good things about it, and it, too, is a propulsive novel.  But I can't see myself reading it again, once I'm done.  It made me think about the TV shows M*A*S*H and China Beach.  I've only read 100 pages, so I'm interested if Hannah goes in any unexpected directions or adds some depth to the characters.  So far, there's lots of exploring of the place of Vietnam and the surgical procedures that nurses did under intense pressure during the Vietnam war.

My mom and I spent some time in the community library in the afternoon.  She is always on the hunt for good books, and I had this momentary hope that we might find the McEwan book.  After all, the Hannah book is recent--but it's one of the few in the library published in this century.  We found a John Jakes novel, Charleston, along with another book. 

As I have been doing more intense reading in December, I've remembered my own writing impulses, particularly the novels I thought I would write.  I've been thinking about my writing goals for 2026.  I'm not sure I want to commit to writing a novel in 2026, but I'm not sure I don't.  Let me continue to think:  if I was writing a novel that wasn't going to be intertwined stories, what would the plot be?

Slaughter of Innocents and Non-Compliance with Tyrants

Today is one of those church commemoration days that doesn't get observed in a big way, at least not often.  December 28 is the day when we remember the Holy Innocents, those babies under the age of 2 who lived in Bethlehem, the babies that Herod killed when the wise sages from the east brought news of the arrival of a new ruler, heralded by a new star.  

Some might see it as a strange day in the midst of the Christmas season. Others might see modern corollaries, scared despots who will do anything to maintain their stranglehold on power.  Sadly, we have no shortage of twenty-first century rulers who would slaughter the innocent in their quest to maintain power or gain more.

This morning I'm thinking about the wise sages who inadvertently created this crisis, by visiting Herod and telling him what they saw in the sky.  Herod asks that they come back so that he, too, can go and pay homage.  They are warned in a dream not to go back to Herod.  They return home a different way.  Here's a carving in a European cathedral (Autun Cathedral in France) that depicts the moment of warning:

This morning I am thinking of all the ways that ordinary people can disrupt evil.  There are all sorts of ways of non-compliance.

This train of thought leads me back to a poem I wrote in 2019, a poem with multiple strands: Epiphany, the ongoing debates/actions concerning immigration, the crisis between east and west that ultimately led to the taking down of the wall between East and West Germany, a bit of the underground railroad. Ultimately, this poem arrived, and Sojourners published it in late 2019 or 2020. It fits my mood for today.


Border Lands


I am the border agent who looks
the other way. I am the one
who leaves bottled water in caches
in the harsh border lands I patrol.

I am the one who doesn’t shoot.
I let the people assemble,
with their flickering candles a shimmering
river in the dark. “Let them pray,”
I tell my comrades. “What harm
can come of that?” We holster
our guns, and open a bottle to share.

I am the superior
officer who loses the paperwork
or makes up the statistics.
I am the one who ignores
your e-mails, who cannot be reached
by text or phone, the one
with a full inbox.

When the wise ones
come, as they do, full of dreams,
babbling about the stars
that lead them or messages
from gods or angels,
I open the gates. I don’t alert
the authorities up the road.
Let the kings and emperors
pay for their own intelligence.

I should scan the horizons,
but I tend the garden
I have planted by the shed
where we keep the extra
barbed wires. I grow a variety
of holy trinities: tomatoes, onions,
peppers, beans, squashes of all sorts.
I plant a hedge of sunflowers,
each bright head a north star.

Melanoma Removal Report

I am happy to report that my melanoma removal seems to have gone well.  In fact, in some ways, it couldn't have been much better, if one must have a melanoma that has to be removed by surgery in a hospital.

My melanoma was shallow (.3 mm) but wide, so it couldn't be removed in the office--the amount of anesthetic in an in-office procedure would be toxic.  So off we went to the hospital yesterday morning for our 5:30 a.m. check in.

The check in went quickly, and by check in, I mean the getting ready for surgery, all the stuff that happens before the actual surgery.  There were lots of health questions and meeting the various people who would be part of the surgery.  There was the hooking up of various machines to my body.  It all went fairly quickly, and I had an hour to sit and wait.

I was impressed by all the people who seemed both professional and kind.  I was struck by how many people it takes to do a surgery that's not very complicated.  I was also struck by how many items were thrown away after the surgery.  In a way, of course that's good in terms of so much less possibility for disease.  But wow, this removal cost a lot of money.

It also cost a lot of literal money.  It may end up being more covered by insurance than it seems to be right now.  The cost was just under $7,000, but I paid in advance for a 20% discount.  In the past, when we've had procedures done at the hospital, like my colonoscopy, and then got all the money refunded (I assume when the insurance paid).

When I got the phone call about the cost, I was flabbergasted a bit--the cost was more than the $1700 colonoscopy cost.  The hospital employee on the phone said that it might be priced differently because the colonoscopy was diagnostic, not taking care of a health problem.  It was not the first time that I said out loud, "Our health care system is so broken."

I came home and wrote to everyone who was waiting for an update.  I drank some coffee so that I didn't get a caffeine withdrawal headache, ate some pumpkin roll, and then I decided it was time for a nap.  I slept for several hours, the deep sleep that I rarely get these days.

I woke up and had several bowls of cauliflower cheese soup that I made on Christmas Day.  We watched Shark Tank and a few episodes of NYPD Blue.  I sewed a bit, but a very little bit.  The day had taken it out of me.

But I was relieved overall.  For a procedure which felt a bit more major for being done in a hospital, I was relieved that all went well.