32 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 10-11-17”

  4. Good morning. Not truly sure about that, but trying to stay positive in the face of so much gone wrong in this fallen world.

    I attended the Decatur City School Board meeting last night. At least I attended part of it. The first part was a workshop where a transgender person spoke and then a professor from Georgia State University spoke. The transgender, male turned female, was the first ordained pastor who remained ordained after becoming female. He /She was reported on in Newsweek. The Presbyterian church they are in is right down the street from the Methodist church where Wesley became an Eagle Scout. It sounded like the transgender is still married to his wife who He/She loves and has children with (but I am not sure about the still married as that was not addressed specifically). He does programs all around the nation on such issues. With the pastor background, He/She was quite personable and engaging as a speaker. The professor was very authoritative and spoke rapidly with facts and figures. It seems the approach is to say that without allowing access to the bathroom and locker rooms of choice that more transgender students will be committing suicide.

    After the workshop segment we went upstairs for the board meeting in a standing room only room. Reports were given by two teams from schools. The first was a team of third grade teachers who had gone to Equador to plan for teaching this year. They studied a group of people who have a thriving native textile crafts business so they could teach economics in a more interesting way to the third graders. The second group to present was a team of middle school students who worked as mentors with younger students in doing caring projects of volunteer work in the community. They were especially cute when talking about teaching the younger students important skills such as taking.

    Next the board said 40 people had signed up to talk so only three minutes per person was allotted for people to present concerns to the board. The first few issues were addressing seemingly unfair treatment of black students. One man spoke of how long this had been a problem and how it seemed such focus was being placed on the transgender issue, that he did not want to see the original problem to be continued to be neglected or for the two issues to somehow be combined under civil rights. A NAACP person spoke. An older man spoke about the signage not being changed in a timely manner regarding events so it made a top notch school system look stupid. And the flag was left at half mast when it should have been matching the flag at the post office across the street.

    Then the speakers got to addressing the main topic. One last spoke of her preschool child who got to wear his red velvet dress to his class and his teacher read a book about such things to the class. She thought that was wonderful. Then a guidance counselor spoke who is gay and related some anonymous opinions from the trans students he counsels. Then the president of the PTA spoke in favor of the transgender population.

    I had been standing all the time for this second meeting and was feeling ill. I then left and went to the bathroom. I went in the handicap stall (appropriate for how I felt). I could tell I was on the verge of fainting. At least it was a very clean bathroom. I got down on the floor so I would not fall. I rested until the feeling past, and then I drove home. So, was I sick from standing in an overly warm room, or was it from what all I heard? I hope to get an update so I can her what the other side was finally allowed to say. Unless by the time it was their turn they had gotten sick and left.

    Maybe I gave TMI, too much information. But that is a view of my part of the world for wandering wonderers.

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  7. It sounded like the guy was indicating it involved the punishment received for misbehavior and possibly in grading. The terminology he used was not what I am familiar with so I did not get the full gist. This is a rather wealthy area and it was a majority of white folks in the room. Our county is majority black, but there are affluent sections that are still majority white. Early on I considered sending Wesley to Decatur City schools because they had top scores in the state. We would have paid tuition to get him into those schools because our local neighborhood school is a county school.Another person from my church back then paid tuition for her son to attend Decatur City schools. I recall her talking about the housing project kids mixed in with the others. You know that is a difficult mix of black housing project children with white affluent children. That mom eventually homeschooled like I was doing.

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  9. It is indeed morning…that is for certain….the sun is shining and the snow is slowly melting around here…the air is frigid albeit fresh!
    Continued prayers for Michelle and her precious family. Late last evening she said today they would take the adorables for a walk along the beach today…breathe in the fresh salt air dear Michelle and know you are loved ❤️

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  10. Our hearts certainly can grow faint at the rapidness our nation is accepting evil. 😦 I guess that is why God’s word tells us over and over to not grow weary etc.

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  11. Janice, if you were standing all that time, you were likely near fainting, as the blood gradually pooled in your legs. The hot, crowded room would have only made things worse. The only time I ever fainted, the feeling of nausea just before I fainted was intense.

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  12. Thanks, Roscuro. I am a fainter so I know what you mean about the nausea. I did not have that last night, but I did have a big sweat. A former pastor’s wife who is a nurse told me I have an over active vagus nerve. Now I find that I sometimes pass out from vomiting which can be quite dangerous. For that reason I try very hard never to have to vomit.

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  13. Janice, profuse sweating is also a sign of being about to faint. The vagus nerve enervates not only your stomach and lower digestive system, but also your heart. One of the first lessons we learned in my first nursing program was that stimulation of the vagus nerve from something like constipation or vomiting could cause a person’s heart rate to slow down, making them faint.

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  14. Good Wednesday to you all.

    No fire updates from Michelle that I saw this morning, only this that she posted about 20 minutes ago:

    “Well great. Finally took a shower and looked inside backpack I stuffed with clothes at 2 am in the dark without electricity. Let’s just say the choice is between the gym or speaking at Wheaton next week . . .”

    Wonder when they’ll know about their house, could be a while. 😦

    Janice, I cover so many of those kinds of meetings that I marvel at people who go to them when they don’t *have* to. 🙂 LA City Council, which I don’t cover regularly but sometimes need to listen in via phone or video for particular items, either being heard in the full council or in committee, is particularly annoying for the weird public speakers that show up.

    And the council makes no attempt to shut down foul language, so some speakers are throwing the ‘F’ word around constantly (one regular speaks in a falsetto, may be wearing a costume, too, I’ve only heard audio for that person but they seem to be at every meeting I have to listen to).

    The culture seems to be collapsing. Every so often the though runs through my head about what my mom (gone 25 years now) or (gasp) my grandfather, who was so dignified, would ever make of any of this public behavior that is now so commonplace. 😦

    On Sunday when I was leaving the dog park, I heard some shouting and saw that a woman I know on the small-dog side (the park is divided) was being yelled at by a couple guys (some of what they said was in Spanish, but then they transitioned to English and I heard her called a “b” and then, of course, the ubiquitous “f” bomb over and over again sprinkled in their comments.

    I stood there for a while until they got in their car (so I knew it was over and she was ok), but I just shook my head at how horribly crass our common (and accepted) cultural mores have become. When did it become OK to yell the ‘f” word at people, especially at a woman who was older than these guys were?

    It really is all quite sad.

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  16. Very scary:

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2017/10/10/pure-devastation-at-least-15-dead-as-firefighters-struggle-to-weaken-california-fires/

    (posted under an hour ago by the WaPo)
    ____________________________________

    SANTA ROSA, Calif. — A series of historically deadly Northern California wildfires regained momentum Wednesday as winds whipped back up, pushing blazes through parched hills and vineyards and prompting more evacuations from an arc of flames that has killed at least 17 people, destroyed more than 2,000 buildings and battered the region’s renowned wine-growing industry.

    Fires advanced overnight toward populated areas in flame-battered Sonoma County, prompting officials to order a fresh round of mandatory evacuations — some of which were announced by deputies “running toward the fire, banging on doors, getting people out of their houses,” said Misti Harris, a Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman.

    “It’s rapidly changing, it’s moving quickly, it’s a very fluid situation. The fire is growing,” she said. …
    ________________________________________

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  17. We folded. I suspect daughter has gone as far forward as she can educationally. We have her sitting down watching a little child movie. She is happy. We are happy.

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  22. Being in the Healthcare field, we have regular training activities. A lot of it is online. We recently had one on gender orientation. According to them, your gender is whatever you say it is. Sex is determined by organs. Our electronic medical record program will update at the end of the month. There will be a new section on gender , etc. It includes an organ inventory. Who, in their wildest dreams, would have ever thought we would have to do “organ inventories ” to determine if you are male or female. How far we have fallen.

    As a side note, I have encountered “trans” people in the work setting. I managed to treat them with respect and politeness, even without their training. How can you ever share Christ with them if you don’t?

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  23. Here is a link to the actual board meeting comments. The first comments are one side and then you will hear from a black pastor whom I have met and then from two black parents who speak from the opposing viewpoint. I believe I was on a prayer call with the black mom.

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  24. RKessler,I’ve had similar training, but I haven’t heard any talk of organ inventories. The one teacher who spoke more extensively on the issue did say that if a trans man still had ovaries and uterus, or vice versa, then it was important for us to remember that in treatment, since those organs would still have an effect on their health. Health histories are always important when doing nursing care. I haven’t encountered a trans patient yet, though I’m sure I will eventually, but I intend to treat them as human beings worthy of dignified care when I do encounter them.

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  25. The link to the comments above just covers a portion that I did not get to stay for. I think it pretty clearly shows both sides concerns. I was very happy to get to hear some of what I missed.

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  26. It did not work. Halfway through the second movie, she said it was stupid and she was not going to watch any more. Then she carried on for a while. Quite a while. It has been eye opening for husband who is usually gone for most of her antics.

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  30. Daughter has spent the past forty five minutes singing very loudly that she wants to be famous. Now she is singing the ABC’s. She is in her room so it is better than being in the same room with her doing that.

    I don’t know, Janice, I used to think it was but it seems to be ongoing now. A friend in town has worked with several mentally ill people over the years and says a lot of it is familiar to her.

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  31. I’ve been wondering about Kizzie today, too — a good prompt to pray.

    Glad you’re alright where you are, Jo. I’ve been thinking of all of our California regulars here on the blog. Today Ree also came to mind. Am I recalling correctly that she’s in NorCal, also? Anyone hear from her regularly outside this blog?

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