I am starting to realize, from the datelines on my previous posts, that Friday must be "blog day." Friday, for me, is the day when I splurge just a little to celebrate the upcoming Sabbath. It is a day of anticipation, and for some reason it is a day where the creativity and introspective tendencies flow well. On Friday mornings, I make sure to leave the house a little early and take the R train all the way in to the City Hall stop. I then head over to my newly-discovered "hipster" coffee shop on Chambers Street. Now I certainly don't object to cheap bodega coffee, but sometimes a expat Northwesterner needs to step up the coffee pursuit just a notch, and Starbucks is a pretty poor option. So you can imagine how delighted I was to find a little slice of Portland in Tribeca, right on my way to work. This shop has pretty good coffee, excellent bagels, pleasant music, minimalist decor with local art on the walls, and baristas that look like members of The Decemberists. So in other words, it is PDX transplanted into NYC. They have become my Friday ritual for a nice big coffee and a drippy-hot toasted wheat bagel with butter, which I consume with decadent pleasure while hacking out my semi-weekly blog update. So there you have it folks, a behind-the-scenes look at the life of a pop star. I'm sure you were all wondering and discussing various theories as to why the blogs come only on Fridays, and now you know.
In any event, this entry is not only a restaurant review or a day in the life, but it is also an update. Things are moving in many interesting directions for us. Our big announcement is that we are finally going to start doing a "thing," and I use such ambiguous terminology because I have a hard time figuring out exactly what it is. But maybe it's best that we don't obsess over naming things anyway, because once we name something it loses a good portion of its vitality. Anyway, the "thing" in question has a very simple name:
The Tortuga Collective
Ok, so what the heck is a torutga and in what way is it collective? Well, tortuga is Spanish for turtle, but we are not really about turtles, although the collective part is accurate enough. Actually I'd rather wait to go into the name choice in detail and just give a brief overview of what The Tortuga Collective is (at this point in time):
- A group of people who are gathered together with the intention of knowing God better and loving people face to face
- A group of ordinary musicians, artists, and radicals (thanks Shannon!) who want to mutually support and encourage each other
- A group of dreamers and visionaries who recognize that "how it is" is not "how it is supposed to be."
(Please note that these are not carefully thought-out elements of a mission statement or anything of that nature, but rather just random thoughts from the top of my head)
Right now, the Tortuga Collective is going to be four people who live together, have a sort-of order of life based around worship and prayer, and serve together wherever we are called. It is more than that, but for today I just want to give you a taste. We will be meeting over the next few weeks to iron out things like directives and mission statements, and I will be sure to post those things here as soon as they are available. So for now, I will leave you scratching your head and wondering what I'm talking about, but at least you now know what I'm eating and drinking on Friday mornings.
Love,
Brian
Friday, January 11, 2008
Friday, January 4, 2008
Props
http://www.oregonlive.com/O/relationships/index.ssf?/base/living/1194562516122040.xml&coll=7
This is coming very late, but better late than never. Above is a link to a story that appeared a few months ago in the Portland Oregonian about Home PDX, the church that we were a part of before we came to New York. They are our "mother church," to utilize a very tired Christianese term, although we are really more like siblings than children with the church that we helped start. I am putting this link on here because I want people to know about Home, and to see that it is possible to take a very simple point (i.e, loving people face to face) and turn it into a successful, beautiful thing. The heart of Home PDX is identical to the heart of 141-NYC, mainly because we are cut from the same cloth. The challenge for us is to stay faithful to the heart while avoiding the temptation to duplicate the specifics, because those specifics can only exist in their unique context. You cannot put Home PDX in the copy machine and expect it to fly somewhere else. God forbid, because if that were the case, then Home PDX would just be an institution, a system, or an ideology rather than a way of life.
I also want to point out that we just added a new link, for http://www.crossweave.org. This is the website for Crossweave in San Marcos, California, another wonderful group of people who have loved and influenced us greatly.
This is coming very late, but better late than never. Above is a link to a story that appeared a few months ago in the Portland Oregonian about Home PDX, the church that we were a part of before we came to New York. They are our "mother church," to utilize a very tired Christianese term, although we are really more like siblings than children with the church that we helped start. I am putting this link on here because I want people to know about Home, and to see that it is possible to take a very simple point (i.e, loving people face to face) and turn it into a successful, beautiful thing. The heart of Home PDX is identical to the heart of 141-NYC, mainly because we are cut from the same cloth. The challenge for us is to stay faithful to the heart while avoiding the temptation to duplicate the specifics, because those specifics can only exist in their unique context. You cannot put Home PDX in the copy machine and expect it to fly somewhere else. God forbid, because if that were the case, then Home PDX would just be an institution, a system, or an ideology rather than a way of life.
I also want to point out that we just added a new link, for http://www.crossweave.org. This is the website for Crossweave in San Marcos, California, another wonderful group of people who have loved and influenced us greatly.
Friday, December 21, 2007
Celebration of smallness
Today is the last day of work before Christmas for many of us here in the city. It is a cold, windy and grey day, and the streets are hardly buzzing with anticipation as they have been over the past few weeks. Oh, I'm sure the tourists are still in full mob-mode in Midtown and Union Square (where I unfortunately must travel later today to do some last- minute shopping!), but for me, the day represents less of a giddy stepping-off into celebration than a welcome rest from a long and difficult stretch of the journey. A sabbath rest, if you will.
On Sunday night we fly back to San Diego for a week, to stay at my parents' house for Christmas. We are looking forward to spending time with everyone and relaxing. New York must be escaped every now and then so that the sense of wonder remains fresh and constant. Refreshed, we plan to return and move into the next phase of this strange operation called 141-NYC.
What is that phase, you may ask? Well, the primary thing is to move forward into action, but action in a very small and personal sense. We have learned that the city defies any attempt to create static models for minstry, and it resists any attempt to build systems to bring healing. The sheer complexity of masses of human life is one thing; the fact that the city is a beast that is more than the sum of its parts is another. So instead of systems, we look for praxis and learning. We engage, step out into the flow of life and allow it to change us while remaining within our perspective. This is referred to by Miroslav Volf as "double-vision." It involves a willingness to embrace the Other, but without denying our identity (which is of course, defined entirely by the cross).
Practically, this means "getting out there" no matter what the odds or appearances say. After all, there are thousands upon thousands of homeless young people in this city, but I defy anyone to point them out among the crowds. In Portland, we talked about our friends and said that they were invisible to the rest of society, and through love they became visible. When we said "invisible," we were speaking figuratively of course. Squatters and travelers are quite easy to see in Portland. In New York, they are literally and physically invisible. They have to be, because in a city of conspicuous wealth and consumption, symbols of poverty and rejection are not allowed. Or if they are allowed, they are allowed as a token bit of scenery to add to the "urban ambiance" of the city.
So being there, for us, means being aware. It means having clarity of vision (in a very real sense). It means seeing peoples' hearts as we pass by, instead of their outer disguises. I believe that God has been training us to do this for the past five months. He has been teaching us that New York is a city with many layers, and one cannot simply remain on the surface if one wants to truly live here with significance. We have a little bit of money to get started, all that we need right now, because our plan is to ring in the new year in a celebration of smallness. We will be looking for team members, brothers and sisters, fellow travelers who like the idea of starting small and with as little fanfare as possible. We will free the captives, but only one at a time. Sorry if that seems anticlimactic, but like a grey, crappy day right before Christmas, it's perfect for New York.
On Sunday night we fly back to San Diego for a week, to stay at my parents' house for Christmas. We are looking forward to spending time with everyone and relaxing. New York must be escaped every now and then so that the sense of wonder remains fresh and constant. Refreshed, we plan to return and move into the next phase of this strange operation called 141-NYC.
What is that phase, you may ask? Well, the primary thing is to move forward into action, but action in a very small and personal sense. We have learned that the city defies any attempt to create static models for minstry, and it resists any attempt to build systems to bring healing. The sheer complexity of masses of human life is one thing; the fact that the city is a beast that is more than the sum of its parts is another. So instead of systems, we look for praxis and learning. We engage, step out into the flow of life and allow it to change us while remaining within our perspective. This is referred to by Miroslav Volf as "double-vision." It involves a willingness to embrace the Other, but without denying our identity (which is of course, defined entirely by the cross).
Practically, this means "getting out there" no matter what the odds or appearances say. After all, there are thousands upon thousands of homeless young people in this city, but I defy anyone to point them out among the crowds. In Portland, we talked about our friends and said that they were invisible to the rest of society, and through love they became visible. When we said "invisible," we were speaking figuratively of course. Squatters and travelers are quite easy to see in Portland. In New York, they are literally and physically invisible. They have to be, because in a city of conspicuous wealth and consumption, symbols of poverty and rejection are not allowed. Or if they are allowed, they are allowed as a token bit of scenery to add to the "urban ambiance" of the city.
So being there, for us, means being aware. It means having clarity of vision (in a very real sense). It means seeing peoples' hearts as we pass by, instead of their outer disguises. I believe that God has been training us to do this for the past five months. He has been teaching us that New York is a city with many layers, and one cannot simply remain on the surface if one wants to truly live here with significance. We have a little bit of money to get started, all that we need right now, because our plan is to ring in the new year in a celebration of smallness. We will be looking for team members, brothers and sisters, fellow travelers who like the idea of starting small and with as little fanfare as possible. We will free the captives, but only one at a time. Sorry if that seems anticlimactic, but like a grey, crappy day right before Christmas, it's perfect for New York.
Friday, December 7, 2007
Advent
It goes without saying, or even needing to be said, that we have not posted in quite some time. I have been blogging on and off for various sites over the past four years or so, and I can tell you that this is a recurring pattern for me. Great fits of activity, insights and poetry are often followed by long doldrums. It is not for the lack of motivation. I think about blogging almost every day. It may be that, for me, blogging is a less-than-ideal form of communication. My personality is such that I want things to come out polished and well thought out, and blogging is much more conducive to immediacy. Kelly, of course, is much better at blogging, and maintains a fairly frequently updated blog on her Myspace page. Anything that has appeared on this site has come from said page. But since I am the self-appointed keeper of the "organizational" (i.e. 141-NYC, whatever that means on any given day), you can be sure that frequency may be an issue from time to time.
That said, I digress, but not entirely, to my subject. We have been attending a Lutheran church for the past few weeks, and it has been quite a different experience for us. It is not so much new for me as a return to the past, as I grew up in the Lutheran church and attended a Lutheran elementary school. I have found the return somewhat refreshing. For Kelly and Luke it is a new thing altogether. Kelly has found, however, that the more structured, tradition-based and liturgical element has significance to her that she had been missing in the non-denominational settings of our past. One of those elements that seems especially relevant to our situation now is the liturgical calendar.
Following the church calendar helps us to realize that seasons are both appropriate and intentional. There are times for celebration, for mourning, and for waiting. There are times for great bustles and bursts of activity, but there are also times of quiet introspection, and all of these are divinely ordained; or at least, they are ok to practice! So we don't have to feel useless or incompetent because we cannot keep up with the manic pace of modern ministry that demands demonstrable results at all times. I realize this is not a new or revolutionary discovery, that I am in a sense discovering something simple that has been there all along. But like Chesterton said, in trying to be the best heretic I could be I ended up finding I was orthodox all along (or something to that effect).
The current season, Advent, means that now is a time for waiting, watching and preparing. It is a time for reflecting on where we are, and looking to the future. The dark blues of Advent and the candles add to the introspective mood. This mood is only heightened by the chill of late fall that quiets the city for brief moments on evening walks by the bay. It is as though our Creator has infused this season with physical properties intended to turn the mind away from activity and in to contemplation. Yes, it is the hectic pre-Christmas season, but the cold air of anticipation also heightens our senses and causes us to pause, to hear the echoes of footsteps on frigid sidewalks, and to remember the places we have journeyed from and journeys awaiting us without roadmaps or directions.
That said, I digress, but not entirely, to my subject. We have been attending a Lutheran church for the past few weeks, and it has been quite a different experience for us. It is not so much new for me as a return to the past, as I grew up in the Lutheran church and attended a Lutheran elementary school. I have found the return somewhat refreshing. For Kelly and Luke it is a new thing altogether. Kelly has found, however, that the more structured, tradition-based and liturgical element has significance to her that she had been missing in the non-denominational settings of our past. One of those elements that seems especially relevant to our situation now is the liturgical calendar.
Following the church calendar helps us to realize that seasons are both appropriate and intentional. There are times for celebration, for mourning, and for waiting. There are times for great bustles and bursts of activity, but there are also times of quiet introspection, and all of these are divinely ordained; or at least, they are ok to practice! So we don't have to feel useless or incompetent because we cannot keep up with the manic pace of modern ministry that demands demonstrable results at all times. I realize this is not a new or revolutionary discovery, that I am in a sense discovering something simple that has been there all along. But like Chesterton said, in trying to be the best heretic I could be I ended up finding I was orthodox all along (or something to that effect).
The current season, Advent, means that now is a time for waiting, watching and preparing. It is a time for reflecting on where we are, and looking to the future. The dark blues of Advent and the candles add to the introspective mood. This mood is only heightened by the chill of late fall that quiets the city for brief moments on evening walks by the bay. It is as though our Creator has infused this season with physical properties intended to turn the mind away from activity and in to contemplation. Yes, it is the hectic pre-Christmas season, but the cold air of anticipation also heightens our senses and causes us to pause, to hear the echoes of footsteps on frigid sidewalks, and to remember the places we have journeyed from and journeys awaiting us without roadmaps or directions.
Monday, October 1, 2007
The city of lonely hearts
The question still remains for us about ministry. Why New York? Obviously we have been called here, as we work through our struggles and emerge scathed yet victorious. The tests of our faith have been significant and continue to come on a nearly daily basis. Yet I cannot seem to shake the very vague and very real sense of mission, a mission to the city as a whole and not only an isolated demographic or people group.
I was on one of those tour boats the other day with my parents. We were cruising slowly along the East River, admiring the golden towers of downtown and the graceful aches of the bridges on a glorious fall afternoon. Behind me, I heard someone comment, "The city of lonely hearts." Such a true statement; a place so massive and opulent that it doesn't need people. The noise of progress, of money, fame, or any of a variety of forces drowns out the voice of the individual. New York appears to be the city of the victorious, the heroes who get tickertape parades down the canyons of Broadway. But in reality New York is the city of the underdogs. It is the city of those who try and fail, who hide in the shadows, who maintain mere existence from the table-scraps of the empire. They are everywhere, and they are not only dressed in rags or pushing shopping carts. They are also wearing business suits and scrurrying out of the Broad Street station. They are dressed in their best for a Friday night gallery opening on 24th Street. They are selling you lottery tickets and a Budweiser tallboy with a warm grin at the corner bodega. They will tell you their story if you give them the slightest moment, and the cramped N train car at rush hour is seething with stories that are never told. So perhaps we have been called just to be the people that will stop and listen.
I was on one of those tour boats the other day with my parents. We were cruising slowly along the East River, admiring the golden towers of downtown and the graceful aches of the bridges on a glorious fall afternoon. Behind me, I heard someone comment, "The city of lonely hearts." Such a true statement; a place so massive and opulent that it doesn't need people. The noise of progress, of money, fame, or any of a variety of forces drowns out the voice of the individual. New York appears to be the city of the victorious, the heroes who get tickertape parades down the canyons of Broadway. But in reality New York is the city of the underdogs. It is the city of those who try and fail, who hide in the shadows, who maintain mere existence from the table-scraps of the empire. They are everywhere, and they are not only dressed in rags or pushing shopping carts. They are also wearing business suits and scrurrying out of the Broad Street station. They are dressed in their best for a Friday night gallery opening on 24th Street. They are selling you lottery tickets and a Budweiser tallboy with a warm grin at the corner bodega. They will tell you their story if you give them the slightest moment, and the cramped N train car at rush hour is seething with stories that are never told. So perhaps we have been called just to be the people that will stop and listen.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Out of the waiting place
I realize that it has been a really long time since our last entry. There is a reason for that, however. There has not, until recently, been much to write about. I believe that the month of August was a sort of a holding pattern for us, a time for us to become content with the happenings of the moment and to learn not to obesess over the details of the future. It honestly was a painful process. "The Waiting Place" is not a fun place to be, especially in a world where we are used to having answers to questions instantaneously.
With all that said, the last week or so has been very eventful. Things are coming together for us in amazing ways. I just started my new job at Nyack College. I am now the Learning Assessment Specialist for the New York City area. This means that I will be helping students in the adult degree program to come up with the credits they need to complete their degrees. Also it looks like there will be potential for teaching in the future. All in all it looks like a great opportunity and I am very excited. Kelly's work situation is also doing well, she has a few clients that look like they will be on for the long-term.
We will be moving to Bay Ridge, Brooklyn tomorrow morning. We are staying in the basement apartment of a friend's place until we can find our own apartment in the neighborhood. This wasn't our first choice, but it gives us time to get Luke into school and to get settled in to our routines without having to stress too much. I'm looking forward to living in Brooklyn. It's a very different place than Manhattan, but we will still be very close to the area in Manhattan where we are hoping to focus our ministry.
Things are looking up and I am thankful to say that we can all breathe a sigh of relief for the moment. Hopefully now that some of our more basic "survival" needs have been taken care of, we can start to think more about the direction of 141-NYC. This has been an amazing time of learning, testing and observing. I hope to be able to report more on this in the near future. Thank you everyone for your prayers and support.
-Brian
With all that said, the last week or so has been very eventful. Things are coming together for us in amazing ways. I just started my new job at Nyack College. I am now the Learning Assessment Specialist for the New York City area. This means that I will be helping students in the adult degree program to come up with the credits they need to complete their degrees. Also it looks like there will be potential for teaching in the future. All in all it looks like a great opportunity and I am very excited. Kelly's work situation is also doing well, she has a few clients that look like they will be on for the long-term.
We will be moving to Bay Ridge, Brooklyn tomorrow morning. We are staying in the basement apartment of a friend's place until we can find our own apartment in the neighborhood. This wasn't our first choice, but it gives us time to get Luke into school and to get settled in to our routines without having to stress too much. I'm looking forward to living in Brooklyn. It's a very different place than Manhattan, but we will still be very close to the area in Manhattan where we are hoping to focus our ministry.
Things are looking up and I am thankful to say that we can all breathe a sigh of relief for the moment. Hopefully now that some of our more basic "survival" needs have been taken care of, we can start to think more about the direction of 141-NYC. This has been an amazing time of learning, testing and observing. I hope to be able to report more on this in the near future. Thank you everyone for your prayers and support.
-Brian
Monday, August 6, 2007
The Heights
181st Street in Washington Heights ( just 3 subway stops away from our neighborhood) is a flowing sea of humanity on a steamy Saturday afternoon. Kelly, Luke and I have set out in search of bargains and some cheap entertainment. We emerge from the subway station at 181st and Fort Washington into the bright summer sun. Walking east, we pass through the quiet, somewhat genteel section west of Broadway (the “gentrified” side of Washington Heights), past organic fruit stands, upscale clothing shops, and a packed Starbucks. Crossing Broadway, we enter into the true heart of the neighborhood on the east side.
The pulse of life beats loud on the Dominican side of the nabe. Mothers drag children through the crowd as sidewalk salesmen negotiate prices of jewelry and watches in animated Spanish. Groups of young men strut past, chatting on cell phones. Cars zoom past as the air fills with booming merengue and reggaeton blasting from tricked-out SUV’s. The smell of empanadas and roast chicken mingles with exhaust and subway fumes. Hordes of kids surround a coco helado cart, begging Mama for some cold, sugary relief from the midday heat.
We walk past blocks of boutiques and bodegas as passers-by nod hello and smile. One shoe store after another advertises their low prices with blaring banners. Kelly stops to peruse the designer knock-off sunglasses at a small stand. “Check it out, five dollars,” smiles the vendor, his hand motioning across his merchandise. She picks out a pair and hands the man a five, and he carefully cuts the tags off with his pocket knife.
Our destination is the Goodwill Thrift Store on 181st and St. Nick’s. Inside, among the crowds of people and deafening beats of cheery Spanish pop tunes, we search for hidden treasures. On the musty racks hang the cast-offs of New York’s more fortunate, recycled here for the benefit of this vibrant neighborhood. In the basement, while Luke digs through piles of toys, I help an old woman with grandmotherly eyes find the right size shoes for her husband. In the process, I find a brand-new pair of Converse Chuck Taylors in my size for only eight dollars.
We return to the street after making our purchases and start to head back west to the A train. After one block, we arrive at a small crowd outside a liquor store. A clever old hustler has set up a street casino on top of an overturned cardboard box – the classic shell game played with three tiny soda-bottle caps. The hustler entices people walking by to try their luck, clutching a handful of dollars. His hands move like lightning, shuffling the caps around and fooling his marks out of their cash. As more people gather, he lets a few win to entice more of them in. We stop to watch a few rounds, then continue up the block.
Suddenly, two uniformed cops push by us quickly in intercept mode. They approach the makeshift casino with shouts in Spanish, but the hustler has already kicked aside his box and disappeared into the crowd. The cops shout questions at those hanging around, but they merely shrug their shoulders and move on. The gap in the human river that was created by the game has sealed up, and the flow continues on uninterrupted. The cops give up on their lost cause and disappear around the corner. Kelly and I exchange grins, our mission for the day fulfilled as usual on the living streets of Upper Manhattan.
The pulse of life beats loud on the Dominican side of the nabe. Mothers drag children through the crowd as sidewalk salesmen negotiate prices of jewelry and watches in animated Spanish. Groups of young men strut past, chatting on cell phones. Cars zoom past as the air fills with booming merengue and reggaeton blasting from tricked-out SUV’s. The smell of empanadas and roast chicken mingles with exhaust and subway fumes. Hordes of kids surround a coco helado cart, begging Mama for some cold, sugary relief from the midday heat.
We walk past blocks of boutiques and bodegas as passers-by nod hello and smile. One shoe store after another advertises their low prices with blaring banners. Kelly stops to peruse the designer knock-off sunglasses at a small stand. “Check it out, five dollars,” smiles the vendor, his hand motioning across his merchandise. She picks out a pair and hands the man a five, and he carefully cuts the tags off with his pocket knife.
Our destination is the Goodwill Thrift Store on 181st and St. Nick’s. Inside, among the crowds of people and deafening beats of cheery Spanish pop tunes, we search for hidden treasures. On the musty racks hang the cast-offs of New York’s more fortunate, recycled here for the benefit of this vibrant neighborhood. In the basement, while Luke digs through piles of toys, I help an old woman with grandmotherly eyes find the right size shoes for her husband. In the process, I find a brand-new pair of Converse Chuck Taylors in my size for only eight dollars.
We return to the street after making our purchases and start to head back west to the A train. After one block, we arrive at a small crowd outside a liquor store. A clever old hustler has set up a street casino on top of an overturned cardboard box – the classic shell game played with three tiny soda-bottle caps. The hustler entices people walking by to try their luck, clutching a handful of dollars. His hands move like lightning, shuffling the caps around and fooling his marks out of their cash. As more people gather, he lets a few win to entice more of them in. We stop to watch a few rounds, then continue up the block.
Suddenly, two uniformed cops push by us quickly in intercept mode. They approach the makeshift casino with shouts in Spanish, but the hustler has already kicked aside his box and disappeared into the crowd. The cops shout questions at those hanging around, but they merely shrug their shoulders and move on. The gap in the human river that was created by the game has sealed up, and the flow continues on uninterrupted. The cops give up on their lost cause and disappear around the corner. Kelly and I exchange grins, our mission for the day fulfilled as usual on the living streets of Upper Manhattan.
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