Being Sick

I think I have the flu. I have been laying low the last 2 days. A week ago we had our Intercommunity Novitiate Party which was fun. It was a party with Sisters of Calabrini, Holy Cross Sisters, Sisters of Casmir, Mary Knoll Sisters, Augustinians, Sacred Heart Fathers, Mary Knoll Fathers and Brothers and Sisters of St. Joseph. We had a potluck with food and dance. It was neat seeing the different ethnicities doing there singing and dancing. I got up and danced with the Africans.
There is a reading from Ronald Rolhieser that is really sticking to me the past few weeks. "Faith isn't where your head is or where your heart is. Faith is where your ass is at".  That seems to make sense to me. Some days I wake up and think where are you God. I don't feel your presences at all. Do you even exist. Then there are days where I wake up and know the presence of God in me and in my life. So do I have faith some days and not other days. I guess it is trusting in where my ass is at. That is where I am suppose to be right now. I am learning to sit and just deal with whatever comes my way. If it is something bad to try and hold it and embrace it.
I know my brother has called me Peter Pan because I am always on the fly and never seem to grow up. I think there is a lot of truth in that. I hope I am learning how to be grounded and just sit with things. But it is very tempting to go on to the next adventure and just keep going from adventure to adventure. But does doing that mean I have a superficial life. A life that is not real with any substance ? Peter Pan was the life of the party always having fun always making people feel good. Does he really connect to people in a deep meaningful way. Is there real connectivity? Is Peter Pan just avoiding pain that he doesn't want to deal with? I don't know maybe I am thinking to much.
I am really looking forward to my short Christmas break and to get out of my head for a bit. Merry Christmas everyone.
The novices attended a videotaping mass here in Milwaukee that will be shown February 2nd at 9am on the Ion channel and I believe 5:30am on February 2nd on Fox. Supposedly. And it is nation wide. I am sitting in the front row so I am sure I will be visible with my mouse nest of a beard.

 Doing an african drum march around the room, Martha -uguanda, Marcel- Nigeria, Susan - Tanzania

 These are the Holy Cross Sisters who are from India and Bangladesh

 We hosted Thanksgiving we had 3 Colombian, 1 Venezuelen, 2 Uganda priests over to celebrate

This is Father Reed our Novice Master. 

This is Susan from Tanzania. She helps me brush up on my Kiswahili

I forgot to take pictures but my roommate from college Tierney visited me. We went to the Buck vs Nets game and went to the Pabst brewery

Poverty

Milwaukee supposedly gets 190 days without sun. That is depressing just to think about

I just watched 60 minutes and Diane went to Camden New Jersey where it is one of the most poverish cities yet New Jersey is the richest state in the USA. It seemed like all that was there were drugs, abandoned buildings and schools. No shops. Most of the drugs are being bought by kids from the suburbs. The murder rate is 7 times higher than the national average. 1/3 of the teens in the city have been caught with some sort of drug activity. The parents that are there mostly single have little education and there are no jobs in the city because most of the industries have pulled out due to violence. It is sad for the kids there. They have hope and lots of them said, "For Christmas I want a home, I want a room. "There only escape is going to school.  My initial reaction was New Jersey should bull doze the whole city. But then where are all these people going to go. I’m sure the other cities don’t want these people. A kindergartener was asked what are the three meals a day. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He didn’t know that because he only eats when his mom finds food. Mom can’t read, single, two kids, no house, or an apartment, can’t get a job, has no skills. What do we do? How do we change the system? There has to be answers.

In Milwaukee the average homeless person has 7^th grade education.

Poverty has been on my mind a lot lately.

Grocery stores have to throw out most of their food to cover themselves legally. If they gave someone food or let them dumpster dive and they get sick they could sue. We have to change the system. We waste so much food here. I remember dumpster diving next to the Hostess story right by my High school because they were throwing out all the expired cupcakes and Twinkies and we thought what a waste we can’t let this happen. It takes years for a Twinkie to really expire.

Then I think about Tyson chicken in Pennsylvania how most of there workers were illegal immigrants working in barns packed with Chickens walking around in chicken shit and there job was to catch a 1,000 chickens a day and get them into a truck. They got paid by how much they did. Many got sick and now have wrist, back, arm, and leg problems. That is poverty to me. People have to work like that and get basically nothing.

I'm reading a book called Fire in the Ashes. This single mom with two kids who lives in the Bronx surrounded by the crack dealers and gangs gets an opportunity to move to Montana where a community has raised money to get them there and get them a place to stay until she can afford to find her own apartment. Everything was going well, Kids doing well in school except the son struggled in school, Mom got a job and is working hard and gets a bank account. It sounds like a success story. Then as the years go by the boy gets into drugs and stealing then kills himself in his mothers place. The mother goes into depression and becomes and alcoholic loses her job and goes back to living on well fair. The daughter was a success and broke through. Have a great job, husband and four kids making it in Atlanta. It sucks sometimes you try so hard to make a difference and you are expecting great results and then it can all turn. You do what you can but you have to let go of the results. That for me is really hard to swallow.

I guess it boils down to what am I going to do about it. Poverty is someone in need or deprived of necessity for life. This can be interpreted in many different ways. I know I can be present to people and try to have an awareness of the charitable things I can do and try to figure out how to have a voice in the change of the system. I guess one day at a time, one act at a time and one person at a time. I think that is what I can do right now until I figure out how to live for the life of others.

 Vikings vs Packers and an unhappy Packer fan at the time in the background.

 I volunteered at the Folk fair, This is a voyager. half French half Native American. I cleaned dishes at the Native American fry bread stand where they sold Indian Tacos

 Jo Jo at the bucks game excited as ever. His first professional basketball game.

On a positive note I went to a buck’s game with Dave Holton and his son JoJo who is 7 years old. He had the time of his life. Free cape because it was cape night. He got a t-shirt that they threw out and it fell under the bleachers but he was able to crawl down and get it. He also got a basketball because the same thing happened. I bought him popcorn and Mountain Dew. I think he had the greatest day ever and that was a real joy for me.

I guess with everything in life you witness the hardships and the joys.

Type 7 Enneagram

I’m a seven on the enneargram. It is like the myers Briggs and is a personality test. Very useful tool to learn about yourself and about others. I highly recommend to check it out if you haven’t. I had a great visit to Minnesota for my cousin Carlene’s wedding. It was great seeing all the family. It went by too quickly. I wish I could have spent more time catching up with extended family.  It was a wonderfully spent weekend. I went out and celebrated Halloween which was fun. Indoor soccer just started. I’m in an over 30 league so I am the young buck on the team. I scored three goals in the first game however I sprained my ankle and still recovering from that. A few days before that I got a rock climbing membership at a climbing gym in a suburb. It felt great to get back climbing. I went climbing today. I have no stamina like I use to when I was climbing about a decade ago. I also have little strength compared to back then. It is going to take me a while to get the endurance and power back. So that is an exciting challenge for me.

This last week was a really hard week. Sometimes I feel I am the only person who is about helping the community and not about the self. People will always think differently and some peoples view of community is totally different from mine. Infact it is almost as if  its “let me do my own thing mentality and you do your thing.”  One would also think that striving for religious life would mean that everyone in the community would strive to make themselves better holy people. Wanting to go the extra yard to make a difference in the world. Instead is filled with rumors, gossip,  and filling up lives with unnecessary drama.  Today I feel God must be shaking his heads thinking what are these people doing? They don’t get it!

During the weekend I went to New Glarus Brewery. Probably the best Brewery tour I have ever been on. I think Spotted Cow is the best beer in Wisconsin followed by Moon man. You can only get there beers in Wisconsin. I was also able to go Mountain Biking one last time because it warmed up a bit. I’m sure the cold front will be coming back soon.

Here is a quick over view of a Type 7 on the enneagram which is my type.

Type Seven in Brief

Sevens are extroverted, optimistic, versatile, and spontaneous. Playful, high-spirited, and practical, they can also misapply their many talents, becoming over- extended, scattered, and undisciplined. They constantly seek new and exciting experiences, but can become distracted and exhausted by staying on the go. They typically have problems with impatience and impulsiveness. At their Best: they focus their talents on worthwhile goals, becoming appreciative, joyous, and satisfied.

         Basic Fear: Of being deprived and in pain

         Basic Desire: To be satisfied and content—to have their needs
fulfilled

         Enneagram Seven with a Six-Wing: "The Entertainer"

         Enneagram Seven with an Eight-Wing: "The Realist"

Key Motivations: Want to maintain their freedom and happiness, to avoid missing out on worthwhile experiences, to keep themselves excited and occupied, to avoid and discharge pain.

 We had our first snow fall of the year. Luckily it has already melted

 This is in the town of New Glarus which is known as Little Switzerland. Stopped and had a aVenison brat and swiss cheese fondue.

Testing the beer to make sure it tastes right at New Glarus. I like the tour because you have the ability to interact with the employees. Infact I spent about 15 minutes wight the microbiologist who was testing the beer for different mold or bacteria in the beer. 

Triggered

Triggered. I really got triggered today in Just Faith. Just Faith is a a 30 week class where we meet once a week to talk about poverty and Social Justice  in the world. We meet at St. Mary's Parish in a Suburb of Milwaukee. We were talking about poverty. I talked about my experience in Tanzania about poverty there and yet they were happy and I talked about the frustrations I had with there type of thinking of only the present and not the future. They would eat everything they had now and starve in the future because that is how they have done it from generation to generation. Anyways there is this woman who left the conversation and talked on her phone for about 15 minutes and then when she came back I felt she attacked me. She said, “that is so American and cliché that we assume and think they are happy. We do that just to make ourselves feel better. They are struggling in life and they know life is hard.” She went on for about 10 minutes staring at me telling me how I am wrong infront of everyone because she had been to Haiti and seen extreme poverty there. Maybe it wasn’t a direct attack on me but it sure felt like it. I was ready to rip her head off and prove her wrong. Then I realized why and I getting so upset of this. Why am I triggered. Is it because she is right? Is it because she is attacking my view? Is it because she is like me a is a rich white person who lives in suburbia in a bubble who occasionally goes out and volunteers to make themselves feel better and feel they have contributed to society and then goes back to there bubble with a 50 inch flat screen TV. I refrained and let it go. I don’t need to prove her wrong or prove anybody. That is my ego that wanted to rip her a new one. My picture below is how I felt. I was King Leonidas for Halloween. He is a character from the movie 300.

Maybe the people in Tanzania weren’t happy and just putting a mask on.  Maybe they were happy to me because I was from America, or white or just someone who wants to listen to them and talk to them. I know for a fact though some of the happiest people I have ever seen in my life live in Tanzania. I am sure they are all not happy and some don’t know any different but I do know what I experienced.  I haven’t written in my blog for a bit but I needed to vent.

ESFP or ENFP

ESFP or ENFP. A week ago we took the Meyers Briggs exam. I test as an ESFP but I feel I relate more to the ENFP when I was reading the descriptions of each one.  But I am not sure so in reality I probably am an ESFP. I am borderline between the S and N. I thought is the retreat was very informative. I recommend everyone should take a Meyers Briggs test to learn more about yourself. They have free ones online. I thought it was a very fun seminar. I even googled both personality types ESFP and ENFP when I got home to read more about each one.

ENFP

Warmly enthusiastic, high-spirited, ingenious imaginative. Able to do almost anything that interests. Quick with a solution for any difficulty and ready to help anyone with a problem Often rely on ability to improvise instead of preparing in advance. Can usually find a compelling reasons for what ever he wants.

ESFP 

Outgoing, easygoing, accepting, friendly, enjoys everything and makes things more fun for others by their enjoyment. Likes sports and making things happen. Know what's going on and joins in gladly. Remembering facts easier than mastering theories. Best in situations that need sound common sense and practical ability with people and things. 

On Sunday Preston decided to leave. I felt kind of bummed out but I know he is doing the right thing. He was my roommate last year and he is a great guy. But he has been miserable this year so far He is only 27 and I think he needs to go and explore life more.

Thursday was a good day. I went for a walk along the lake and sat there for a while sitting in silence with the water rolling up onto the beach. It was a very peaceful afternoon. I went for a walk on the grass and said screw it I’m going to run as hard as I can. I don’t care about me knee. I took off my sandals and sprinted. It was the best thing I could have done. It felt freeing. I was running then cutting hard at 45-degree angles from side to side then 90-degree angles. I felt great. I tried to do figure runs with the twisting of the knee but my knee isn’t ready for that. Then the next day a little soreness but not too bad. I’m so glad to be running again. I’m going to try and enjoy this amazingly warm October weather as long as possible.

 This is Nick who is Dave's youngest kid. He loves bouncing on this red donkey. Easily entertained

 The leaves are changing color and are starting to fall. The weather is slowly dropping

I'm with Jason and his wife Michelle which most of the Soccer guys from SMU attended in St. Joseph Michigan