Well, last night I spoke to my dad for the first time in two to three months. He’s doing well, it seems. And, best of all, there is hope that he will be able to be with our family again soon! I’m going to try to visit him on Friday after Thanksgiving. Perhaps it won’t be as difficult to develop a relationship with him after all…

Well, I must get back to that horrid 1,500 word essay due tomorrow. I’m trying to get some research to write it on “The Impact of a Father-Son Relationship,” but all I seem to find on the ‘net is information on fathers of young children, expecting fathers, and the effects of broken relationship, including a multitude of sites about homosexuality as a result of that broken relationship. All quite interesting, but irrelevent to the topics I am supposed to cover with the essay.

Lord, thank you for starting me down this path of restoration. And please help me get this essay done!

I reach too far and stumble.
I pull back and go without.
When will I discover
The balance of this life?

I run ahead and get lost.
I slow down and get behind.
How long until I discover
Life’s intended stride?

Too often I choose something
I think is best for me.
Only to discover
That it isn’t meant to be.

Lord Jesus, please show me
How to live this life I’m in.
Put Your hand upon me
And keep me from my sin.

It appears an interesting thing happens under the circumstances I have found myself in.

I have no car (I was t-boned a couple weeks ago, ouch).
I work some distance from the campus.
I have no money for the bus (And it takes about six times longer than driving!).
I live in the dorm with about thirty-five other guys.

Every day I find myself getting a ride to and from work from a different person. I have few repeat chauffuers. The one exception is my brother, who drops me off at work about half the time. If I don’t have a car by the end of the semester, the entire dorm may know exactly how to get to my office. Not that it’s necessarily a bad thing… I mean, then I wouldn’t have to give out directions any more, right?

One of the scariest things about the whole ordeal is that almost everyone who picks me up for the first time gets lost. Seriously, the directions aren’t that complex! I mean, only one of the turns is to the left; street names are the majority of what they need to remember! And, strangely enough, everyone seems to get lost in a different way. They miss different turns, they confuse different street names, they turn the wrong direction on different streets. At least they don’t take too long to get to the office. The record so far is only 45 minutes after I get off work. I still have no idea how they ended up where they did. I’m just glad they finally got there. And I still got back to campus before the time the bus system would…

Not to complain any more, but… Please Lord, I need a car!

Why is it that food that tastes and smells so great always makes your breath smell so bad?

I discovered a disturbing court decision the other day. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decided that parents do not have an exclusive right to direct the education of their children. The ultimate authority, according to the panel of judges at the hearing, rests in the hands of the state government and the school districts. Now, this doesn’t sound that bad, really. But let’s look at the context in which this decision was made.

A group of Californian parents gave permission for their children to participate in a questionnaire that included, as the letter put it, questions that may make their children uncomfortable. The examples given in the letter were questions about experiencing violence or trauma. Ten of the fifty-something questions, however, were of a very sexual nature. When the parents discovered this, they sued the school district, claiming that they would not have given permission had they known that their children (ages 7-10) would be asked questions dealing with sexuality.

Now, in light of the case for which this decision was made, it has some interesting, and in my mind frightening, implications. According to this decision, parents do not have to be notified if their children are going to receive sex education. Also, parents do not have the right to have their children excused or withdrawn from such lessons. Now, I am not married, and I do not have children, but when I do, I want their instruction and education in this delicate subject to come from their mother and myself, not the schools. Public school “health classes” are far to problematic and, in my view, liberal. What right does the government have to take away my rights to be the only one to tell my children about the birds and the bees?

Not being satisfied with the article I originally found in the paper, I did a little research. What I found upheld my understanding of the court decision I got from the article. My research follows:

The official opinion:
US Court of Appeals of the Ninth Circuit

A news site:
Cybercast News Service

A Christian news site:
Crosswalk

Someone else’s personal opinion:
ChronWatch

(2-21-08) EDIT: I’m sorry, but these links are now broken. The pages they directed to have long since been moved or removed.