Here's hoping day three after an angiogram is the nadir. Moving rather gingerly, and keeping even that to a minimum. I suppose it's to be expected, given what they did, but I didn't. This too shall pass.
The cardiologist's office called yesterday to schedule a follow-up appointment "within three days of the procedure." I'll go in Tuesday morning questions in hand. During the two previous conversations - one at the hospital after my crash and the other in his office - he hasn't come across like one of those dr.s who has an eye on the clock and is hoping to recover the three minutes he went over with the last patient. So I'm hoping I'll leave with answers to questions like, "If this blockage was undetected despite all the other tests, and if I'm outside of every at-risk category for coronary disease, how do I know that one of the partial blockages you saw while in there isn't going to cause a heart attack a year from now?"
The fairly large bag of wires that comprises the complete set to rewire every circuit on Ilsa, the VW, came with a pretty decent set of instructions. As I completed each step I crossed it off and proceded to the next. I finally finished that part of the restoration.... and have one wire left over.
Aaargh!
It's a black wire, which means it carries power even with the ignition off. So now I go through the eight pages of instructions and closely examine every electrical component on the car to find out what doesn't have a 16" 14ga black wire, but should.
I went shopping for shoes today. Went to DSW (Discount Shoe Warehouse). I haven't bought a pair of dress shoes in almost a decade but it was time. The insides of my current pair (yes, that's a singular noun) is worn through at the heel.
I'm ashamed. Came home with two pair. But in fairness, the second started out cheap and was 60% off. And now I can wear brown shoes with brown pants.
As an added benefit, I'm now good until 2022. Or twice that long for having purchased two pair.
Did you notice that "anonymous" commented on an earlier post about shoes? He answered my question by saying they do not put shoes on a corpse being laid in a casket unless the family specifically asks for it. First, why?? I don't really care, just curious.
Second, bury me with my shoes, baby! But just for fun, make one of them the black shoe and the other the brown.
(Except we're both opting for cremation, so it's not really a factor. Or is it? How does one dress for a cremation??)
Back to last night's topic (if you haven't read it, you'll need to for this to make any sense)....
How does voting my evangelical Christian views - my right as a citizen and my duty in light of Romans 13 - make me any different from the fundamentalist Muslim who seeks to impose Sharia Law on his culture?
First, I'm not going to take up a Kalashnikov or bury an IED to make it happen. NOT that all who would see Sharia law would. (see below) I accept that I am a sojourner, a foreigner in a land that is sometimes hostile and more often just contrary. The Apostle Paul, himself a Roman citizen (a minority and privileged status in the first century), wrote, "Our citizenship is in heaven" (Phil. 3:20).
Note: interestingly, the residents of Philippi held Roman citizenship by virtue of living in that city, a Roman "colony." So his statement about ultimate citizenship in the letter to the Christians of Philippi had particular weight.
I'm dismayed but not surprised when the majority make ballot box decisions I can't support. I accept those outcomes as reality, but work within the system to change them and in my personal life act according to biblical standards instead of what society has endorsed. In some places, and at some times, Christians have been commanded to act in ways directly contrary to biblical teachings, and in those cases they have showed the courage of their convictions to the point of martyrdom. Might I be found as faithful in the unlikely event I live to see similar circumstances.
Secondly, the Muslim who seeks to have Islamic law enacted as the law of the land can, and arguably should do exactly what I'm doing - express that goal at the ballot box. In some places, at the local level, they are doing just that. Have you read about Dearborn, MI, which has turned into something of a center for Muslim immigrants? Some have characterized it as a Muslim city. So is it OK if the majority population in a place like Dearborn writes Sharia law into their municipal code and applies Koranic definitions and penalties to crimes?
Ah, here it gets tricky! And controversial. Gingrich and Huckabee both said they'd work to pass laws prohibiting Sharia law from appearing as any part of any code anywhere in the country. Righteous? And coming full circle, would those two be as committed to preventing biblical standards from being implemented as law?
Part of the problem is that most of us don't really understand what Sharia law is. Do the horrors of Taliban "justice" in places like Afghanistan legitimately fit within Sharia or are they a perversion?
Even Muslims can't decide that one.
Sharia Law article on the Huffington Post.
to be cont'd.
2 comments:
As a matter of general principle, I'm in favor of decentralized governance, which includes the side effect that folks in one community may scratch their head at laws enforced (or perhaps only on the books symbolically) in another. I believe that citizens get much better response from city hall on any given matter than they do from their United States Senator; it's a matter of numbers. Having said that, I also believe the 14th amendment was passed so that local communities could not deprive their citizens of certain rights due to them as United States Citizens. So, if Sharia Law does not deny to its adherents their rights as U.S. Citizens, then I'm not concerned about it. I also know that I would not choose to live in any community that chooses Sharia as the primary moral informant of it's civil codes.
Mike H.
"its" not "it's" ...oops
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