greaterthansparrows

"42" is the number on the Brooklyn Dodgers uniform worn by Jackie Robinson when he broke the color barrier in major league baseball.  The movie bearing that title is the story of how he came to that time, and what his rookie season was like.  Baseball is the background, but the story is one man, two really, driving an unstoppable wedge to splinter an unjust structure of racism.  The story is what it required of them on profound personal levels, and the story is true. Who is the 'two' if Robinson is 'one'?  Branch Rickey, owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers.  He was the impetus, and while he tries to palm it off as smart business--and he is canny and skilled--it isn't that.  Rarely does a film story include personal, Christian faith and play it as the quiet foundation:  no hitting the audience on the head to proselyte, no snarking either. Rickey selects Robinson as the one to break the code, the unwritten law of separation.  He describes what might b...

It was such an anomaly that it made the national news:  the high temperature in Anchorage Alaska on Monday was 86 degrees, in Honolulu, 84.  Everyone was being cautioned to remember their sunscreen as they hit the beaches in their swimsuits instead of their jeans.  It didn't last, of course; but they had a high of 81 on Tuesday before they lost the unusual warm sunshine.  Wednesday, yesterday, was 71 degrees with a note that that was seven degrees above the norm.  That means that the normal temperature for Monday would have been maybe 65 instead of 86 degrees. What a treat for those who live through so much cold!  Other things might be forgiven for coming to a halt so that everyone could hit the sun, knowing that this was a rare moment indeed. I thought of a Ray Bradbury story about a small colony on a planet where it always rained.  I think it was called "All of Summer in a Day."  The scientists were predicting that the rainclouds would break...

Carole and I did a slight detour on our way somewhere else on Sunday while she was here, and stopped by the old house.  There were vehicles there which I recognized as belonging to the new people, so I stuck my head in and hallooed.  I wanted her to get a peek at what was going on, and I was curious too, having only heard secondhand preliminary reports.  We were invited in and took a tour. They have gutted both bathrooms, which I pretty much expected.  They had said at the outset that they would have to take out the shower in the bathroom behind the kitchen, because the toilet was in too narrow a space between it and the exterior wall for current codes.  They have moved the toilet not to the center of its same back wall as I expected, but under the window.  Upstairs, they have opened the bathroom into the closet of the small bedroom and put a new, jetted tub front to back in the room, perpendicular to where the old one was.  The new toilet and sink a...

I was assigned to speak in church last Sunday.  I asked with a laugh if this was because I was done with teaching the Institute class for the summer and didn't have to put in that preparation time this week, and the bishop's counselor said, "I'm afraid I wasn't that astute.  It was because the topic suggested you to me."  The topic was on being prepared for the last days.  There was another sister who would speak first(she ended up home with a sick child, so the counselor spoke), and I was scheduled second.  In our ward sometimes they do the standard husband and wife assignments, but sometimes they don't. The last days, as a topic, can include a great many concerns and lots of scriptural warnings.  We hear a lot about the tribulations, disasters, and wickedness that will occur left and right.  It seemed to me that the focus point I wanted to address was the warning that in that day men's hearts will fail them, because that's what makes or breaks ...

I seem to  kind of alternate here between the profound and the ridiculous.  Our stake Relief Society Institute class is done for the summer, so the study and preparation time I need for that is set aside for now, though I have to speak in church this Sunday.  The last big push to clear everything out of the house has been survived, but the boxes here are piled high because it was not possible to sort and dispose of everything there within the deadline.  The only advantage is that we're not under the gun on a timetable, so we can just keep plugging away.  Trouble is, rooms that were mostly organized at the beginning are now overwhelmed with stacks of stuff needing attention.  Hubby was actually feeling pretty well yesterday and tackled several hours' worth of boxes.  Some of the things which belong to our children have been sorted and shipped out, with others being made ready.  So, there's progress. Last night, I sat down in the living room and...

The rebellion of Kodah (  Numbers 16 ) and others is the other portion of what we covered this week.  He gathered 250 "princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown" to announce that there was no reason that Moses should continue to have pre-eminence and set himself above all of them, because "all the congregation are holy." Moses asks them if it seems a little thing to them to have the office of serving the Lord in the tabernacle.  He asks them to come up, and they will not.  They declare that Moses has failed of his promise to bring them into a land of milk and honey, and in fact brought them out of a goodly land--Egypt-- and now given them no inheritance.  The land for their possession, fertile and fruitful, is the land they have all refused to go into (  see last post ) because they're afraid and lack faith.  Though I suppose, now, that the lack of inheritance could be a complaint that the Levites are to live off the tithe...