I don’t know. A female relative once told me that everyone uses someone for something. I’d say that is a bit cynical of a viewpoint. but when I think of predatory men exploiting the damsel I am quick to forget that there are women with agendas.

I see pretty young women at churches and think that these girls, being brought up right, are going to bypass the dysfunction and misery that our culture promotes as healthy and natural. That is the logic that caused me to look in a church for my wife.

Can you believe that the New York Times has a picture of those two Boy Scouts? In their minds it is a portrayal of the charm of a large older boy showing affection to a younger smaller boy. Is that charm? Or is that just putting a charming face on predation?

By way of my wife, I knew a couple of Baptist women that were “beautiful people.” They never found men or men never found them. Old maids is what a term could be I guess. They ended up rooming together as an economic expedient. The had plenty in common on a spiritual level.

I told my “boss” about them. I think I was trying to make the point that having sex was not one of life’s “necessities.” I have known Catholic nuns that have spent their whole lives celibate. Somehow their lives didn’t look like lives of frustration and denial.

My boss insisted that those Baptists had to have been lesbians. That there was no way that anyone could live their lives without scratching that itch.

I kind of got to resenting that guy. The bad thing is or was that I was never a man of sexual purity. The other bad thing was that we both knew it.

I could aspire to being a new creation, but that is an awkward thing when someone is slapping you with what they know about you.

I am thinking about taking a vow of silence. Now it occurs to me why those monastic sects have that.

Smile and wave boys, smile and wave.

Heh!

You mentioned this man before, I remember. Prince of a guy.

So he goes from deciding his sister was a lesbian to deciding that since he had decided she was a lesbian, Christians must be to blame for her unhappiness. Logic for the mentally lame.

It’s not particularly easy for “the beautiful people” to find love in this world. And the harder somebody has to look at you to find something beautiful, well, the odds tend to drop dramatically. In the end, it’s a miracle that ANYBODY is able to find a soul mate.

That said, suicide is hardly something that only hits “single” people; there are PLENTY of cases in which someone who is dearly loved by his/her spouse kills themselves. Suicidal depression can affect and afflict just about anybody from any walk of life.

Maybe she killed herself because she had such a lousy brother. That’s just as plausible as your boss’ theory, certainly.

That said, if you were seeking my counsel on accepting the chance to earn some money, I’d advise you do “take one for the team” and do it.

I’ll explain: On the Christian view, a wife ought to submit to her husband’s leadership. A lot of liberal women hate that and scream about how intolerant Christianity is. But here’s the thing: the same Bible that tells wives to submit to their husbands tells husbands to love their wives the way Christ loved the Church. Which is to say sacrificially: you will literally lay down your life for her if that’s what it takes.

A husband leads. But he also sacrifices for his wife and his family. He’ll take that crappy job; he’ll drive that long nasty drive through stop and go freeway rush hour traffic. He will do whatever it takes. Because he’s the leader and he’s got somebody who is counting on him to come through for her.

Who’s got the harder end of the deal?

Anyway, just my two cents, and obviously I don’t have all the facts, but I’d say if there’s a chance to make some money and please your wife at the same time, I’d say go for it. Even though you’d have to work with a turd to do it.

As for your relationship with this guy, keep it professional and don’t let it be anything BUT professional. There was that line from the movie “Madagascar” with the penguins saying, “Smile and wave, boys. Just smile and wave.” Sometimes that’s just what you have to do.

This helps me when I’m dealing with a true jerk: I tell myself, “I only have to deal with this guy for a little bit; he has to LIVE with himself 24 hours a day. So it’s not nearly as bad for me as it must be for him.”

The para I found most interesting in your buddy’s article:

For those athletic types who think it’s OK to slack off from time to time, I found some interesting information from a recent study of elite athletes and couch potatoes. Muscle loss begins in 72 hours from the time of last physical activity, regardless of your level of fitness. Additionally, within one year without any physical activity, there’s no difference in the physical condition of the spud/couch potato and the athlete. So it seems the notion of use it or lose it is alive and well, and walking, yoga, resistance exercises, and everything in between is better for us than sitting around every day.

Having let myself go to pot, and now having fought my way back from that “spud,” it’s a word to the wise.

Thanks much for your encouragement. Stratoliners are awesome bikes – especially when somebody maintains them!

God love you back. And thank you for your gracious words of encouragement.

I don’t believe that “success” (converting a lost soul to Christ) is our mandate; that’s the Holy Spirit’s job. Our job is to be a witness, to preach the truth even as we try to walk in that truth as salt and light to others.

Noah preached for 120 years and everybody laughed at him. Only his family ever bothered to listen to and respond to his message.

What is satisfying to you, therefore, is that you are out there doing what God put you on this earth to do.

And, yes, Diane. THAT is what makes YOU beautiful.