Other Bests of 2005

1. Best fiction book: KITE RUNNER.
2. Best new hobby: BLOGGING.
3. Best new way to waste time: SEE #2.
4. Best trip: San Francisco and surrounding.
5. Most inspiring moment in nature: Being surrounded by GIANT SEQUOIAS, trees over 300 feet tall (30 stories) and 1,500 to 2,000 years old.
6. Most expensive problem: a tort reform measure that I agree with--but it killed my job, and those of at least 200 buddies of mine.... (It was SO fun!)
7. Favorite indoor family times: Watching Little House on the Prairie on DVD. We're on season five, and the kids LOVE it. We love it for the great, often expressly Biblical messages.
8. Professional disappointment: Despite a few powerful connections in D.C., we failed to get a review published that I had written on a very serious and important book, Freeing God's Children. I had warm e-mail exchanges with editors at National Review, Weekly Standard, Human Events, etc., but the review window had passed. (Maybe I'll post it, now that there's #2....) (Oh, and there's that job hunting thing.)
9. Biggest prayer request for myself: to be a GOOD STEWARD. Those are the words, and it encompasses a lot. But it's generally a concern about finances.
10. Most visible answered prayer: more sweetness on the home front.
11. Most interesting Christmas gift: at present, the huge basketball goal which I just assembled myself (8.9 billable hours), complete with 153 moving parts, a spring-loaded rim, a fiberglass backboard, and height adjustments from 7.5' to 10'. (But this stack of books is awesome, too!!)
12. Gift that almost got a squeal out of me: a book from Dennis--I'd been hunting for it for over a year--STIFF: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, by Mary Roach.
13. Hank Hill problem: my lawn was lush and green and splendorific, till the fungus got to it.
14. Most painful thing of 2005: indifference, what else?
15. Favorite past-time of 2005: from the NL playoffs on, the kids and I played so much baseball. It's been a blast. (But it's all basketball now.)
16. Chronic health problem: ALLERGIES. Ask your doctor about Claritin. (I saw his stash there next to his passport.) Ol' Loratadine used to be a miracle drug, but not so much anymore.
17. Greatest blessing that didn't happen: We were unable to locate anyone with whom to share our home after the massive Katrina evacuations. We contacted three families, but it was not meant to be. One family had all their stuff sent over, we rearranged our lives, we moved out of the master bedroom so they could have their own bed and bath with privacy, but they got nervous and moved into a hotel before we ever met.

Enough of listmania. Were I to sum up the year, I might give it a negative rating, overall. Maybe an 80 (when I was a teacher an '80' meant you got a 'B' but you probably didn't deserve it). I'm just too optimistic to go lower, not without a death in the family. But we have the hope of heaven, too. And that changes everything. Making the list above reminds me of a great many things I didn't like about 2005, and most of them are ongoing. They're no one's fault, really, just transitions, changes. God brings you to a new place and things can seem hard. And I guess I could wallow in it. (Wallow--you know that's a metaphor that makes the wallower a pig, a hog wallowing in the mud and loving it.) Anyway, I might complain, but when I look at 2005, it's not like a picture on a calendar. It's a window. When I look through that glass darkly, I'm reminded that every single tear, every little complaint I may have, is an opportunity to store up treasure in Heaven. And I can't complain about that at all. Heaven is real life. Heaven's your real home. And getting there, this life recedes the way a dream dies with the coming of the day. So, on balance, 'twas a fine year. Some earthly rewards, some heavenly. I'm brave enough to wish I had more of the heavenly. No--it's not brave. Just knowledge. The certainty of Heavenly rewards makes me want more. But that's another post. Still, one of my favorite books ever is Joni's Heaven: Your Real Home. That book can change your life. (Didn't reread it in 2005, but went to it again and again as a reference.)