Psalm 139

I remember my brother and I discussing Psalm 139 years ago. I’m not sure what brought it up, but I know he kept calling it one of his favorite passages in the Bible.

For whatever reason, it’s really been on my mind the past few days, especially this one bit…

14 – I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well.

15 – My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, {And} skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth;

16 – Your eyes have seen my unformed substance; And in Your book were all written The days that were ordained {for me,} When as yet there was not one of them.

17 – How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them!

18 – If I should count them, they would outnumber the sand. When I awake, I am still with You.

To watch a parent as he/she looks at their child, or even speaks about their child, you can sense the closeness of their words, especially a mother’s. She carried that child in her womb. She gave birth to them. She raised them.

My parents maintained optimism in me even when I was acting like the biggest fool in the world when I was younger. They looked at me with pride, even when I gave them nothing of which to be proud. I can’t explain that.

Parents and their offspring have a symbiotic relationship; they are connected. When the child hurts, the parent hurts. When the child feels joy, the child feels joy. Just look at how a parent reacts when a kid at school picks on their child: THEY GO CRAZY! They’re calling principals and chewing out teachers…

God is constantly referred to as our Heavenly Father, but do we really understand what that means? Psalm 139 gives us a glimpse into that relationship. He saw us, felt us, loved us while we were being formed. He helped shape us, and knew exactly what we were to be like (long before our parents knew).

But the part that gets me: “How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them! If I should count them, they would outnumber the sand.”

When I’m at my worst…down, depressed, and feeling worthless, I have a God who not only loves me, but whose loving thoughts towards me are endless. I don’t know about any of you guys, but I’ve DEFINITELY needed that knowledge during the past few days and weeks.

Hopefully this post isn’t too cheesy for you, but this passage of scripture has meant a lot to me personally, and evidently has to my brother as well. I hope someone else gains from it…

Great…

Get ready to spend like a madman, folks.

Obama Notes “Tragic” U.S. Past.

Sen. Barack Obama, speaking to a gathering of minority journalists yesterday, stopped short of endorsing an official U.S. apology to American Indians but said the country should acknowledge its history of poor treatment of certain ethnic groups.

“There’s no doubt that when it comes to our treatment of Native Americans as well as other persons of color in this country, we’ve got some very sad and difficult things to account for,” Obama told hundreds of attendees of UNITY ’08, a convention of four minority journalism associations.

All right, so we insulted Native Americans by driving them out of their lands well over a century ago. Check.

“I consistently believe that when it comes to whether it’s Native Americans or African-American issues or reparations, the most important thing for the U.S. government to do is not just offer words, but offer deeds.”

Ohhhh, so with a faltering economy, we’re going to start spending like a madman to hand over money to Native Americans and most others who are considered “ethnic?”

If I’m not mistaken, haven’t Native Americans been living their lives tax-free, getting free rides through college, and generally been living it up for a very long time now?

And haven’t government mandates such as affirmative action done little more than incite newer, fresher racism into the mix?

I feel like Obama isn’t just promising the moon to everyone and everything that moves, but he also has the potential to erase decades worth of work towards better race relations. Expansive reparations are NOT going to help anyone in the long run. They will only highlight the fact that there is a notable differences between races, driving a wedge deep between us.

I know my generation, the one preceding it, as well as the one following. Race relations have never been better in this country. Sure, there’s a bit more work to do, but Senator Obama’s plan is definitely not the course of action that is going to solve any of these problems. He will simply intensify them.

And where is the money for these reparations going to come from? Well, they’ll come from higher taxes, of course. And who will be taxed heaviest? The middle-and-upper classes will bear the brunt of the load. Sure, that will unite America like never before.

If this is “Change we can believe in,” then I am a willful unbeliever.

(see what I did there? Christian joke)

Is This Really Necessary?

Since the forecast for the economy is somewhat bleak, fashion outlets like GAP, H&M, and Banana Republic are featuring “Depression Era” styles.

Do you hate the fashion industry just a little bit more every day?

Yeah, so now I’m depressed.

Raccoon Crazy

I had some people direct me to two raccoon videos recently, and I can’t get over how smart and human-like the little suckers can be sometimes. Since the weekends are a serious “down time” for blogs, I’m going to leave this post here and not even think about posting until Monday.

Until then…enjoy.

Keep in mind that you have to let this next one build up. There’s a boring spot right at the beginning. Just give it a minute.

Yao = Wow

I really don’t care about this story…

Yao Ming and many of China’s other top athletes pledged “glory to the motherland” on Friday as the nation’s biggest-ever Olympic team was unveiled for the Beijing Games.

At a ceremony in Beijing to unveil the squad of 639 athletes, basketball star Yao, reigning 110m Olympic champion Liu Xiang and dozens of others vowed in unison to do the nation of 1.3 billion people proud.

What I care about is this picture:

Slight height discrepancy, anyone? Yao is a beast.

Corry: Senior Photos

In the third and final chapter of my “catch-up” series, I present to you Corry, a senior from Caddo Magnet High School. This guy had a great personality, and made for quite a few natural and easy-going shots.

Corry and Renee (mother), thank you guys so much. Y’all were a joy to work with!

Darron & Chasity – Wedding

I’ve said so many good things about these two on my Flickr page and preview post that I’m probably bordering on making some people nauseous, but these people are more than just my friends…they absolutely rock.

Darron & Chas: THANK YOU!

(check out more from the collection HERE)

Preston & Emily

Wow, it took me forever to get around to this, but I’m FINALLY blogging this portrait set with my friends, Preston and Emily Parker. These guys are fan-daballa-tastic, and I was really, really happy they let me shoot their photos.

*high five*

Enjoy…

Thanks for looking!

82%

There are two lessons in the story I saw floating around the Drudge Report today: New York Times 2Q profit drops 82 percent.

New York Times Co. says its second-quarter earnings fell 82 percent from the year-ago quarter boosted by a one-time gain. Meanwhile, print advertising revenue continued to shrink.

The New York-based newspaper publisher says its quarterly net income dropped to $21.1 million, or 15 cents per share, which included 11 cents per share in buyout costs.

Well, that’s just so sad. I wonder if having proven liars on staff has anything to do with it?

Chief Executive Janet Robinson says business was hurt by the “U.S. economic slowdown and secular forces playing out across the media industry.”

Secular forces playing out across the media industry? Interpretation: people are turning to the Internet for their news (free, in most cases), not tired old rags that have lost their luster due to sloppy journalistic practices and a quite obvious bias.

Twitter: Run by Twits

I’ve been in love with Twitter for a few weeks for several reasons:

1. It requires very little time. I can tweet (a short, 140 character post) from my iPhone in about 30 seconds while I’m doing something else, so it’s not a worthless drain on time.

2. It’s a great social connection. I know what’s going on in my friends’ lives, even if they live hours away.

3. It’s popular. Let’s face it, sometimes we all join the lemming march off the cliff.

HOWEVER…Twitter had better get its junk together before services like Plurk steal its audience. What is Twitter’s problem? THIS:

It feels like every time I try to get on Twitter, I see the fail whale. WHY IS TWITTER CONSTANTLY DOWN?

I’m sure there’s a perfectly good explanation for why, and when, and who, and how, etc., but I really don’t care. I just want the stupid thing to work. Don’t give us excuses for months. You’re getting a ton of money; make it work!

On a completely unrelated note, I’m eating a delicious toasted turkey sandwich while editing photos, and it is DELICIOUS!

(See? That could’ve been a tweet instead of an addendum to a blog post, but since Twitter is down…)