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Saturday, September 08, 2007

impression; presentation

impression

A quick one for this early evening...this morning while Joyce, my Joyful Harvest (the ELCA's welcoming evangelism program) companion and I were walking together, hanging door hangers on doors, I commented how nice the neighborhood was. Joyce (a teenager) replied, "Yes! Lots of shade." It was decades ago and technically had a different focus, but the cry still applies--from the Stones "Gimme Shelter"--
Oh, a storm is threatening
My very life today
If I don't get some shelter
Oh yeah, I'm gonna fade away
We were in the old, revitalizing community of North [of Balboa] Park, with its mostly old housing stock, and after Joyce's comment I started looking closely at the single- and multi-family dwellings that were in every stage of repair, disrepair and renovation imaginable! For almost two hours we walked a fairly limited span of mostly residential city streets, and the variety was amazing, but I began to notice the chunks of space that impressed me as feeling best and pleasantest were the ones with the most shade trees; those trees sometimes had newly painted, well-renovated houses nearby and sometimes kind of shabby ones. Sometimes our cry and our most immediate need is for shelter, sanctuary and shade, right?

presentation

When I worked as a line chef, our boss The Chef used to visit new restaurants. I recall his telling us about one in particular in a neighborhood that would qualify as a La Jolla equivalent here in Paradise. The Chef said when he really began tasting the food he realized it definitely was okay, though not noteworthy, but the presentation was gorgeous! Appearances do count, and they can add up quickly.

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