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The response of the blogging world literally overwhelmed Anton (in a good way) and he decided to revamp the site and resources and take the time to allow the mass participation that his original idea generated. What this means is that you can participate still. The official start date of the project is March 17. I’ve put my stories on hold until then so I can start with the new date and go the whole year.

If you’ve felt motivated to be creative this year and want a community that will help encourage that head over to Project52 and sign up (don’t forget to join the Google Group).

I’ll be back with a new story next week.

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I went to a private Christian academy where we did not have “dances.” Instead we had Formals. But they served the same purpose. At the most awkward stage of life we’re supposed to ask out someone and have a grand evening together with our class mates.

I’d never really been on a date before but for some odd reason I resolved to go to the Formal my Freshmen year. I had my eye on Darlene, a short, spicy, hispanic girl that was always up to something mischievous. A good friend of mine also wanted to ask Darlene out. After basketball one morning I told Dan “you have two weeks to ask her to the formal. If you don’t, I’m going to.”

He didn’t. So I gathered all the courage my nerdy heart could muster and asked Darlene. She said yes. Dan was mad. I didn’t care.

I spent the next few weeks in awkward conversations with Darlene. We enjoyed each others company but I could tell that the chemistry wasn’t there for anything more than friendship.

Neither Darlene or I could drive so we took the bus to the formal. I had a tux and she had an elegant black dress. We had a great ride on the way over to… you know I actually don’t remember where the formal was held. It was probably in some fancy hotel in Los Angeles. But I do remember the room.

The ball room was magnificent, filled with long, narrow tables ladened with silverware and napkins folded in fancy, grown up ways. We all sat down and the nervousness dissipated in favor friendly conversion and a good time.

A waiter came to the table and asked if we would like some coffee. Darlene perked up and said “oh yes please, gimmie” in a way only a freshmen high school girl can get away with.

I hesitated. I’d never had coffee. Further, the particular Christian denomination I grew up in frowned upon coffee. Frankly, I was surprised it was offered at all. The waiter may as well have offered me a beer or a shot of vodka.

The waiter poured Darlene a cup. It was a deep black and the steam drifted slowly up into the air, disappearing in a alluring way. It was seductive.

“Yes, please. I’ll have a cup.” I tried to say it like I’d had coffee all my life and that this was routine. But I think it was obvious I’d never had the stuff before.

I took a sip. I can still remember the deep, foreign flavor of it. It was earthy, sharp, and very bitter. My body loved it, my tongue didn’t know what to do with it. I set the cup back down and just starred at it. I took another sip. I let it sink in. This was good. This was complex. This wasn’t easy. This was love.

My friends told me later that Darlene was hoping I’d ask her to be my girlfriend but I never did. I think the coffee had a lot to do with that.

In coffee I had discovered a new, adult world. It was a first step into something I knew nothing about. I didn’t want a girlfriend, I wanted to know more about this world that produced a drink so disturbingly good. There was a mystery there that I knew was important to figure out first. If I could understand coffee, I had a shot at understanding relationships.

Years later I am a coffee snob, no doubt about it. I hand grind my coffee, carefully eyeing the fineness of the grind before adding it to stove top moka maker. I only use fresh roasted coffee from local shops that know how to roast. I get to know the roast masters personally so I can be sure that they know what they are doing. 

I like my coffee complex, hot, spicy, with a delicate finish. Drinking coffee let’s me experience good conquering evil, a victory on the tongue with each sip. I never settle for lesser coffee, even if its free. Its not about the caffeine.

My marriage is like this, only better. I’m a marriage snob of sorts. I’ve taken the time to know what I’m doing. I never settle, even if its easier.

Like my coffee, my marriage is exquisite. I take as much care with the details of everyday life with The Best Wife Ever (Hi Laura!) as I do preparing my patented Diablo Mocha. Each day is a small victory that makes life with her all the better.

I told myself that if I wanted to write a book, then I should at least be able to write one measly 5-700 word blog entry each week… if I couldn’t at least do that, then I had no business even dreaming about being a “real” author someday.  And when I put it that way, it sort of pissed me off. - Marc Wagner

Marc describes himself as “a local writer, musician, and physician who loves words and music, windsurfing, and going on adventures with Janine and the kids.”  He blogs regularly for his church at ConnXions and has written for reviews for Spectrum: Adventist Forum.

I met Marc and his wife Janine on one of our first visits to Bend Oregon because he happened to go to Medical School with my step-brother who set us up on a lunch date. Years later when we finally made it to Bend Marc was one of the first real friends I made and I’ve appreciated his passion for life ever since.

I wanted to interview Marc because he is in transition almost constantly. This is a trend I see in web professionals all the time, myself included, and I wanted to explore that in a completely different context to help understand the transitions in my own life a little better.

Marc is a doctor, who writes. In any creative field there is a tension between how one decides to pay the bills and what someone does to release creative energy. The second part is often seen as a hobby and not taken seriously, especially by others. As we grow older there is constant tension that forces transitions in both aspects of our identities.

So when I found out that Marc had completed a goal of his by self-publishing There and Back Again: Finding Your Spiritual Home, Right Where You Left It, I knew I had to find out more about that.

Marc, congrats on getting your first book published! Its been inspiring to watch the process. Would you describe yourself as a writer who also happens to be a doctor or a doctor turned writer or something else?

I was a writer long before I became a doctor.  I remember when I was 12 years old I embarked on my own version of Lord of the Rings, without reading the books.  Somehow the artwork from the Return of the King cartoon really got me going.  I got about 30 pages into my version of the story and then stopped because it was such a shameless knock off.  Or at least I supposed it was.  In my file cabinet, I still have those crumpled pages, smudged with fingerprints and my #2 pencil scrawl.

Since those early days I have never really gone very long without journaling.  I was fortunate enough to travel extensively in my teens and twenties and it fueled my imagination, almost forced me to write, just to keep up:  The Tower of London, the Berlin Wall, Arc de Triomphe, Roman Aqueducts, the Baths of Caracalla, the Alps, Hong Kong, Thailand, Taiwan, trekking the Anapurnas of Nepal, my brother’s wedding on the Black Sea…  You’ve just got to write that stuff down.  I remember tramping through Nepal, writing volumes on a tiny keyboard attached to my Palm Pilot (not that I still use a Palm Pilot, you understand, but it worked great because it ran on two AAA batteries for days on end—the best high mountain substitute for a laptop I’ve found yet.)

I know that considering yourself a writer has been a challenge at times. How did you finally come around to being comfortable with the idea that you are a writer?

Writers write; that’s what they do.  So if you’re writing regularly, you’re a writer, by definition.  You don’t have to be a published author.  Every author was first a writer.

Having said that, there is an emotional identity that lags behind the mechanical recognition that you are a writer.  It’s an emergent identity.  Not a choice.  It comes by doing, like hunger sometimes comes with eating.  You sort of bite into it and then get into it, and the feedback tastes good, and at some point, you say, “I think I have a book in me.”

What was the biggest obstacle in getting the book written and how did you overcome it?

The biggest obstacle in writing “There and Back Again” was writing when I didn’t feel like it, when I didn’t have anything to say.  This is where setting small goals was helpful. I told myself that if I wanted to write a book, then I should at least be able to write one measly 5-700 word blog entry each week, which translates into about 100 pages of standard book text a year.  Now, of course, a one-hundred page book is a very short book.  And I figured if I couldn’t at least do that, then I had no business even dreaming about being a “real” author someday.  And when I put it that way, it sort of pissed me off.  So I wrote, whether I felt like it or not, just to spite the naysayer in me.

What part of the book are you most proud of?

I’m most proud of the memoir-essay, “Finding Father”, which begins the book, because it’s the closest I’ve come to good story telling.  “There and Back Again” was really a personal essay project, and while I’m good at the essay form, what I really want to be when I grow up is a conduit for good stories, well told.

What’s your next writing project?

My next project?  A book of short stories, definitely.  It will probably contain elements of essay, but I really want to get my story game on.  This is a much more daunting project because I feel there is just so much I have to learn:  dialog, plot, setting, action, exposition, each an art form in and of itself.  It’s overwhelming.  In fact, I’m sitting here thinking that maybe what I should do is take one story that features one skill, say dialog, and really get that right, then do one story that features a sense of place and get that right, then a story that feature narrative action, and so on.  I don’t know if that
will work since every good story contains multiple elements.  But it’s a thought.

I’m encouraged as I look over my old journals, though.  There are already some short stories in them.  I’ll probably start there. Editing an old idea is easier than coming up with a new one.  And my journals are full of autobiographical snapshots that will probably serve as the mainstay of material for the next book anyway.  As the adage goes, write what you know.

He openly invites Atheists, agnostics, Catholics, and others to dialog with him and his audience over a number of issues with the goal of better understanding each other, not proselytizing or tearing down the opposition. For example, read his interview with Dr. Valerie Tarico and A Letter from an Agnostic. Its important to read the comments on the above as well to understand what I’m getting it in terms of his gift.

Last year Michael rocketed out of the Christian Blogosphere and into the mainstream (at least briefly) with his essay The Coming Evangelical Collapse. This essay got him every where from the The Christian Science Monitor, the BCC, CNN, The Drudge Report, Daily Kos, countless others.

Michael writes:

I believe that we are on the verge- within 10 years- of a major collapse of evangelical Christianity; a collapse that will follow the deterioration of the mainline Protestant world and that will fundamentally alter the religious and cultural environment in the West. I believe this evangelical collapse will happen with astonishing statistical speed; that within two generations of where we are now evangelicalism will be a house deserted of half its current occupants, leaving in its wake nothing that can revitalize evangelicals to their former “glory.”

This essay is not your typical blog rant. Its a thoughtful exploration of what western Christianity has done wrong over the past several decades. His basic premise is that Evangelics are about uplifting a cultural agenda instead of Jesus.

Evangelicals have identified their movement with the culture war and with political conservatism. This was a mistake that will have brutal consequences. They are not only going to suffer in losing causes, they will be blamed as the primary movers of those causes.

The setup for the entire series, in my opinion, his Michael’s call to return to a Jesus focused Christianity instead of engaging in political and cultural wars. In short, the more Jesus matters to you, the less important the culture wars will be to you. Currently mainstream Evangelics measure your allegiance to Jesus by your adherence to their cultural war mandates.

Over the past year Michael wrote a book. Its called Mere Churchianity, Find Jesus Shaped Spirituality.

Tragically, last year Michael also got cancer. Fortunately it looks like Michael will recover. Unfortunately he lost his job as a result of the cancer which also means his health care will run out this month.

Regardless of your religious beliefs you want to support someone like Michael. Civility on the internet around critical topics such as belief and non-belief is virtually non-existent. His voice enables real discussion between reasonable people of differing beliefs. Please take a look at Internet Monk and if anything interests you consider pre-ordering a copy of Michael’s book.

I’ll buy a copy for the first 5 people to leslie@salvator.me with an address that Amazon.com US will ship to.

My wife, Laura, set me up with a personal trainer three Christmases ago. At my first appointment, Kael asked me what I wanted from working out.

“All I want is to not be fat again,” I told her. She laughed.

“That’s not going to work! For this to stick, you need to know who you want to be.” Kael said it very kindly, with confidence, and in a tone that also made clear there was to be no argument about this.

I felt lost. I truly didn’t know what else to want. I told her my story. Kael pulled a pencil out of her pony tail and began taking some notes. She stopped me a few times to ask questions as I went along. Then she smiled, with a look of determination in her eye.

“Okay, first thing we’re going to do is get you to a base level of fitness. Once we get there, we can figure out what’s next.”

The following Wednesday, Kael took me through my first routine. I learned about how to stand while holding free weights, how to do a proper crunch, three different kinds of lunges, and what to do with a few of the weight machines as well. The hour flew by and I spent another thirty minutes hounding Kael with question after question, which she answered thoroughly.

On Friday, I went through the workout on my own and my body came to life. For the first time in ever, my body felt right. It was a shy feeling at first, but after a few more sessions with Kael, my body was gaining confidence with every rep, every sit-up, and every minute with a jump rope.

Three months later, Kael asked me to sign up for an outdoor bootcamp and before I knew it I was in class with three middle-aged women and a sixty-five year old woman, all in considerably better shape than I was. The five of us formed an unlikely team. Three times a week we met with Kael outside on a sand volleyball court and worked ourselves silly: sprinting, crawling, running up stairs, lifting weights, and doing everything we could to improve ourselves for those forty-five sand-filled minutes.

I came home sweaty and covered in sand, my body rejoicing. Laura hosed me off outside before I ventured back into the house for a proper shower.
A year later I was in the best shape of my life. I moved my family to Bend, Oregon, kept working out and feeling good, but Kael’s question still haunted me.

“Who do I want to be?”

I confided this story to Patricia, a bootcamp instructor I met in Bend. I’d been working with Patricia for awhile. Like Kael, she laughed at me.

“Leslie, you’re an athlete! Can’t you see that? Your body wants to be an athlete.”

I broke out in a big smile. Patricia was right; I had become an athlete without even realizing it. Then a surprising thing happened. My body spoke up.

“I want to be a Titan.” My body said.

“You mean a big weight lifter?” (I felt weird talking to my body.)

“No. A Titan. The original athletes. The ones who were always ready for battle, capable of handling any physical situation. That’s who I am supposed to be.”

“Okay body, let’s do it.”

So that’s what my body and I are up to. We’re working together to become a Titan. We work on that two to four times a week with an amazing trainer named John over at Elite Fitness along with two other partners. My body and mind are whole and connected for the first time in my life. I want more.

I’m not telling this story to brag or show off. I’m telling this story because there are other people like me. People who need to know that it’s possible. It’s incredibly difficult; it’s absolutely worth it.

The Fat Dragon sometimes shows up and tries to drag me back into the old ways. But now I turn, laugh at him, and he runs away. I usually chase him down and give him a good beating as payback for the decades of abuse because Fat Dragons are easy prey.

My friend Andru from Gear Live invited me to take part in the Gear Live & Friends donation matching for Haiti.

I happily said yes and got one of my best friends, Roger Rustad, to throw in with me. Together we’ve put up $1200 for matching donations.

We need your help to turn that $1200 into $2400 and help Gear Live turn the $5650 in matching donations into $11,300. Better yet, if you have as little as $50, contact Andru and add yourself as a matching donor.

Here’s how it works. Just use your cell phone and donate $10 to Red Cross by texting the word HAITI to 90999 or donate $5 to YELE by texting the word YELE to 501501. Then leave a comment saying you donated over at Gear Live. If you prefer a different charity, just leave a comment over there letting us know where you donated. We’re not going to be police about it.

Our $1200 in matching donations is going to the The Nebraska Global Orphan Project because I personally know some of the people involved and have witnessed the fruits of their labors first hand.

But, bottom line, find a way to give.

By 10th grade, my five foot seven inch frame weighed one hundred and ninety-five pounds. In my head, the line between fat and obese was a mere five pounds away.

My freshman year had provided just the right mix of high school cruelty balanced with acceptance by fellow nerds that I’d developed a callousness regarding my weight; I hated my fat and what it did to me, but I could still live the life I wanted. And that included some physical activity. I was short, but my fat gave me an advantage in playground basketball (one of my favorite activities).

Watching the Lakers, Pistons, and Celtics play over the years helped me develop a fugly (boy was it) inside game. My mean left hook and surprisingly quick drop step combined with a frame that could move people much taller than I got me past the first round of varsity tryouts. I couldn’t sprint from one end of the court to the other, so that was the end of it.

One morning, walking between Homeroom and Algebra, I walked past one of the gym teachers talking to another adult. I don’t remember if the second adult was also a teacher but I assume so. Let’s call him Mr. Ball.

When Mr. Ball thought I was safely out of earshot he said, “See that guy? See how he untucks his shirt? He does it so people won’t think he’s a total lardball. But it doesn’t work (chuckles). He’s still a fatso.”

I kept walking but I wanted to throw up. It was that precise moment I gave up the battle with fat. By the time I reached Algebra class, my callousness had turned to depression.

For the next three years I simply let myself go.

I stepped out of the steam of the community shower, wrapped my towel around me and headed back to my college dorm room. It was the second quarter of my freshman year. I started getting dressed. I found my shoes, looked down, and started crying. I could not see my feet. My belly dominated everything else. I was two hundred and forty-five pounds.

At that exact moment I decided to stop being fat. It wasn’t something I was going to try to do. I was just going to do it. I started immediately by making a simple change to my diet: I stopped eating cheese. I stopped eating peanut butter. I only allowed myself one serving per meal. That evening, I walked a mile around the track. I turned these small determinations into habits and dropped forty-five pounds in six months. I didn’t stop there.

I read about losing weight. I read about good eating habits. I read about regular exercise. I implemented a lot of those things over the years until I weighed one hundred and seventy pounds.

I kept 70 pounds off for over a decade but being “not fat” was a constant battle with no end in sight. My opponent, the Fat Dragon, was relentless in his pursuit.

On the outside I was a completely different person, but on the inside it didn’t matter what the scale said, what mattered was what the Dragon said. The Dragon’s attack was always the same. “You will always be fat. I will make you fat again. Fear me.”

That decade, I liberty my body while enslaving my daily life to fear of being fat again. In many ways this was worse than being fat. I was constantly running from the phantom of who I wasn’t supposed to be.

I had to kill the Dragon. I needed a sword. I needed help. Fortunately, I have the best wife ever. Ever.

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