Announcing a New Blog: Matters of Conscience

Posted on October 26, 2016 by John Coleman

Dear Friends:

I’ve been thinking for a while of starting a second blog in order to keep my buzzkill social and political posts from skunking up A Napper’s Companion. Today I finally took the leap and set up Matters of Conscience.

It’s a work in progress, so if you’re interested in reading, please be patient as I work out the kinks. If you’re not interested, then please know that I value your opinions and made this move especially for you.

You may notice that I removed a couple of posts from this blog and sent them to the new digs. If you’ve been meaning to check out a post and can’t find it here, please try Matters of Conscience.

Peace and love,

John

The “cover” photograph for Matters of Conscience

A Napper Does Time

Posted on April 13, 2016 by John Coleman

A Napper Does Time

So I’m permitted to say in the most general terms possible why I have to be at the courthouse every day, but I won’t even do that. I’ll only say that I have to be there–don’t know how long exactly.

Not only will this obligation overrule siestas, but it will also deprive me of working in my beloved Oniontown. Meanwhile, I’ll certainly fall behind in reading my blogging friends’ posts and writing my own. A Napper’s Companion will offer tumbleweed and crickets.

Until my release, I leave you with a question: Would you place your trust in a face like this?

Forty-five minutes until reporting time

Belated Happy National Napping Day!

Posted on March 15, 2016 by John Coleman

Belated Happy National Napping Day!

Blogger’s Note: I had this post almost ready to go yesterday. Events conspired against me, though. Since A Napper’s Companion is thus far a gratis gig, the scrumptious words that follow had to wait until this morning. Enjoy a day late. Peace, John

Grandson Cole practicing sanity and wisdom . . . before his red hair came in

Thirty-five years ago at Behrend College in Erie, Pennsylvania, Mr. Michael Tkach did me a life-changing service. His persuasive writing class convinced me to become an English major. I was a milquetoast Business Management student, but once Tkach—pronounced tack—made me wrestle with fallacies, my major took a hairpin left–English it would be.

My former professor is now a friend, and today I owe him a second, albeit more quiet, thank you. The following Facebook message from Mike just landed in my box: “National Napping Day! I didn’t know about this, but I thought you might.”

“Joven Dormida” (Sleeping Girl) by Antonio Cortina Farinos on Wikimedia Commons

I do, in fact, know about today’s sane and gentle observance, always the day after our clocks spring forward an hour, but without fail I forget. According to wowktv.com, “William Anthony, Ph.D., a Boston University Professor and his wife, Camille Anthony, created National Napping Day in 1999 as an effort to spotlight the health benefits to catching up on quality sleep. ‘We chose this particular Monday because Americans are more ‘nap-ready’ than usual after losing an hour of sleep to daylight saving time,’” said Dr. Anthony, also known as the Napmaster General, in a BU press release.

The host of a blog called A Napper’s Companion should have this date circled in red on the calendar. I have one defense: for me, every day is National Napping Day. Thanks, Mike, not only for giving me a great steer decades ago, but also for sounding the alarm about this holiday.

“National Napping Day is probably for amateurs anyway,” Mike concluded. “You’re a pro.” I wish, old friend. Dedicated volunteer is more like.

When I started www.ANappersCompanion.com almost three years ago, I shared piles of information to defend and encourage napping. If you’re intolerably bored, you can dial back many months and find more benefits of the blessed oblivion of midday than any reader could wish for.

Jesus pleads. His disciples nap. “Christus am Olberge” (Christ on the Mount of Olives) by Andrea Mantegna (Wikimedia Commons)

But I don’t write much about napping anymore. First, the practice no longer needs any defense. Research rendered in snappy graphics are all over the Internet. Facebook crackles with exhortations and celebrations. Big business has slowly caught on to the wisdom of not only allowing naps but also dedicating space to them. Bill and Camille Anthony have served us well.

To date I’ve posted 179 essays on A Napper’s Companion, and one entitled “Napping Pods for $12,985: A Commentary” has been visited more than any other. By far! And much to my chagrin. I wish a couple of my other posts had attracted such numbers. WordPress sent me an alert yesterday that my stats were soaring. Cool beans, but nearly all the interest was in napping pods.

I’ve never even seen a pod in person, by the way. I remain a garden-variety napper who finds that a couch or bed works fine. A floor is okay, too, as long as I have a fluffy pillow. My siesta strategies haven’t changed over the years.

“The Nap” by Guillaume Van Strydonck. Time was I could relate, sister. (Wikimedia Commons)

But circumstances have eased. Pitiful as it sounds, napping used to be serious. The last fifteen years or so have included intense, excruciating stretches, some of which regular visitors to this blog know about. During the worst times, knocking off for an hour in the middle of the day was essential. I either stepped off the planet into oblivion or imploded. Heck, I almost broke down anyway.

It would be nice to say that I’ve grown or gotten stronger, but I’m as vulnerable as ever, unequal to many gauntlets humans must run. But for whatever reason, swords and clubs are fewer these days, challenges that slash at my spirit mostly disarmed.

Van Gogh’s “Mittagsrast (nach Millet)” (Wikimedia Commons)

I’m still devoted to naps not because I’ll fall apart without them but because they’re good for me. Some folks do well sleeping in one long session over twenty-four hours. I’m happy for them—really. Others’ schedules don’t allow a siesta, which is a shame if they’re tired.

National Napping Day has plenty of scientific support. I’m buoyed by the fact that my daily rest is blessed by research, but I’ll close my eyes in an hour mostly for subjective reasons. Napping is my way of kissing myself on the forehead and saying, “You’re trying to be a good man, John. Lie down and breathe.”

Happy National Napping Day and love to you all.

Wanting to Write about the Martyrs of Charleston

Posted on June 27, 2015 by John Coleman

Dear Napper’s Companions,

Toward the end of May, kind and thoughtful Mary sent me an email that has stayed with me. I had posted a newspaper column I wrote over a decade ago about the prospect of the United States bombing Iraq. Here’s most of Mary’s response:

I came home from my job . . . here in Asheville where you and I briefly met and realized that I have not read A Napper’s Companion in a while. It was a treat to read your posts all at once in the silence of my living room while my husband flipped through The Mountain Express and my Pug snored contentedly.

I enjoyed all of them except the political one, but it got me thinking. I think the political system is broken, because we are. I think we should all step back and let go of our identifying with political parties so strongly and begin to really, actually listen to each other. Perhaps more healing could take place. Hmm. More for me to think about and try to do.

The first words of Benedict’s Rule for monastic life: “Listen to the ear of your heart.” (Credit: Wikipedia)

First, Mary’s setting for reading is enchanting. Would that we all could relax in living rooms with a spouse honoring the silence and a dog snoring to provide the necessary punctuation.

But “I enjoyed all of them except . . .” made me pull up short. A baseball player who bats .300 has reason to celebrate. Thin-skinned writers, on the other hand, get moody over a .900 average. A single clunker can make us sulk and whine, “Aw, to bloody hell with the whole writing thing!”

In fact, I don’t bruise so easily. My stay at the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars thirty years ago gave me callouses, as did the fat file of rejection letters I’ve received from hundreds of magazines and book publishers. Mary’s except stung for an instant—a flu shot, a plucked eyebrow. The pinch was immediately followed by gratitude.

I wrote back, “I couldn’t agree with you more. I’m really grateful for your note because you’ve taught me something important.” Her lesson takes some explaining.

A week ago I savored the free Wi-Fi at a Panera Bread in Lyndora, Pennsylvania, and started a report about my week with kids and pastors at church camp. (You’ll get to read that soon enough if you want to.) Unfortunately, the joys of hanging out with fresh-faced teenagers and clergy friends intersected with receiving news of the nine martyrs of Charleston, South Carolina.

As I sipped mango iced tea and sighed, my intended report buckled under Dylann Roof’s scowl. Rather than staying in the woods of Camp Lutherlyn, I followed the thruway to Emanuel A.M.E. Church. Soon I was dissecting the latest installment in our national shame, and the kiddos and Martin Luther’s Small Catechism were hundreds of miles behind me.

I should have stayed at camp, where a butterfly rested on my sneaker.

I had a morning after experience when reviewing what I had written: “What did I do?” Even as I was droning on about a racist, terrorist attack, Mary’s except cautioned me. I should have known. Sampling around 1500 words, I felt like a cook who had spent hours on a dish that turned out bland. Eh!

The fact is, writers need to be open to learning their gifts and limitations. At fifty-three I would have hoped to be confident in my wheelhouse, but since most days I squeeze in at most an hour at the writing table, awareness has been delayed.

Ah well, as Sherlock Holmes said, “It is better to learn wisdom late than never to learn it at all.” Did you know that both William Shatner and Sebastian Cabot covered Bob Dylan? “Mr. Tambourine Man” and “It Ain’t Me, Babe” respectively, and others, too. The results, spoken rather than sung, were embarrassing and have been justly consigned to, well, camp. Captain Kirk seems to have embraced his inner pink flamingo. I don’t know about Mr. French.

There’s nothing much sadder than writers and artists who are under the impression that their stuff screams when, in fact, it’s eh or worse, ridiculous. (Lack of self-awareness is hardly sadness at all, of course, compared to getting murdered in a Bible study.)

I’ve written a fair amount about societal cancers and governmental rancor and absurdity because of the effort’s therapeutic purging. But in sharing such work, I may sound like a baritone trying to tackle “Nessun Dorma.” Some measures work, but the entirety doesn’t sing.

The point: Mary’s except, so gently rendered, invited me to recognize my voice, which has more to do with singing about my wife, children, grandson, and dog–close to the end, I’m afraid–than with spelling out what we humans can do to keep our species from imploding. More to do with celebration and lamentation than explanation. I enjoy having my say, but folks don’t stop by A Napper’s Companion to pick up ways to save the world.

I imagine if you’ve hung around here for long, you’re like Mary from Asheville, reclined in a quiet room with a sleeping Pug. You’re looking for a few minutes of hope, a port of joy or comfort in all kinds of weather, or a love letter.

Like you, friend, I don’t have much other than questions? (Credit: Wikipedia)

Or maybe a song and a prayer, which are good places to end. As I hold our family members who welcomed in a young man concealing bullets and rage, I’ve got no answers, no fix. But I do have a song, not from church camp, but verses from an old hymn:

From ev’ry ailment flesh endures

our bodies clamor to be freed;

yet in our hearts we would confess

that wholeness is our deepest need.

In conflicts that destroy our health

we recognize the world’s disease;

our common life declares our ills.

Is there no cure, O Christ, for these?

And I have a prayer:

Let there be a cure, Eternal Love,

and lead us to it.

A song and a prayer aren’t much, I know, but they’re all I’ve got.

Peace and love,

John

What I Hope My Grandson Will Remember

Posted on December 6, 2014 by John Coleman

A Napper’s Companion love, love, love alert. If you’re tired of me going on about grandson Cole, you are hereby issued a pass. My next post, already in progress, will be the customary blend of joyful and brooding. For now, if you can’t get enough of bald babies, come on in.

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Cole’s friendly monster first birthday party . . . by Elena Thompson and Cole’s groupies

Following my last silly post, Naming Monsters on Black Friday, dear blogging friend NapTimeThoughts and I had a little exchange that basically ended this way:

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Fifteen little monsters up for adoption

I wrote: “Wouldn’t it be great to sit with our grandmas again? Mine would have Vernors ginger ale and big brown tins of pretzels. Heaven.”

NapTimeThoughts wrote: “Mine would have coffee ice cream and graham crackers with butter on them, and we’d be playing Chinese checkers in the den. Someday Cole is going to have this conversation with someone, you know. What do you want him to remember?”

Not only does NapTimeThoughts have a belly-laughing, thoughtful blog, but she comments generously and genuinely on mine and others. Her question here has lingered with me in the days since she asked it. “What do you want [Cole] to remember?” My answer will change over time. Since Cole just celebrated his first birthday, he would be beyond genius if he remembered anything about me, should I cash in my chips in the near future.

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Whatever you remember about your gramps, kiddo, be sure to include color!

But a grandfather can hope. My Vernors and pretzels and NapTimeThoughts’ coffee ice cream, graham crackers with butter, and Chinese checkers are details—as my friend well knows—that help resurrect our grandmothers. A soda pop bottle, a cool marble, that’s all it takes. Suddenly, a personal, particular love lives again.

Thanks, NapTime, for a question worth a couple days’ reflection. (Credit: Wikipedia)

Good old NapTime enjoys a bit of back and forth, thank God. Her query was a gift that led me to an answer. “What do I want Cole to remember?” Assuming at this point he won’t recall my feeding him broccoli cheddar soup or his kissing my cheek with a peck and a mmmwah, I do pray that this one piece of Gramps takes hold.

Here’s What Happened

This morning daughter Elena and Cole showed up at the house. As usual, wife Kathy and Elena had a plot to hatch, so Little Lord Cole and I had to find a way to amuse ourselves. Grandma’s ginger snaps and a walk around the dining room was the ticket. Already eager to embrace multi-tasking, Cole gummed bits of cookie and reached for my mother’s old teapot on top of the china cabinet. In response, I channeled Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh—gently, without being heavy: “Cole, just enjoy the cookie. You don’t need to do anything else.”

This is life, Cole: taste the cookie.

“Yeah, right, Gramps,” he probably thought. But Cole is a deep soul. Once he had a fresh piece of ginger snap on his tongue, I stopped roaming and looked at him. We were perfectly alone. “Listen, Cole,” I said. “This is very important.”

He actually got still. Amazing. His only movement was the cookie lolling around in his mouth.

“You have to remember,” I said, “I love you. It doesn’t matter if things are really great or really bad, your gramps loves you. Nothing can change that.”

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Schmutz face or pristine face. National Honor Society or way out of line. A life-time promise, sir. I’ll never give up on you, and when you stumble, I’ll remind you of the good I see in you. Take that!

After Cole and Elena left, I walked around the house for a while, looking at the commonplace–the wilted blossoms of Cole’s great-grandmother’s Christmas cactus–through a watery blur of blessing.

Here’s What I Hope:

Cole will remember neither the cookie nor my words. And on glad days, he won’t need a rearview mirror to make do. But, my dear NapTimeThoughts, my answer to your question on my grandson’s first birthday is this: when he is old enough to shave and has done himself stupid harm, let spirit-memory bring back what I gave him this morning. Let him know that he is worthy of love. Let his shoulders recall these old arms drawing him close and let his cheek still feel the kiss of unconditional grace.

You won’t always be this cute, birthday bucko. No worries. When you get pimples and smell like sweaty socks, you’ll still be okay with me.

P. S. Thanks, NapTime. And Elena, could you put this one in Cole’s memory book, please?

Blogging, Awards, and the Longest Acceptance Speech Ever

Posted on March 21, 2014 by John Coleman

I’m a slow one, I am, but I catch on eventually. When I started A Napper’s Companion almost a year ago, it was a selfish endeavor. Editors were taking forever to get back to me about book submissions, and when they did, the answer was “Nope.” My morning writing discipline, nourishing as it was, occasionally felt like solitary confinement. So I stuck my neck out there with a blog, wanting mostly to get my stuff under somebody’s nose rather than letting it rot in my laptop’s guts.

All right, put your nose under those spectacles and read my stuff! (Credit: Radius Images / Corbis)

As the months have passed, I’ve received several nominations for blogging awards. The first time it happened I tried to track down the source of the award. Dagnabbit! Every road led to another blog. “Ah ha,” I thought, “this is a blogging gimmick.” So I settled on a policy: say thanks, be polite, but don’t engage.

But then something completely unexpected happened. Part one: it dawned on me that it was selfish to expect other bloggers to read my work if I didn’t read theirs. So I read and came to regard reading not only as an ongoing pleasure, but a responsibility. I don’t schedule blocks of time for keeping up with blogs I follow, but a couple times a week it happens: Coleman sits with a cup of coffee or a glass of wine and has great fun with my friends. Yes, I said it: friends. That’s part two: I never ever expected to find such a wealth of cool, funny, thoughtful friends in the WordPress community. I don’t suppose we’ll ever actually meet; hell, I don’t remember where most of them live. A few of them don’t pay much attention to my blog, but that’s okay. We’re comrades and considering the likes and comments some receive, they could spend several hours a day just following their followers and commenting thoughtfully. Not possible. Love them anyway.

Anyway, I’m accepting an award nomination today. I’ve known for decades that “writing is a quiet game”—can’t seem to track down who said so originally. What I’ve learned lately is that the blogging landscape is lovely, but, damn, is it crowded. WordPress stats say, “Over 409 million people view more than 13.1 billion pages each month.” Holy crap! But in the midst of all these voices, I’ve come to really connect with a little choir. In between reading posts, I think about my blogging mates (Australian lilt required). I hope they’re doing okay, and for some walking in the valley of the shadow, pray they’re still among the quick.

Among bloggers, awards are a way of patting each other on the back and extending genuine appreciation. Do we hope to increase our traffic a smidgen? I suppose so. But I’m accepting a nomination from blog bud nap time thoughts (I’ll do the same for another from kerry’s winding road in a separate post) for a human reason. She’s saying thanks, and I’m responding, “You’re welcome. And thanks back atcha!” I’m spreading and feeling the love.

I’m accepting a nomination for “the Quintet of Radiance Award,” which is actually a bundle of five awards. What the hey, why not go for a bundle? “Most Influential Blogger Award,” “Awesome Blog Content Award,” “Inner Peace Award” (by which my friend must mean “the Chunky Neurotic Dude Award”), “Sunshine Award,” and “The Versatile Blogger Award.”

My only obligation is to describe myself using the alphabet, but because I’m a sunshiny little pain in the arse, I’m going to use the letters to describe things I like. This may at times read like a shopping list:

A: Abiding Hope family (the church I serve as pastor), avocado, asparagus, artichoke hearts, anything Alfredo, art, America’s Test Kitchen, atheists and agnostics (see last item in this series), and agape (Greek for God’s unconditional love)

B: basil, books, blogging, cat Baby Crash, the Benedictine Sisters of Erie, the Buddha, Big Band, David Brooks (best right-of-center columnist), and Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings”

C: (so-cute-you-just-want-to-poop-your-trousers-along-with-my-grandson) Cole, curry, cardamom, cilantro, cabernet sauvignon, chardonnay, Chipotle Mexican Restaurant, Julia Child, contemplation, and compassion

Grandson Cole. Admit it, you kind of want to poop, right?

D: Desitin (should I join grandson in pooping), E. J. Dionne (best left-of-center columnist), dill weed, delete, dude, and dang

E: (wonder-daughter) Elena, eggplant (dredge in egg and flour, fry in grease, delete nutritional value), El Canelo Mexican Restaurant, and eros (Ew! This from a pastor? You bet. Gift from God!)

F: feta cheese, friends, Food ala Floyd, and fubsy (which means “short and somewhat squat”)

G: gravy (any denomination, salty and fatty, bitte), guacamole, Greek olives, and gentleness

Straw, please. (Credit: Koji Hanabuchi / Corbis)

H: the Harvard comma and Phil Harris

I: India pale ale and irregardless (which isn’t actually a word; it’s just regardless)

J: Jesus, Joe’s Cheese House (Marinette, Wisconsin; cheddar aged 16.5 years; eat or use to remove warts), and jogging (ten years ago I’d have said “running”; oh well)

K: Kathy (wifely; good Lord, how has she tolerated me for 33 years?), (“I’ve Got a Gal from) Kalamazoo, and Graham Kerr

Kathy, who could make any letter illustrious, with Watson.

L: lime, Louis CK (one is bright and refreshing, the other vulgar and hilarious), lasagna, Lutheranism, and love

M: Micah and Matt (son and son-in-law; proud as hell), meditation, monasteries, and music

N: nasty (a word I use for fart, as in “Oh, my dear chap, did you just emit a nasty?”; the actual item I can live without—really), “Nessun Dorma” (see T.), and napping

Swedish tenor Jussi Bjorling. Sang a mean “Nessun Dorma.” Died of drink too young. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

O: oregano, olive oil, the Oxford comma, and Mary Oliver

P: pesto, pinot noir, pizza, the Palmer (walk and wiggle your hips like one of those girls in Robert Palmer music videos), Louis Prima, Jacques Pepin, poetry, prayer, and peace

Q: query (wrote a ton of those dang letters)

R: Ricardo’s Restaurant (best filet mignon in Erie, Pennsylvania), roasted red peppers, Leon Redbone, and Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto

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Leon Redbone (Credit: Wikipedia)

S: Siestas, sleep, shalom, shamatha, cat Shadow, Starbucks, Star Trek (original television show), Star Wars, sour cream, salmon, the serial comma, Paul Simon, and Steely Dan

T: operatic tenors (opera not so much, just take me to the mountain top) and tomatoes

U: uvula (just a fun word for the phlegmy stalactite hanging from the back of your throat)

V: Victory Chimes (a schooner in Maine) and singing along with Viagra commercials (“Viva, viva, Viagraaaaa!)

W: dog Watson, white pepper, E. B. White, weenus (slang term for your loose elbow skin), wine, The Writer’s Almanac, and writing

X: X-rays (thank God; they eliminate exploratory drilling)

Y: yield signs (permission for rolling stop granted)

and

Z: Zen, Zoloft, and Brother John Zuber and his fellow monks at Gethsemani.

Okay, that was genuinely fun, but it’s time to move on. (I just know I’m leaving something really important out.)

I’m also supposed to nominate other bloggers for the “Quintet of Radiance Award.” I follow lots of blogs and am nominating only those I think might welcome such a nod. If I’m wrong, please forgive. Here goes, friends:

a little elbow room

always backroads

deep in the heart of textiles

coffee talk with Erin

Rosie smrtie pants

one thousand two

plan B-each