bierkergaard

2 Cor 5:14,15 For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died;  15 and he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again. As mentioned last week, I was camping for a couple of days in the mountains of Pennsylvania recently. I am ambivalent about camping. I love the outdoors and the activities yet also don't do well in extreme heat and humidity. Camping in the summer is typically sweaty and sultry. My body develops a serious itch over the summer which makes me want to avoid the heat and humidity like Dracula does with the sun. I have tried to figure out if it is a lack of hydration, body oils, or something I am consuming. Or a combination. It happens every summer and sets in late June and doesn't depart to mid-September. I have to avoid full body showers and instead sponge-bath the crucial bodily areas all summer long. The shower d...

On Friday evening before dusk, I went for a drive up in the mountains. I was camping with a fam and they had to run some errands, including getting some Hershey Bars for smores down in the closest town of Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania. About an hour round trip from the campground. Why it is called Jersey Shore is puzzling. Maybe I will check into it if the question continues to pester me. Maybe not, and just savor the mystery! I went in the opposite direction, towards a town that was on the other end of the state park. I was feeling very nostalgic as the rurality reminded me of living in West Virginia from 1967 to 1970. So many hills and rivers and roads through them.  My backyard in West Virginia had a deep ravine. I love the mountains. It is in my blood.  Couldn't live where I was, though. Far too isolated from other things I like such as ethnic food and culture, etc. I am a suburban person in the end. My little patch of grass. Close to the river, work, conveniences, and ...

Continuing the Portland, Maine, thread, we had a whale of a time up in that town a couple of weeks ago. I am using  a seafaring term with whale intentionally, since Portland is on the coast. I am also picking up Moby Dick to try and read it for about the 17th time. So, I have whale on the mind. Heck, if I can read Soren Kierkegaard's Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses , I can read anything. Of course, it took me about five years to do so. Slow and steady. The final literary battle is Brothers Karamazov . The best thing about traveling is connecting with old friends and making new friends. I was able to hang out with two friends who had formerly lived in Lancaster who now reside in the Portland area. One of the guys, I had not seen in person for over a decade. Chalk up one positive to Facebook; we had reconnected there. I had forgotten how funny the dude is. It wasn't long before we were busting each others chops, the way guys do when they like each other. He and I once said...

View from a hotel in Portland A few weeks ago, a buddy texted me and asked if I wanted to do a road trip to Boston. I replied that I had been to Boston a lot in the last 15 years and would he consider Portland, Maine, instead. About three more hours up the road but a new place to explore. He was all in and we began  to plan for a visit. I dig when something goes from and idea to an experience in quick fashion. Get out of my head and onto the road. I had tried to get to Portland last summer and it just wasn't in the cards. Portland has a thriving craft beer scene and I also know people who live there, so it was a win on both the beer and relationship counts. We had a wonderful time and I may blog about it more next week with the details.   When I went to search for lodging, I couldn't find anything that seemed affordable. Corporations own the search results and there were no bargains to be had. On top of it, putting in Portland without the Maine typically always bro...

I am a sucker for motivational quotes. Posted this above meme today on Facebook. Progress, as it is said, not perfection. I am heading out of town again this weekend (early Friday actually) for Portland, Maine. The other Portland. I have been wanting to get up there for a couple of years for the scenery (Portland is on the Atlantic Ocean), food, and craft beer. I also have some friends who live up around Portland and we, my buddy and I, will partake of these three items over the days and nights we're are up there. So, I will be busy tomorrow packing and making plans for an early Friday departure and won't be back until Monday sometime. So, I am blogging now because I certainly won't be doing it up in Portland. The time is too valuable. All week I have been trying to keep to my plan of eating healthier. Essentially, eating well but better. That translates to a lot of vegetables in two out my three meals a day. Frankly, I have never liked vegetables. Can't say th...

Just returned from the Jersey Shore from a family event. I was able to catch up with all of my cousins as well as my brothers. There are 8 boys and only one girl in our generation of children. Within a couple of generations, there will be a lot more Bierker's in the U.S. Not from me in all likelihood, unless something Abrahamic happens. It was neat to get to know my cousins' kids' better or even meet them for the first time. One of them was wiping wedding cake frosting on his face like war paint last night at dinner and my older brother and I were egging him on. His dad, at a different table, was super chill about it and found it amusing too. Good parenting. Let kids have some fun. Adulthood will beat fun out of them if they are not able to keep that kid fire alive and part of this sustainability is the ability to be a kid when a kid. I have worked with far too many teens who are prematurely parentified for one reason or another. I don't believe I would be a good p...

This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously - no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption.”   C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory I had a one of the students in my class, after the school year had ended on Friday afternoon and she was outside of the school front entrance on a bench with another student who had also been in my class, ask me if I had been the class clown when I was in high school. In my class I had tried to have a sense of humor with the kids. Forty-five days for 90 minutes daily is a looooong time to teach Study Skills to rammy and restless 9th graders. She thought I was funny.   I did have them period 1/2 and most of them were still sleepy...that was a plus. Easier to dial up than dial down.     Humor was both tactical and strategic, to keep the kids guessin...