April 19, 2016 (Kampala): I'm reading a little this morning about Copernicus and the letter he wrote to the Pope explaining his revolutionary idea that the earth moves. While studying astronomy, he noticed something was 'off', and it bothered him. Up till then, astronomers had held widely varying and often conflicting views on the basics …
Easter
Marcy 27, 2016 (Kampala): Today is Easter. The girls are excited about church and wearing their new dresses. I am reflecting on how I feel. I remember one Easter (1999), when I was attending a new church. In the pastor's presentation of Jesus, I was deeply moved. No doubt experiences like that, with all the …
Perfect children
March 20, 2016 (Kampala): My 'troubled relationship' is with my daughters. Perhaps I have idolized them as the 'perfect children', in the sense that I try to control them to make sure they're perfect. It manifests in two ways. First, I want them to be perfect (by my narrow definitions), and when they are not, …
Hybrid heritage
March 11, 2016 (Kampala): This morning I read the first chapter in the exciting new book I got: The Book of the Cosmos by Dennis Danielson. It's an anthology of cosmological literature spanning 4000 years. The first chapter compares ancient Greek and Hebrew views of the universe and its origin. I can summarize as follows: …
Stupid
February 25, 2016 (Kampala): The voice of guilt over being a terrible father has been growing louder. It's no surprise, since I've been unkind to my girls this week. It's almost like I can't help it. Yesterday I even mocked Mercy over something she said. Is this the real me? I self-righteously told them two …
Fire in the mind
February 16, 2016 (Kampala): George Johnson writes, in his book Fire in the Mind: "Whether there is hope of converging asymptotically on something called truth depends on whether you believe, like Plato, that mathematics and natural laws exist in and of themselves on some ethereal plane, or whether you believe they are human inventions at …
No breastfast
A journal entry from February 8, 2016, recounting our move out of Ikland: Thursday morning, February 5, I intended to have one last glorious quiet time in pristine Timu nature. But just after sitting down on my boulder, G padded up behind me and sat down beside me. My heart sank. Without asking, he picked …
Spark of recognition
February 2, 2016 (Timu): I woke up before 3:00 a.m. this morning, and thoughts flooded my mind. My body is tired, my gut wracked with pain. I feel like shit. One of the things that came to mind was what I want to say to my three old men - Iuda, Gabriel, and Simon - …
Wishful thinking
People with narcissistic tendencies often have what's called a poor 'reality test'. A reality test is the ability to accurately assess actual entities and events outside one's private inner world. In well-adjusted individuals, this testing is done continuously as a way to ensure that our inner world of experience and outer environment are calibrated and …
The Listener
January 27, 2016 (Timu): Yesterday was quite a day. My dictionary guys came, and we had a good session. I got some lovely new words: technical, culturally highly significant, and likely very ancient. For example, /b'ej'ékù-/, 'white ants that fly late in the season', or /wàsò-/, 'the stick that's bent over as the spring in …
