Mín Englisc Blog

(1) LORD, hearken to my prayer; My supplication hear. Reply in truth and in righteousness. And with Your servant now To judgment do not come, For in Your sight no man is just.
(2) The foe has hounded me; My life to earth he crushed. Entombed he kept me as those long dead. My spirit therefore faints, Within me overwhelmed. My heart in me is desolate.
(3) I days of old recall; I muse on all Your deeds; I ponder long what Your hands have wrought. I stretch my hands to You; My soul longs after You As thirsts a dry and desert land.
(4) Haste, LORD, to answer me! O how my spirit fails! Hide not the light of Your face from me, Lest I become like those Who to the pit go down. O let me not with them descend.
(5) Let me Your mercy hear When morning light appears; I flee to You for my hiding place. Teach me to know the way; Show me how I should walk, For I lift up my soul to You.
(6) Deliver me, O LORD, From all my enemies; That You may hide me I flee to You. Teach me to do Your will; My God of Spirit good, O make me dwell in upright lands.
(7) For Your name's sake, O LORD, Deal graciously with me; Relieve my soul in Your righteousness. My foes slay in Your grace; Destroy my enemies, Because I am Your servant true.

Of late, I've been again downcast, feeling quite despondent and often lonely despite the presence of others around. It might be worse; the darkness has not been my closest friend. Although I did not know it, depression is a possible side effect of some of my medicines, and now that we are aware of it, we've talked to the doctor's office and hope to be able to do better. It's not at all comfortable to have one's mind so altered. I thank God that my lot is in lands more perfect than it seems, and that I have a good heritage in what he has given, regardless of how it may seem at certain times. Ensure that you keep me in your prayers: I'm wearied by these medicines, and I long to be relieved from my burden as I have never before longed. Pray, too, that this might not be forever a thorn in my flesh, especially since I've not received surpassingly great relevations!

One week's schoolwork done. I've also been able to get some historical work done, transcribing the minutes of the Synod of 1831 (the only one I'd not been able to do before) and reading a bit otherwise. On the other hand, I've likely gotten a small parttime job at McCartney Library: the idea is to be working with the papers of Clarence Macartney, a famous preacher after whom the library is named (not sure why the spelling difference), and I hope to be able to start early next week. It looks better on a hopeful librarian's résumé to have worked at a library than just to have worked at a sandwich shop :-)

School has resumed; I'm through three days of classes so far. We've been so busy with preparing to resume school, with the tests in Cleveland, and with actually getting set up here that I've been actually somewhat stressed out and not had a ton of incentive to post. I hope not to have any more droughts like this.

Today, I've made plenty of progress with work: I'm now 2/3 done with another minutes book, that of St. Johnsbury RP in late nineteenth-century Vermont.
Tomorrow, we're looking to visit Grandmother — only Mom and Dad will be driving, but because Isaac and I are to be flying down :-)

Here is a picture from flying with Isaac a few months ago.

Today was a unique event: an informal retirement party for a military officer who's the senior assistant Scoutmaster for the Boy Scout troop in which I was a member. This was simply for family and friends, not the formal dinner for other military members.


This, Temple Rodef Shalom, is one of the most impressive buildings that I saw in Pittsburgh, outside of downtown. It's a Reform Jewish synagogue.

Sorry for no posts for so long: since my testing finished on Monday, I've been quite busy with various things, and forgot about posting to a large extent. It doesn't hurt, of course, that I enjoy having the face of one of my favorite writers on the top of the blog, especially with his death being such a sad occasion.
One way in which I've been busy is related to church history: today alone I put in over six hours of time transcribing documents, especially the minutes of our Hot Springs congregation in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico.

I was reading tonight a little on various subjects, and found this interesting story about square watermelons. They cost several times the price of a normal shape of watermelon, but imagine the convenience: they stack very easily, and the novelty is quite interesting.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn has died.

I've now had enough small seizures (again, nothing bigtime, but quite sufficient for the sake of observation) that the one doctor I've seen today told me that I'll today be put back on my full daily dosage of medicine. I've had enough of the little seizures that I've been told not to press the button to alert nurses. It seems quite possible that the EEG and related scanning (i.e. being hooked up to the machines) will be concluded tomorrow. Happy :-)

Overall, my time here in Cleveland has gone quite well: as the doctors have stopped two of my three medicines, I've had perhaps eight small seizures — none at all severe, most of which had no symptoms visible to the eye — which are yielding the type of data that they need to understand my condition. Many people spend a week here, or even more, but it looks like I should be able to be done with this testing by Monday: it's quite possible that I'll stay until Tuesday, but because we're hoping to have some extra testing done that would otherwise have required us to make another trip up here before surgery. I'm thankful that my worst problems are (1) the IV hurts a little bit when I touch it [but less than I feared!], and (2) I can't use the computer when it's charging [it messes up the EEG that I'm on], so there's a lot of time that I can't use it, and I can't work with images as I expected to be able to do.

Sorry for no posts until now: I've been really busy this week between various things. We received the call last night, and now I'll be leaving within a few minutes for Cleveland to begin my several days of testing there.