I Love Soccer

Last night the Red Team finished a great season losing a tough game in the semi finals. We won our first game 4-2 and then after an hour and a half of rest got beat by the Ref's team 4-1. "The Ref" is this guy named Yousef (sp?) who actually does ref most of the games, except when his team is playing. It is strongly rumored that Yousef once played on the Russian "A" team, whatever that means. It shows because he makes everyone on the field just look silly!!

This morning I got up at 7:00 to watch France play Senegal in the first game of the World Cup! It was a great game with lots of good action and I am officially stoked for World Cup goodness.

Jump the Tracks

At Park Street there is access to the redline from both sides of the train. There is a platform, maybe 6 feet high on either side of the tracks where people can stand and wait. Quite often when I'm waiting for the train at this station I find myself fantasizing about jumping across the tracks! I'm not a really good judge of distance, but I'd say it's around 15 feet across. I'm pretty sure I couldn't make it, but I wonder if I could get far enough to crash into the other side and scramble up. If it was a Fear Factor challenge to jump across the tracks would I make it? I also sometimes wonder if anyone else is thinking about jumping across the tracks.... so are you?

Grace at Johny D's

My small group has started a new study on the book What's so Amazing About Grace, by Phillip Yancey. Yancey is one of my favorite christian authors and I've already read the book, but it's one I can read again. The book tries to convey the meaning of grace, not by explaining it, but by demonstrating real examples of grace.

One of the assignments for my small group is to try and notice examples of grace in my daily life. This weekend at Johnny D's, I saw some grace. Johnny D's is a bar / restaurant in Davis Square. Every Sunday afternoon there is a Blues Jam at the bar where musicians come and sign up to take turns on stage. This Sunday I went to the jam for the first time with my roommate Luke, who wanted to play the drums (Nice work Luke!). Not long after the music started playing I saw an older man with downs syndrome come into the bar and walk up towards the front of the stage. He pulled out a harmonica and begin to play "air harmonica" as he swayed around to the music. Luke who had been to the blues jam before said that the man was a regular and came every week. I thought it was great that the bar and the group of regulars let this man participate. It's not like he was really disrupting anything, but at the same time it wouldn't be much of a stretch to imagine wanting to keep him out. He stood front and center playing his harmonica and blowing occasional kisses to the crowd. He wasn't making Johny D's any money on food or drinks, and I wonder if he even payed his $2 cover to get in. I imagine someone could easily complain about the harmonica man, but instead everyone let him have his space. Just seeing him sway to the music brought a smile to my face. Not only because he looked kind of silly, but more importantly caus I could see how much he was enjoying himself. Towards the end he got an even bigger chance to shine when the leader of the jam held the mic for him to play a real harmonica solo! He blew straight into his harmonica without moving his mouth for a complete 12 bar blues solo! The crowd gave a big cheer as he finished his solo and threw his arms into the air in celebration! You could immediately see the joy that a simple act of uprovoked kindness had brought to the harmonica man. Even though the note never changed it was a beautiful tune because it was backed by the unmistakeable melody of grace!