When I was a boy our neighbor had an old car that no longer functioned beyond being a sophisticated toy for us kids. It was spectacular fun. We turned dials, shifted gears, mashed pedals against the floor, turned the wheel, honked the horn (battery long dead), cranked open and closed the windows. We “smoked” candy cigarettes and flicked the imaginary ashes in the ash tray or out the window. We travelled the country and never once ran out of gas. The biggest impact might have been the spit spatters on the windshield left behind using our motor-making sound lips. True enjoyment!
To misuse the line of a once well-known song: “Take a trip and never leave the farm!” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyQi-1Z2tN8).
I recently found myself reminiscing about that car. Great memories. Imagination is still wonderful. Fantasy is still a great entertainer. Escape into play is still a wonderful respite. Play has been considered the child’s work. I like that description. Obviously, I worked a lot as a child. Great fun!
Imagination was a great friend. And, it still is. Imagination/fantasy is wonderful distraction, best if managed and not allowed to be the manager. Yes, a grand resource. Yet, it can also lead to excessive avoidance and even lead to self-delusion. I wonder how much time I have spent splattering the windshield of my life without having left my driveway—and yet believed I have done more than simply distributed my spit. Worth a pondering. I do not want to miss out on constructive, restorative fantasy, but neither do I want to miss out on reality.
Published by sparedbygrace@yahoo.com
I am Richard Brewer—a Christ-follower, psychologist, husband, father, grandfather (Papa) sometimes writer, and lifelong student of people.
For much of my professional life, I've had the privilege of sitting with people as they wrestle with some of life's most difficult questions—questions about faith, suffering, grief, relationships, identity, failure, hope, and what it means to live well.
Those conversations have changed the way I see people and the way I understand my own faith. They have taught me that life is rarely as simple as our explanations of it, that people are almost always more complicated than they appear, and that sometimes the wisest response to a difficult question is to empathize and to keep asking better questions.
I am a committed Christ-follower, but I am not interested in pretending that Christianity eliminates mystery or that faith means having an answer for everything. Faith invites us to pursue truth honestly, to think deeply, to acknowledge what we do not know, and ultimately to trust the God we do know.
Mediocre Meanderings is where I explore some of those questions.
I write about faith and psychology, grief and suffering, leadership and relationships, aging and ordinary life—and occasionally whatever else catches my attention along the way.
I do not write from the perspective of someone who has figured life out. I write as someone who has lived enough of it to know that I have not.
These are my thoughts, questions, observations, and occasional attempts at wisdom. Take what is useful. Challenge what is not. And, if you would like, meander along with me.
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Mediocre Meandering 