Why do I do that? After grabbing Starbucks and logging on, I found myself sitting next to Paul Chaney and Jim Turner of the International Blogging and New Media Association. I had emailed Paul and volunteered to help out however I can with IBNMA if they can use me.

Paul says, “You’re one of those godbloggers aren’t you?”

I don’t know why that makes me bristle. Paul certainly didn’t mean it as an accusation. But I’m like Peter, quick to qualify myself on a dark morning. Not that I betray myself or my faith, but I don’t speak with confidence. In some sense, I have trouble believing Matthew 28 in my gut. Jesus said,

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

I talk about editing from time to time–because I’m an editor and this blog has the word “editing” in the title. And I wish I could edit myself this morning. If I had my conversation with Paul, I would strike through some of the things I said. I would write in things that were more honest. Less feable. More confident in the authority that is in God who is in me.

So this post is my penance, I suppose. I’m not sure I believe in penance, but reading Gene Wolfe always warms my heart toward traditional Catholic ideas like that. (And I’m ready Gene Wolfe right now. Pirate Freedom, of course. It ROCKS.)

Here’s what I believe when I sit down at a table and think it through. My heart is in my fingers on the keyboard, not in the tongue of my mouth.

TheHighCalling.org is sponsoring the Godblog track of BlogWorld 2008 in Las Vegas because we believe that we are called to glorify God in all that we do. It’s really the way I’ve come to interpret the passage above from Matthew 28.

I’m not out to convert the world or baptize them. I’m just here to teach and obey. I’m not a bad teacher, I’ve learned. That’s the piece above that God has called me to do. All authority, all authorship of creation, has been given to God, therefor I go in to all the world that I can.

Being bound by space and time, I can’t go everywhere or be everywhere. But I can be in Kerrville. And I can be online. And I can be at TheHighCalling.org and HighCallingBlogs.com and here at GoodWordEditing.com.

And if I’m wrong about all of this–that’s okay with me. I’m not out to push my understanding of the truth against all odds. I’m just going to share what God has done in my life.

Future updates today will be on my Twitter page if you’re interested.

Argghhh, what better day for this bilge rate to be sailing off to Las Vegas to stay in Treasure Island than International Talk Like a Pirate Day? Me own boy is sitting across the table there wearing his Calico Jack Rackham Jolly Roger, ready to fly the sheets off to school.

Then me and my Jenny be flying the steel to Vegas. See you there, mateys!

I don’t know the answer to that question, but I do know that it has been one heckuva week for me as I’m scrambling to get ready for BlogWord and Godblog.

I’ve got my schedule printed–including meetings with several members of HighCallingBlogs.com, people I’m looking to recruit as bloggers, people I’m looking to recruit as writers, and people I’m just hoping to meet so I can say hi–Darren Rouse, Guy Kawasaki, and Brian Clarke have all had a big influence on the way I understand social media.

And of course, there are the exhibitors that I plan to visit:

• b5media and their ongoing poker game with Darren Rouse. That’s a conversation that I need to think through carefully. I have tremendous respect for Darren.
• cocomment is something that I think will finally work for us (here’s my cocomment feed, sort of)
• buzzlogic looks promising as an ad solution, but I’m still not sure where we stand on our desire for ads
• crowd science may provide some good statistics, but I already get statistics from google. So they’ll have to explain that. Also, they have some blackhat jokes on their homepage that made me wonder about them.
• disqus will need to tell me how they are different than cocomment. I need to install their plugin here before I go to blogworld.
• International Blogging and New Media Association looks like something I could help with. I plan to attend their organizational meeting.
• Fast Company is a brand I need to learn more about. For instance, why do we need one more LinkedIn type social network?
• intense debate is another cocomment and disqus challenger.
• Kithbridge is someone who looks like it thinks about RSS the way I do. I’d like to talk to them.
• Lijit is another brand I have been hearing about that I plan to investigate. I want to understand what these people are doing exactly and how it could overlap with HighCallingBlogs.com.
• MarketLeverage is a group that also presents to the Direct Marketing Association, so I’m interested to talk to them about how they see DM applying to social media in the future.
• mindtouch looks like an interesting wiki approach to project management, but I don’t see how it is necessarily better than google apps–other than the wildly raving endorsements from technology bigwigs.
• Outbrain looks like it has developed a social widget. Not sure how it applies to us, but I’m curious.
• PRWeb is something I’ve long admired since I read an incredible case study about it in Scott Meerman’s book The New Rules of Marketing and PR. (GREAT book by the way.)
• Technorati. Sigh. I haven’t been actively researching there in some time. But I need to go see what’s new. So much to do. So little time.

That’s the audacious promise Walt Whitman makes in the beginning of the American epic “Song of Myself.” I know I rant about Whitman around here all the time, but this time I have a reason.

Hurrican Ike has displaced my Uncle Bill and Aunt Merrie from their home in Galveston. I can’t do much for them–but I know Uncle Bill loves Whitman. So I’m going to record Whitman for Uncle Bill. The rest of you are welcome to listen too. Or read along at with a cool annotated version of the text from Virginia Commonwealth University.

 

 Song of Myself 1-6: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

That is the often quoted commencement address that Winston Churchill supposedly gave. According to the Churchill Centre the actual quote is a bit different and part of a longer speech:

Never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.

Why do I post this? Because sometimes it just feels like the world doesn’t need any more words. There are enough books already. Why write another one? Why write anything at all? Why even finish this blog post?

But then I think about Richard Bach: “A professional writer is an amateur who didn’t quit.”

Never, never, never, never, never give up. Who cares if Winston really said it? Give me a cigar and a bowtie, because I’m going to keep quoting him.

When Tina Howard (spaghettipie and Blog Tour Spot) asked me to participate in a blog tour for Marla Alupoaicei, I happily agreed. I met Marla at Mt. Hermon, and we had a good conversation. She’s also a published poet.

That’s why I’m posting about her latest book, Generation Hex, written with Dillon Burroughs. I promised to post a review. I do have many concerns about the book, though. You can read an excellent summary of the book’s problems at John Morehead’s site. I share the concerns he raises, so I won’t rehash them here. But please, go read his post.

Continue reading →

Last week, I interviewed Michael Card when I was out at Laity Lodge. We’re looking to create a Laity Lodge podcast, and I’m exploring some tools here to see what that might look like for them. As a bonus, Sandy Wood of StarDate fame was also there, and she generously loaned us her voice for the intro/outro.

This one’s branded as Laity Lodge since it’s an experiment for them, but I’ll probably consolidate all of my other podcasts here over a set period of time.

Let me know what you think! If you’re interested in subscribing to this via iTunes, you’ll have to manually load the RSS feed (http://www.goodwordediting.com/?feed=podcast) in your advanced options. I’m not going to submit to iTunes for awhile until I have some more episodes to work with.

 

 Laity Lodge 1 - Michael Card [13:28m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Last night, my wife and I went to see The Dark Knight. We’re a little slow about these things. We loved it, but we were both perplexed that the movie felt so long. At 2.5 hours, it was a little long, but not unusually long for movies these days.

And then, the typical post-movie conversation took place.

ME: I think the movie had too many acts.

HER: Too many?

ME: Well, more than I’m used to. I like three. But that was all over the place. Not in a bad way. But it’s hard to wrap my head around the narrative.

Then we spent a few minutes trying to recreate the plot… and we had a lot of trouble. We got lost trying to figure out how a major character ended up dying. So we gave up.

“It’s like the plot was intentionally a chaotic mess,” I said. “Again, not in a bad way.” Thus began an elaborate discussion (during which I missed the Starbucks exit because I can’t talk and drive).

We decided the chaotic structure of the movie supported the overall theme of chaos and anarchy. But not before we raised the old issue of plot versus character. Are the best stories character-driven or plot-driven? No doubt, both elements are important, but which is the most important?

Is a well played Joker enough to satisfy? Is a clever plot with paper thin characters enough to satisfy?

I’ve talked with folks about plot outlines. Mark David Gerson got me thinking about it again today. And I always come back to the same metaphor. When I start a story, poem, book, or even an essay, I have a destination in mind. Writing is a road trip so get a good map. (None of this crazy On Star stuff!) There will be hundreds, maybe thousands of different routes to get from the starting point to the destination you planned. There will be many, many interesting people to meet along the way, if you have the patience to take things slowly.

And of course, sometimes you get lost (in a good way) and end up settling in a different spot than you had originally intended. Which means you may have to retrace the journey several times to change the reader’s expectations at the beginning of the trip.

The analogy is wearing thin, but the question remains. In a good story, do you emphasize character over plot, or plot over character? Which is the most important to you… and why?

For just a minute, I’m going to adopt the role of pastor here. So file in. Take a pew. Sing a song by yourself. Say a prayer. Is your mind in the right place? Good.

Let’s talk about politics.

It’s that time. Now that both parties have had their convention, things could get heated. Here’s a reminder to folks to behave appropriately. Be careful when you change your status on Facebook to some politically cranky rant. Be careful on Twitter. Be careful when you leave comments.

I wonder if we should make a pact with each other? Let’s be accountable on our blogs and social networks to a higher level of discourse for the next few months with these Ten Commandments of Talking (or blogging) Politics.

(Also, I turned the commments off on this one. But you can go comment on the full post at HighCallingBlogs.com)

Led a poetry workshop at Laity Lodge this weekend during the Michael Card retreat. In light of the coming months, here are some poetic thoughts.

A Voter Reads First Peter

Priests are rare today. So are kings.
We overthrow them–divide the power
between voters and delegates and judges,
trust the rule of law over ruling
monarchs. Crowns melt into coins.
Divide the wealth, dilute the ruler
into rules and measurements. Laws
birth lawyers–weak priests to preach
the rule, to stand us up before
fire and flame, sometimes justice burns
where it will. God save us.