Posted by Troy Eckhardt on March 31, 2017 at 9:41 am
The cable service went out last night. Right after the TV went black, I experienced a strange silence and immediately noticed that I was in a house, and a woman was in bed next to me. I introduced myself, and we seemed to have an almost ancestral memory that we were somehow related. As my past became clearer, I realized that this person was my wife and that we had had children together.
We searched the house, looking to see if any of the children were still alive, and found a few wandering around in a daze, and stumbling as though they hadn’t used their leg muscles for some time. It took some effort, but we were finally able to convince them that we were their parents and that the strange, empty grief they were feeling was due to a cable outage.
After several minutes and some odd, awkward stares at each other, we decided to step outside. Under a star-bright sky, neighbors were opening their doors and, as though waking from dreams, stretching and staring around in wonder at a world we’d all forgotten.
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on March 28, 2017 at 9:12 pm
It was the first week of spring in Central Florida. While others in far-off regions of the country were enjoying March’s transition from lion to lamb, Floridians were trudging through 85-degree mugginess and dreaming about next year’s three-week winter.
As Tater made his way across the sun-soaked asphalt of the Wal-Mart parking lot, he thought of his mother, who had sent him on this errand. Almost seventeen years old, Tater, whose real name was Japheth, had been recently thrust from complete non-driver to part-time professional chauffeur and grocery-getter. Thoughts of Mom had become bittersweet lately. Her happy disposition and quick wit had recently been slightly marred by the tumor discovered growing in her left temporal lobe. Mom didn’t like to drive as much as she used to. Tater bleakly wondered how much longer she would be able to write out the grocery lists he frequently carried to the store.
“Dad seems so optimistic about her prognosis,” the voice in his head whispered, “but without knowing if she has a few months or several years to live, it’s hard to know when it’s ok to pretend everything’s normal again.”
Stepping through the entryway into the vestibule between the Hell of a sweltering springtime and the Hell of a seething cauldron of idiot consumers, Tater welcomed the blast of air conditioning. He decided that he’d rather face the masses for as long as he was able than spend one more minute being crushed by the humid inferno outside.
“Her speech may have slowed a bit, but she’s as organized as ever,” he thought to himself as he noticed that items on the list Mom had written were grouped according to their locations in the store. “Let’s start at the back. First stop: The dairy section for cheese sticks and milk.”
Almost finished with his course through the labyrinth, Tater rounded the corner toward the front of Wal-Mart. He pushed past a snot-nosed child hanging half-way out of a cart and a dark-skinned immigrant woman wearing bright, unusual clothing, then grabbed the blueberries and romaine and headed for the check-out lanes.
“Too full; too full; too full; oh, Lord, no way!” Rejecting every prospect, he moved toward the speedy lanes, which were slightly less jammed, while he took inventory of the items in the cart. Eighteen. Good enough for the twenty-or-fewer line.
Staring at the ten-year-old tagging behind the woman ahead of him in line, Tater tried not to be too disturbed as the boy ate the bountiful harvest he’d just plucked from his nose. A barely audible sigh was voiced behind him in line.
Assuming the noise was the private, pitiful complaint of a woman who had either just witnessed the nauseating feast Booger Boy was enjoying, or who was dreading the walk through the heat to a car-turned-oven, Tater thought again of Mom. He loved her and agonized over what she might have to go through. Dad spoke of an eternity with God and an order and purpose to all things under His sun, but Tater wasn’t always fully comforted by his father’s faith. He knew Mom struggled with it, too.
SIGH. Louder this time. Almost ignorable, but not quite. By the third time the sound reached his ears, Tater knew that the sigh was not private after all, but meant for him. He turned to face her.
“Can I help you?”
Skin cracked and worn like the leather seats in Dad’s Suburban, eyes like tarnished pennies, and pursed lips used to two packs a day met his gaze. “You have more than twenty items,” she croaked.
“No, I don’t.”
“Yes, you do.”
“I have eighteen.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Look, I counted, ok? I have eighteen items. I could get two more.”
“You have more than twenty.”
Tater’s neck burned hotter than the pavement outside as he reached for a two-pack of Reese’s cups and a bag of M&Ms; Mom and Dad’s favorites. As he pitched them into his cart, he smiled at the woman and said, “Now I have twenty. Jesus loves you. Have a great day.”
Suddenly, life didn’t seem so bad.
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on March 6, 2016 at 1:07 pm
Does the echo have the answer? I don’t know; Alexa! Get it? 🙂
On Valentine’s Day, 2016, my wife surprised me with an Amazon Echo. It’s something I never would have bought for myself – at least it hadn’t really endeared itself to me through the single commercial I’d seen for it. But now that she’s here, she’s part of the family.
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Filed Under: Tech
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on January 22, 2015 at 9:50 am
A friend of mine asked the following question on Facebook:
Ok, since everyone is posting political stuff thanks to the state of the Union speech last night….I’d like your opinion on this….Does the American Dream still exist?? You know, if you work hard enough you can be successful. Is hard work enough anymore?
Over 100 comments later, here is the answer I gave: Read the rest of the article »
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on June 7, 2014 at 10:44 am
A Facebook friend, a person I admire outside of the digital life as well, posted something about the street preachers in our town. I gave my two cents. I hope she takes it in the loving way I intended it.
Here is my response:
This is probably my church, and street preaching is one of about fifteen ways we evangelize. It works for some, and not for others. I personally focus on other methods because I’m good at what appeals to me, but I have seen a lot of souls saved from this method. I prefer talking one on one, but I will not disparage something that I know brings some to the saving knowledge of Christ Jesus.
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Posted by Troy Eckhardt on at 9:02 am
After a Facebook friend posted this image, a lively debate ensued. One woman asked two questions which I felt compelled to answer: “What is love?” and “So it’s conditional?”
The following are my responses:
“What is love?”
Jesus said, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” From this we can deduce that love is the extent to which a person is willing to sacrifice for the benefit of another.
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Posted by Troy Eckhardt on April 19, 2014 at 9:36 pm
I have very dear friends who do not “celebrate” Easter because of the pagan roots of many of the origins and common traditions surrounding the holiday. Read the rest of the article »
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on March 31, 2014 at 11:11 am
It is no secret that I am angry at the National Council of the Boy Scouts of America, and I have been since the day they traded our time-honored values in exchange for stacks of money (mostly from AT&T and its CEO Randall Stephenson.) Read the rest of the article »
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on June 27, 2013 at 9:44 pm
What’s wrong with two people of the same gender who are in love getting married to each other? It’s a good question, and I’m glad you asked. Although for many people, “The Bible says it’s wrong,” is enough to justify the sentiment, it does not really address the question in a secular way. Read the rest of the article »
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on March 25, 2013 at 3:08 am
From where does morality come? Whose morality should influence social behavior and public policy?
When a friend posted this image on Facebook, I thought a bit about what the Bible has to say about slavery. It mentions differences between Hebrew and heathen slave treatment in the Old Testament. It deals with selling daughters and what their new masters should do with them if they are not “pleasing,” or how the slave girls’ new husbands should regard them if they are re-gifted by their masters to their sons to wed. Jesus Himself tells slaves to obey their masters. Many of the heroes of the Bible were slaves. Years of Jubilee were set up to insure that some types of slave were able to go free. Read the rest of the article »
