Mike Abrahamsohn in our living room (May 6, 2008, 8:17 PM)

Which do I write? "This morning, I dreamed about my dear friend Mike." Or, "This morning, my dear friend Mike appeared to me in a dream."

Saturday morning. A child's alarm mistakenly goes off at 7:10 and is silenced. Kay & I look at each other, roll over, and go back to sleep.

I am at some kind of wooden mansion with other people. We go around and enter a large room. Something happened earlier in the dream, but it was unremarkable and quickly forgotten. Then I notice Mike, standing in a corner, looking straight at me.

He looks hyper-real, as if he had been doctored in Photoshop. He has no blemishes. The whites of his eyes are unnaturally white. We look at each other silently.

My son Trevor (for some reason, slightly younger than he is now) is standing right in front of Mike. Mike cautiously raises his hand and tries to gently poke my son. His fingers go right through Trevor's head, as if one or the other of them is not fully there. To me, the rest of the dream has faded into a dreamlike quality, but Mike is oddly real.

He then reaches out his hand towards me—only this time, he does not go through! We are both surprised. I feel him, he is real. Though he does not speak, I can hear his thoughts as he tries to twist and pull his own arms: "I thought I'd be able to stretch myself into another shape." (How like him! Instead of saying, "I have a body!" like any normal person, he is trying to deform himself like a real-life Gumby.)

The room we are in has great windows down one side. I pull aside the curtains to reveal a vast man-made pond, between knee-deep and waist-deep, filled with water lilies. "Look," I point, "remember how we tried going through that, but got all tangled up?" The memory seems real, though nothing like that ever happened, at least not literally. But we are both laughing at the memory.

Then he grabs my hand, and looks intently into my eyes. His eyes smile.

And I wake up.

(extracted from original image)

This is part 2 of a series on my stolen laptop.

Having my laptop stolen from my car left me feeling violated. I'm sure there is only slight resemblance to suffering personal violence, but the experience gave me greater sympathy for victims of violence. The daze. The fear. The uneasiness in innocent situations that would not have bothered me previously.

The incident also affected my immediate family. My wife drove the car that night, taking our youngest daughter out on a date. They were uneasy about leaving a car with one window missing, so they parked right in front of a restaurant window and sat at that window. And watched the car as they ate. And felt uneasy.

The theft occurred over lunch on Friday. The following Monday, I went out for lunch again, this time with no laptop in the car—because I didn't have one. Although the lunch was with my agency recruiter (technically my employer), the conversation became quite spiritual, and she surprised me with this challenge:

"Have you prayed for the thief and forgiven him?"

This took me aback because the thought had not occurred to me, even though forgiving one's enemies is one of the primary practices of following Christ. I had just finished reading The Shack on Sunday, so as I drove away from lunch, I followed the example of the book's main character and said aloud, "I forgive you. I forgive you. I forgive you."

On Monday afternoon, I took my first steps toward forgiving the thief, and prayed for him. But on Monday night, I was still ticked at my boss.

And God said, "Let me get this straight. You're more upset about your work being wiped out than about your laptop being stolen?"

"You're a jerk!" I replied with a laugh. Ha ha. I knew he had me.

But I still could not forgive my boss.

Who do you still need to forgive? What are you going to do about it?

Stolen Laptop series:

1. Stolen Laptop: In broad daylight
2. Stolen Laptop: Violence and forgiveness
3. Stolen Laptop: Security settings

This is part 1 of a series on my stolen laptop.

Last month, my laptop was stolen from my car in broad daylight. It was in a grey tote bag lying on the floor, right there where you see all the broken glass. I thought that laying a dark bag on a dark floor would make it mostly unnoticeable. That may have hidden it from casual eyes, but not from the thief who set out to do a job.

It was Friday, and I was meeting someone for lunch at IHOP. When I arrived, other techno-geeks were also arriving for lunch, and I parked next to them. The restaurant shares its parking lot, so I was not parked directly in front of any restaurant windows. Still, it was right in the view of passing traffic.

Lunch finished, I walked back out at the same time as the guys I had parked beside. They were staring. I sat down in my car, and only then noticed the mess that used to be my front passenger window. My first thought was, "Somebody must have done a poor parking job and bashed in the side." The guys parked next to me asked, "Was anything taken?" I said no! I was so used to leaving it that way all day at work, that I had driven and parked without giving it a thought. Besides, I was shaken up.

Thanks to the generosity of a friend at Apple who gave me his once-a-year personal discount, and the generosity of my parents, I am writing this on my new 15" MacBook Pro. It's certainly an upgrade from my previous machine. And thanks to the wonders of Time Machine backups, I did not lose any data.

But you can bet I won't be leaving it on the floor of my car.

Have you ever had anything stolen? What did you learn from your experience?
Read on for how I had to process things—on more than one level.

Stolen Laptop series:

1. Stolen Laptop: In broad daylight
2. Stolen Laptop: Violence and forgiveness
3. Stolen Laptop: Security settings

Calling all photographers! I believe that God (or, if you like, the universe) has given you a gift: a special ability to see beauty. Consider using your gift in a new way. In the words of our contemporary prophets, "Give it away, give it away, give it away now."

Learn more at help-portrait.com and get involved. Caution: You may be changed.

Though my birthday was many months ago, only last week I enjoyed a long-promised birthday present: a ticket to see Porcupine Tree! You see, I grew up listening to progressive rock: Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Todd Rundgren & Utopia, Genesis, Yes, and a smattering of others (Camel, Gentle Giant, Renaissance, Focus). For this classic prog guy, it has been a breath of fresh air to be discover the neo-prog of Porcupine Tree. (Thanks to my buddy Chris for the ticket, and for introducing this band to me in the first place.)

I had seen them two times before from the crowded floor of the Fillmore, but this was my first time at the Warfield, and I was pleasantly surprised that we had balcony seats. Perfect for an old guy like me.

The opening act was a peculiar fellow playing a peculiar instrument. I looked him up afterwards and learned that he is That 1 Guy playing "the magic pipe," and that he is a classically trained bassist. Here's a taste of what we saw (only much, much louder, and even more fascinating in person):

When Porcupine Tree took the stage, frontman Steven Wilson announced: "We've spent the last year working on a new album called The Incident which has just come out. Disc 1 is 55 minutes of uninterrupted music, and we would like to perform that for you now. That's prog."

…And that is just what they did for their first set: moved from section to section of a large opus with scarcely a break. The roadies were kept busy because they had to have Steven Wilson's next instrument ready to go, and he switches frequently between electric guitar, acoustic guitar, and keys. Sometimes it's hard to appreciate a concert if you're not already familiar with the music. But the music was new to almost everyone there since the album had only been released the week before, and wow. Just wow.

Then after a ten-minute break, they played a second set of their older material. In the middle of the show, I thought, "I wonder if I am the only person here who is worshiping God right now." To this old prog-rock guy, it was a wonderful evening shared with good friends.

I kept track of the shirts I saw in the audience: Marillion (two shirts), Camel, King Crimson, Dream Theater (two), Genesis. Unlike keyboard-driven classic prog, Richard Barbieri's keyboard work is amazing in a different way: creating ambience. If I ever create another worship band, I want a keyboardist who doesn't play piano riffs, but instead lays down sonic textures: swooshes, bleeps, and weird sounds.

If you're learning about Porcupine Tree for the first time, I recommend their previous three albums: In Absentia, Deadwing, and Fear of a Blank Planet. They have earlier albums but those are the ones that first grabbed me. If you liked progressive rock and have missed hearing tunes incorporating complex time signatures like 5/4 and 7/8, do yourself a favor: check them out.

"These have more heel than I usually get.
But you're short anyway."

I believe in you
I'll give up everything just to find you
I have to be with you to live to breathe
You're taking over me

Evanescence, Taking Over Me

Shelly: "Dad, what's this song about?"

Me: "What would you like it to be about?"

Shelly: "I don't know."

Me: "Well for me, it's a worship song."

Shelly: "I guess I can see that."

Me: "Or maybe it's just a song about obsessive love. It can be what you like. But I worship to it."

Shelly: "You worship to everything."

Me: "That's right. Because the whole world is flowing that direction, if you pay attention."

Heh. Ever feel the same way?

Hat tip: Dan Kimball

Photo by reynaldo f. tamayo (license)

I'm still here! But this blog has taken a back seat to higher priorities. After working my day job as a software contractor, my evenings are usually devoted to my "second job," namely continuing to search for full-time employment.

After a long season where the well seemed to have dried up, I had three phone interviews this past week. I hope this is a sign of the beginnings of economic recovery. Maybe I can be a canary in a coal-mine, in reverse.

If you pray, please remember me as the Lord brings me to mind. I am asking our Provider to open the door to wherever he wants me — ideally, a role where my emphasis on test-driven development and code quality is welcomed and recognized (as opposed to having to work around the system).

If you don't pray, I'll take happy thoughts and job referrals. :-)

Hey, the sooner I get a full-time job, the more time I can spend blogging.

Προσκυνέω — worship. (Not a tattoo, but a stamp from this Sunday morning.)

For Mike, where he cut himself in his first attempt.
Someday we will rock again.