Sounding Gough

There's a little person in our house

Today I couldn't stop staring at my son. He's a person. I know it kind of sounds like one of those caricatures of a drug induced person staring at their hand saying, "whoa my hand, dude" but I was just in awe. It's a parent thing but it was a slight act of morning worship, not of my son, but of God and the gifts of the miracle of life, individuality, family, DNA, and a whole mess of other things. What was even more amazing was trying to imagine what future things I would be observing this boy do. Things like, using the potty (that will be a glorious day), first day of Kindergarten, first game/meet/play/whatever, prom, marriage, kids?, and who knows, bail hearing..let's hope not but I'd be there! Blows my mind.

I can get so caught up in parenting and anxiety and thinking about parenting roles that I manage forget that this is a distinct relationship with a unique individual. It's a joy to love him, even when he tells his daddy to go away, and know that I'll love him for who he is no matter what. 

I guess all I'm trying to say is that I love being a Dad.

Pixelated DNA

 We were given Christmas Eve until this coming Monday off as holiday and it has been a nice time to catch up on some projects. One of those projects has been to scan old family photos to preserve them and to make books with them with My Publisher or another online book maker. Using the office copier I was able to scan multiple photos at once at a fraction of the time our all-in-one printer/scanner/fax is able to scan. With an 11 by 17 surface I was able to scan many photos at once at high resolutions with only a 3 second pass. Photoshop Elements 8 then automatically separates and straightens them into individual pics. The same program has allowed me to restore many old pics, some with extensive damage. Even with all these shortcuts the project is time consuming with so many photos. However, it has been wonderful to be so intimately connected with these people, many of whom I never met, and with whom I share DNA. I've always felt a connection to my Great Grandfather, Ninian Welch. He was a prominent Chicagoan, lawyer and later a judge. He was known as a great lay preacher and Christian educator. People would gather to hear him speak. I have shared two pics that I have restored as best as I could that document this fact. I only wish I had a copy of one of his talks. 

If you go back further you find that Ninian was a grandnephew of a famous Scottish preacher, John Welch. I'm still trying to unlock that gene. 

As I manipulate pixels on these photos I reflect on history, family, DNA, life and death. Pretty big stuff. However, mostly I am infused with gratitude and love. All of these people had their strengths and weaknesses, both of which repeat in various forms in subsequent generations. In knowing myself I feel that I know them better than I I think I do. 

Oh honey here comes..what's his name? I dunno, just Google him.

 Google has a new app for Android based phones that is called Google Goggles. You use your phones camera and take pictures of things that it will search. Currently it works really well on books, wine labels, known pieces of art, major landmarks, and corporate logos. It also scans business cards to enter into your contacts. With facial recognition software and everyone tagging one another in online pics, and Facebook and Picasa now have facial recognition software options, we will soon be able to take a pic of a face and, like it or not get a name and any other publicly available information. 

Now if they can just build this into a pair of Bluetooth glasses I'd never have to call someone guy or dude again.