Musings From A Rolling Eyed Turtle

When I was elementary school, we often played tether ball at recess.  The game is played with a ball that is attached to a rope which, in turn, is attached to the top of a pole.  The object of the game is for two players to hit the ball in opposite direction to the other and the winner is the one to cause it (the rope and ball) to wrap itself around the pole to the point in which the ball touches the pole.  One time, while I was playing, the rope broke and the ball went flying.   As we stood watching it, wondering what in the world we were going to do, we realized it was “game over!” The memory of playing tether ball was recently stirred when I heard the phrase “untethered from the Gospel”.   It also prompted me to look up the word tether and I found that it means to be connected to, joined to, or tied to. As I scrolled through more definitions, I found that a tether is also an attachment that characteristically anchors something movable to something fixed...

I do enjoy traveling and I keep an eye out for good prices. I also enjoy looking at trends in travel. For a while, the travel industry focused their advertising on taking those trips that might be on your bucket list.   That faded a bit and I started seeing ads about taking the trip of a lifetime. I guess both those campaigns have been waning since I’ve been seeing information about taking an “epic” trip.   Recently I noticed the phrase “unforgettable trip” in advertising.   More recently, I’ve been seeing promotions about taking “sustainable” trips and even “reconnecting to our roots” trips. As I’ve been pondering these advertising campaigns, I thought I’d consider what their ideas encompass and then look at them from a spiritual perspective: 1.   “ Bucket list trips ” are based on a list of the experiences a person might hope to have before they “kick the bucket” (i.e. die).   While I can certainly come up with a bucket list of trips, I’m thinking a bu...