I am a big fan of two highly under-rated things: unstructured free time and long, meandering conversations.

This Summer, the summer before I plunge headfirst into the waters of Seminary and full-blown postulancy in the Episcopal Church, I have made an intentional effort to practice both with great regularity. Both of my girls are at camp right now, so my boy, wife and I have been a threesome since Saturday evening. Today, Aidan and I whiled away the morning, working hard at time-wasting activities like Legos Star Wars, the Video Game, Season 5 of The Simpsons and comic books. I hope I will always remember the image of my son, silhouetted by the emerging daylight in his pajama bottoms (not shirt!) with his sleepy grin he always wears as he creeps into the kitchen following his usualy 830 AM or so reveille's.

When I was growing up my home had a constant flow of overnight guests. During them summer, it was unusual not to have a family from out of town Mom and Dad knew from their Army days, choir members on a tour to our Church or some former exchange student friends staying in our house. Maybe it was because we lived on the lake or something or maybe it was our decidedly 70's split-level house with the private downstairs that made us and other people feel comfortable with visiting. One highlight of these visits were the hours-long conversations we would have with our friends that started in the dining room during the fantastic dinners my parents whipped up (chili, seafood chowder, burgers, fish fries, red beans and rice) and wound up in the living room.

I remember the ugly green faux Louis XIV couch placed against the long wall of the living room. Facing them were the other 4 "company chairs) that our guests usually sat upon while we talked about nothing and everything in particular. I recall listening to our friends from Turkey tell us all about this strange religion called Islam and inform us that "Esau" (our Jesus) was a great prophet. I recall Bozorg and Hussein, two Iranian students (I wonder where those dudes are now??) chain smoked Marlboro Reds (back in the day when one smoked indoors) and discussed their Economics degrees. Friends from church, the neighborhood, Atlanta and all over seemed to wind up in that living room after dinner and before we knew it someone would look at their watch and say, "Wow, 11:00, we have to get to bed" (or get going, if they were not staying).

This enormous house we live in was built during a stressful, adversity-ridden period of our lives- so much so that when we moved in, we did not want to live here. The antidote for the bad energy, karma, juju or whatever we felt filled this place upon our arrival, has been filling the house with friends and long, meandering conversation. Last weekend, we had a friend come over at about 3:00 and stay until 11:00. We had conversation the whole time with her about God, business, college, sobriety and what must have been a huge list of topics. I love the fact that our house is silent much of the time due to the fact that no TVs take residence here. Interesting people can come over and we can talk over good music, a couple of bottles of wine and silence. The bad spirits of the years we built this house are being crowded out, one by one, with each word uttered by guests finding comfort underneath our roof.

Make sure you make time to do nothing and to talk about whatever. Aggressively pursue boredom. Sit still long enough to remember that you are alive.