John Gunter

Thoughts on Life and Living

7 reasons why I love weddings

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(This article is part of a series of posts I am writing this month on weddings.  For an overview of the series, please click here.  My first post in this series was “June is the month of weddings. . . ”.)

John Gunter at Phil Autry's wedding
Some of the wedding party at Phil and Jiexia Autry’s wedding.

So, in honor of weddings and June, here are 7 reasons why I love weddings:

  1. See old friends – Especially with living overseas, weddings are fun in just getting to see old friends.  I love this aspect of weddings.  Seems like weddings are about the only place I see certain friends.  Always fun reconnecting.  
  2. The various facial expressions of the groom – This is a bit of a tricky one.  I will talk of three such facial expressions here.  Some grooms have the look of utter euphoria.  They have waited ALL of their lives for this moment and there she is. . . the most beautiful girl that he have ever seen walking towards him with a sense of glorious finality.  “The race is over and I have won!”  Wonderful to see.  Other grooms have the look of sheer terror.  This is usually not about their pending marriage, but rather the actual wedding ceremony.  They would rather do ANYTHING than stand up in front of that many people in uncomfortable clothes, with the fear that they might mess something up and embarrass the woman that they love with all of their lives.  Funny to see, but [Read more…]

Update and summer plans for this blog

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John Gunter blogging at Funky
This is me blogging. I work out of a local coffee shop 2-3 days/week. The corner of the store is my office!

After two months of writing this blog, I am happy to report that all of my hopes and desires for this blog have been met and exceeded. 

At the beginning, I published the articles “Intentional processing. . . what will this blog be like?” and “Maniacal self-absorption, loneliness, or somewhere in between? Why blog…”.  These posts spelled out my goals for this blog.

To try something new and see how it goes, I am going to use these summer months to write 2-3 series of articles.  These two series will consist of weekly, interrelated posts.  I think they will be published at the beginning of each week on either Sunday night or Monday.  Each series will be 5-7 weeks long.

The first series was begun on Monday.  Please see the first post by clicking here.  As you see, this series will be on my observations of weddings.  I have been to 1,294,985 of them.  If you would like an overview of this series, please click here.

The second series will begin the first or second week of July.  It will be a series in which I write about my first impressions of life in this country in Asia.  I will send out a post in a few weeks with an overview of what this series will look like. [Read more…]

June is the month of weddings. . .

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John Gunter at David Moon's wedding
David Moon’s wedding a few years ago

It seems like June is the month of weddings doesn’t it?  I’m sure someone can give me a good explanation for this, but I don’t really know why this is the case.

It’s the same here in East Asia.  I have the honor of attending two weddings of dear friends in the next few weeks, along with regretfully missing the weddings of Erin Norton and Daniel Schneider in America. 

Naturally, this month has me thinking about weddings.  One of the legacies of both my profession (working with many people) and in still being single is that I have participated in over 20 weddings.  Additionally, I have attended an amount of weddings that would rival the number of Israelites in the Old Testament.  As a result, I feel like I’ve seen and/or done just about everything regarding weddings.

I’ve seen a bride’s veil catch on fire during the lighting of the unity candles section (my sister Betsy).  No one was hurt, but [Read more…]

Mom’s laugh and sacrificial heart

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John Gunter with parents
Mom, Dad, and I at their surprise birthday last year

Today, my Mom (Kay Gunter) is on my mind.  If you don’t know her, that is too bad.  She has a laugh that is inexplicably delightful.  She laughs from her belly.  She laughs loud and boisterous, the kind of laugh you can hear from far away locations, like from Atlanta to Toledo.  She laughs in a way that makes everyone in the room happier for being there.

Additionally, my Mom is sweet and kind.  She visits EVERYONE in nursing homes, hospitals, dungeons, caves, sewers, and every other rough place people who are fortunate enough to know my Mom end up.  Seriously, my entire life has been filled with her serving people who are down, [Read more…]

Intentional processing. . . what will this blog be like?

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Family at Mom and Dad's birday 2011

This is the final post, of three, which is introducing this blog.

You can look up at the top menu of this page to understand more about the topics I will be focusing the posts upon.  Embedded in the top menu pages will be helpful books, resources, and other things I like and would suggest to people.  Now onto more of the style and manner in which I will approach this. . . what will this blog be like?

Painting in broad strokes, it is my hope to structure this blog in the following ways.

Chronicling – Journaling has been a large part of my personal pilgrimage through life.  From my junior year in college until last year, I had filled up 46 journals.  I have found that simply putting my thoughts, prayers, struggles, dreams, and aspirations on paper enriches life and keeps me going in a thoughtful, intentional direction.  One of my few regrets from my 10 years of living overseas is that I have not done a good job of writing about everyday life type stuff.  I have been admonished to do this many times, by many people, but this has fallen upon deaf ears.  With this blog, I will be getting back to some of my basics of journaling, but do more chronicling of everyday life in East Asia.

Processing – I learn best by processing life lessons from the past, grappling daily with the challenges and joys of everyday life, and look to the future in light of how the past and present [Read more…]

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