Showing posts with label musings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label musings. Show all posts
Saturday, April 19, 2014
Games We Play
I did it again. I wrote a post for The Post Calvin. It's inspired by my recent "spring break" working at the Boys and Girls Club. That spring "break" is another post for another time.
Thursday, March 27, 2014
This is what I call MicroBlogging
I have a bad habit of getting excessively pensive at the darkest, most trying moments of my life. It often leads to what I have termed "Xanga-Style" blogging. Nothing against Xanga in general, but my personal Xanga is a surplus of [preteen and teenaged] angst that the world doesn't really need to see.
I think it's important to express myself on these emotional topics, but I'm worried that an overabundance of my own sadness will bring you all down with me into a pit.
In order to avoid that, I've spent the past few months curating my emotional trials into this list of microblogs. May it be for you much like a sad love song--in your moments of pain, a commiserate friend; in your moments of triumph, a memento mori that keeps you humble.
I think it's important to express myself on these emotional topics, but I'm worried that an overabundance of my own sadness will bring you all down with me into a pit.
In order to avoid that, I've spent the past few months curating my emotional trials into this list of microblogs. May it be for you much like a sad love song--in your moments of pain, a commiserate friend; in your moments of triumph, a memento mori that keeps you humble.
Topics too depressing to get their own post
- When you consistently use more conditioner or shampoo than you use shampoo or conditioner, so that you never finish both bottles at the same time.
- Spending the whole game of Settlers of Catan winning, only to have the other players revolt against you, and cause you to lose so bad you want to cry.
- When you're talking with a friend about a TV show or book series that you only casually enjoy, and they ask you, "Do you mind if I give away some parts?" and you say no because you're enjoying the conversation and want it to continue, but then you go back to watching or reading and you realize that the entire experience of the series is changed now that you know that one spoiler.
- The fact that last seasons of really good, long-running TV shows always come across more as cast and crew nostalgia than as a good ending to the show.
- Keeping so many emails in your inbox so that you remember to respond to them that you eventually cannot see all of them and so forget to respond to them.
- Sticky notes that only stick long enough for you to stop looking at them, and then fall off the wall and you can never find them again and they remind you of nothing.
- How much more fun it is to put up Christmas decorations than to take them down.
- Dirty laundry.
- Enjoying the creative stimulation that a caffeine rush gives you, but suffering from so much presticogitation that you can't actually use it to stimulate your creativity.
- When you like the Glee version better than the original, but can tell no one.
- Causing a traffic jam by trying to avoid a car accident.
- Having a terrible day at work, but then having your boss tell you that you're a "great asset to the team" and then wondering whether that is a compliment or a cry for help.
- Coming to the end of a bagel after mistakenly thinking that you had a whole half left.
- Loving a song so much that you cannot physically restrain yourself from listening to it over and over and then slowly beginning to hate it.
- Having really stupid pet peeves, but not knowing how to develop the patience to keep them from peeving you anymore.
- Taxes
- Struggling to read analog clocks when you're 24 years old.
- Wanting to go back to college because it was the last time you knew what you were doing.
- Wanting to share a funny Michigan-Winter joke on Facebook and then remembering that, because you don't live in Michigan anymore, your friends will be more confused than commiserate.
- Fun and awesome dreams that are also so easy to psychoanalyze that you're too embarrassed to share them with anyone because they'll immediately know all your deepest insecurities.
- Seeing deer in your backyard and wondering for the rest of the day if they got hit by a car because what the heck were deer doing in your "yard" in the city?
- Things that should go viral but never will because famous internet people never see them.
- Catching up with a book or TV series without realizing that it wasn't over yet, and then suddenly having to wait for the next installment to come out.
- Dirty dishes.
- Music that is at just the wrong volume so that you either have to set it to 23 and be barely able to hear it, or set it to 29 and wince at every downbeat.
Thank you for your patience in reading my woes. I hope I did not bring you down too much. I may be forced to continue this list in the future because, you know, we live in a fallen world and all that.
--Mary Margaret
Wednesday, March 19, 2014
The Cycle of Grocery Stores
Yet again, I come here merely to point you elsewhere. Specifically, I direct you to my post on The Post Calvin where I will attempt to woo you with elegantly crafted prose about the Dominick's down the street from my high school.
Monday, March 10, 2014
A Legacy of Song
Last month, some of you may have noticed my post at The Post Calvin that spoke about my experiences with hymns in church. This present post relates to that, if only obliquely.
Music is uniquely powerful. I think many, if not most people feel that power and celebrate it in little moments in their lives. I'm not a rockstar singer--I dropped out of choir after eighth grade--and my Saxophone is gathering dust in my closet (and is probably also infested with mice, but that's a different story). Nevertheless, I think I am one of those people for whom music means more than for most.
I'm told that this is because of my grandmother.
My maternal grandparents were both, I'm told, excellent singers: my grandmother, Jane, a soprano, my grandfather, Joe, a baritone. When they stood next to each other in church, any number of their six children next to them, they filled those babies' heads with melodies and harmonies and a subconscious joy in the sound of a well crafted, well executed song.
Grandma spent much of her time cleaning, crafting, fiddling about around the house, and unless she was speaking, she was singing. Sometimes, she would sing songs, but most times, she just sang notes. I have a vivid memory of watching her in the kitchen in Barrington, Illinois, her soft, wordless singing floating to me over the sound of the rushing tap, the sun catcher on the window in front of her holding colorful images of the birds she loved so much, in part because their songs matched her own.
My mother, also Jane, continued the tradition of constant melodizing, and in fact got a bachelor's degree in vocal performance. I remember nights as a child when I would wake from a nightmare and my mother would come in to comfort me back to sleep, and I would ask her to sing the Star Spangled Banner, which I called the star song. I thought it was a beautiful song, and I loved my mother's voice, and the combination of the two soothed many of my frightened fits. When I would listen to the radio or watch movies, I would sometimes hear a song so lovely, I felt the need to memorize it so that I could sing it to my own someday-children in their troubled moments.
When my mother and I would go to churches other than our home church--if we were out of town visiting family, or if we were attending a first communion, christening, or wedding--I would secretly hope that others around us would hear my mother's singing and be jealous of me because I got to hear it every day. I got to wake up to my mother singing along to her hymns as she read her Bible in the morning before work. I got to listen to her sing the harmonies to all the television theme songs. I got to be serenaded on my birthday. Everyone should have been jealous of me.
The moment I learned that not everyone sang as much as my matriarchs was, in fact, in a church. I don't remember what church, or when, but I remember looking around during the congregational singing and seeing dozens of people merely staring up at the stage, some bobbing their heads, some standing with an emotional hand in the air, but none of them singing. I remember that I tried it, right there. I tried to just look at the words on the screen as they passed, tried to not sing and just to listen. I enjoyed the experience of hearing all the voices around me raising up those words, but I did not enjoy not singing. The words were there, the music was playing, I needed to sing.
The moment I learned that not everyone sang like my matriarchs was, also, in a church. When I was in England, I weekly attended St. Thomas with St. Maurice with a large contingent of other Calvin students. One of those students, a great friend of mine, Hope, often stood near me during worship, belting out the words to songs familiar and not. Her voice, nothing like my mother's or grandmother's sweet sopranos, was, at first, jarring to my ears. I wanted her to be more on-pitch. I wanted her to be softer. I wanted her to sing as beautifully as the women I'd grown used to.
The moment I learned that the beauty in singing comes not just in the sound, but in the act, was not in a church, but in my mother's living room. At the time, this living room was furnished in thick, sound- and light-blocking curtains hanging in the doorways, several large plastic containers of towels and other hygiene products, and a heated hospice bed where Grandma lay for weeks, her Alzheimer's preventing her from sitting up or standing. It was a hot July in Chicagoland, but the air conditioning kept my mother, my aunt, and I all comfortably cool as we stood around Grandma's bed, in which, after a few more long hours, she would die. We held her hands, we ran our fingers through her still-thick, white hair. We sang to her.
White coral bells, upon a slender stalk
Lily of the valley deck my garden walk
Oh, don't you wish that you could hear then ring
That will happen only when the fairies sing
My aunt began the round. Like me, aunt Judith was raised with music in the air around her, and like me, she could not make it as beautifully as she wanted to. Then my mother, with her practiced and wonderful voice, joined. Their voices came together in a way families should, like at Christmas when Grandpa reads the nativity story to us, first from a rocking chair in the big Tree Room in Barrington, Illinois, and now from a television in my uncle's sitting room. Their voices made magic, and it didn't matter that one was clearly stronger than the other, or that one had a quaver to it that kept it from hitting every little note in the arpeggio.
As the song is a round, I joined in third, coming in just in time to be in unison with Judith, though I didn't know the song as well as she did. And now I was in the family too. And it felt like Christmas feels, like church when everyone sings, even off pitch, like the dishes in the kitchen with the birds watching. It really was a magic beyond explanation or description. She gave us our voices, and as we sat there around her, we felt compelled to give them back. We just couldn't not sing.
Music is uniquely powerful. I think many, if not most people feel that power and celebrate it in little moments in their lives. I'm not a rockstar singer--I dropped out of choir after eighth grade--and my Saxophone is gathering dust in my closet (and is probably also infested with mice, but that's a different story). Nevertheless, I think I am one of those people for whom music means more than for most.
I'm told that this is because of my grandmother.
 |
| Jane Eileen on the Left, Jane Eileen on the Right, Jane Eileens all around, late into the night, ba da ba da |
Grandma spent much of her time cleaning, crafting, fiddling about around the house, and unless she was speaking, she was singing. Sometimes, she would sing songs, but most times, she just sang notes. I have a vivid memory of watching her in the kitchen in Barrington, Illinois, her soft, wordless singing floating to me over the sound of the rushing tap, the sun catcher on the window in front of her holding colorful images of the birds she loved so much, in part because their songs matched her own.
My mother, also Jane, continued the tradition of constant melodizing, and in fact got a bachelor's degree in vocal performance. I remember nights as a child when I would wake from a nightmare and my mother would come in to comfort me back to sleep, and I would ask her to sing the Star Spangled Banner, which I called the star song. I thought it was a beautiful song, and I loved my mother's voice, and the combination of the two soothed many of my frightened fits. When I would listen to the radio or watch movies, I would sometimes hear a song so lovely, I felt the need to memorize it so that I could sing it to my own someday-children in their troubled moments.
When my mother and I would go to churches other than our home church--if we were out of town visiting family, or if we were attending a first communion, christening, or wedding--I would secretly hope that others around us would hear my mother's singing and be jealous of me because I got to hear it every day. I got to wake up to my mother singing along to her hymns as she read her Bible in the morning before work. I got to listen to her sing the harmonies to all the television theme songs. I got to be serenaded on my birthday. Everyone should have been jealous of me.
The moment I learned that not everyone sang as much as my matriarchs was, in fact, in a church. I don't remember what church, or when, but I remember looking around during the congregational singing and seeing dozens of people merely staring up at the stage, some bobbing their heads, some standing with an emotional hand in the air, but none of them singing. I remember that I tried it, right there. I tried to just look at the words on the screen as they passed, tried to not sing and just to listen. I enjoyed the experience of hearing all the voices around me raising up those words, but I did not enjoy not singing. The words were there, the music was playing, I needed to sing.
The moment I learned that not everyone sang like my matriarchs was, also, in a church. When I was in England, I weekly attended St. Thomas with St. Maurice with a large contingent of other Calvin students. One of those students, a great friend of mine, Hope, often stood near me during worship, belting out the words to songs familiar and not. Her voice, nothing like my mother's or grandmother's sweet sopranos, was, at first, jarring to my ears. I wanted her to be more on-pitch. I wanted her to be softer. I wanted her to sing as beautifully as the women I'd grown used to.
The moment I learned that the beauty in singing comes not just in the sound, but in the act, was not in a church, but in my mother's living room. At the time, this living room was furnished in thick, sound- and light-blocking curtains hanging in the doorways, several large plastic containers of towels and other hygiene products, and a heated hospice bed where Grandma lay for weeks, her Alzheimer's preventing her from sitting up or standing. It was a hot July in Chicagoland, but the air conditioning kept my mother, my aunt, and I all comfortably cool as we stood around Grandma's bed, in which, after a few more long hours, she would die. We held her hands, we ran our fingers through her still-thick, white hair. We sang to her.
White coral bells, upon a slender stalk
Lily of the valley deck my garden walk
Oh, don't you wish that you could hear then ring
That will happen only when the fairies sing
My aunt began the round. Like me, aunt Judith was raised with music in the air around her, and like me, she could not make it as beautifully as she wanted to. Then my mother, with her practiced and wonderful voice, joined. Their voices came together in a way families should, like at Christmas when Grandpa reads the nativity story to us, first from a rocking chair in the big Tree Room in Barrington, Illinois, and now from a television in my uncle's sitting room. Their voices made magic, and it didn't matter that one was clearly stronger than the other, or that one had a quaver to it that kept it from hitting every little note in the arpeggio.
As the song is a round, I joined in third, coming in just in time to be in unison with Judith, though I didn't know the song as well as she did. And now I was in the family too. And it felt like Christmas feels, like church when everyone sings, even off pitch, like the dishes in the kitchen with the birds watching. It really was a magic beyond explanation or description. She gave us our voices, and as we sat there around her, we felt compelled to give them back. We just couldn't not sing.
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
With a Little Help For My Friends
When I was in high school, and again when I taught high school, most of the teachers had a theory that the 3rd quarter of the school year--the time between finals in mid-January and the week right before spring break--was the worst quarter. Their reasoning was that
This theory attempted to explain why there were more in-school fights in 3rd quarter than the other quarters, why grades tended to slump around February, why more break ups happened. I'm sure there is a correlation-does-not-imply-causation argument here. Nevertheless, it felt like a sound theory at the time, and it made us all feel more validated in our 3rd-quarter miseries.
I'm currently wondering if that theory can be applied to out-of-school life, too. I mean, Seasonal Affected Disorder is definitely a thing, there aren't more exciting holidays that come more often once you're not in school, and non-school-aged folk seem even more angsty about lack of social interaction than high schoolers ever were.
Regardless of the reason, I've been privy to the sadness and trials of several of my friends lately, more so than I remember being a couple months ago. I'd love to tell you that I've handled these privy-counsels with grace and love, but all I can really say is that I did my best, which is not as good as I'd like it to be.
[Caveat]
I remember in junior high, there was a group called "Natural Helpers." The administration passed out little questionnaires at the beginning of the year with questions like, "What would you do if your friend came to you with?" and, "What is the most important thing to do for someone who is struggling with ?" At the end of the questionnaire, we had to put the name of one of our friends whom we felt comfortable going to with our own problems.
After a couple of weeks, the administration notified certain people that they were now members of Natural Helpers. They would go to a training retreat, have monthly or something meetings, and be expected to help their friends with all their problems.
I was not asked to be a Natural Helper. Back then, I was just hurt and confused as to why I wasn't a good enough friend to be one. Now I'm legitimately upset because that would have been good training for anyone, and I didn't get it, and now I feel set back.
[/Caveat]
I've been through hard times in the past. I've experienced painful loss, I've been through bad break ups, I've felt like a failure, I've been ashamed of myself, I've been disappointed in those around me, I've felt lost and confused, I've been unsure of myself, I've felt betrayed...suffice it to say that I've lived a life and haven't magically avoided issues. All of those trials have given me tremendous sympathy for people going through rough patches that resemble my own, (They have also given me a fair bit of empathy for people experience pain I can't even imagine, but that's a different story).
Once I find myself on the other side of one particular hardship or another, my first instinct [after celebrating hard with some video games and a good book or two] is to make sure no one else has to go through what I did/have/will. When you've been in a pit, felt it's cold, damp, darkness, and you see someone else about to fall in, you aren't about to sit blithely by and watch.
For a while, I thought this was enough. I thought wanting to help was what mattered. Especially as a Christian, I thought that if I wanted to help and I prayed to God to tell me the words to say, to give me the wisdom I lacked, I could be to struggling friends the comfort they needed.
But in this 3rd-quarter time of struggles for seemingly all of my close friends, I am finding that that is absolutely not true. Just wanting to help is not enough. Wanting desperately to lay myself over that pit like a net to keep someone from falling in, or fashioning my body into a rope to pull them out...neither of those is going to help them the way I want it to.
The reasons for this strategy's failure actually relates closely back to my last post, about non-profit volunteering. When I come into someone else's trial and think myself the expert in ways that they aren't themselves, I am doing what all those well-meaning education students do to the Boys and Girls Club, only I am doing it to my friends.
Worse than that, I am not sure that my net-stretching and rope-throwing is always right-intentioned. I fear that, like the pretty picture above says, I am more trying to help myself than I am trying to help them. Watching my friends in pain is not easy. Watching my friends in pain that I have personally experienced is even harder, because I almost feel that pain again. I want to end their pain so that I can end my own, or I want to end their pain in ways that I couldn't end my own back when I was personally in it.
Moreover, if I persist in trying to end their pain and their pain doesn't end, I might do them the immense disservice of blaming them for continuing to hurt. I've done everything I can for them, I might think. If they don't feel better, if they don't solve this problem of theirs, that's their fault. If they would only take my advice, they would feel better. I get frustrated with them and misplace my emotions. Instead of being righteously angry with the forces that put them in the situation they're in, I am frustrated with them for not getting out of it.
I have to constantly remind myself that I am not the expert on life's troubles. I have to remember that I am not my friend; I do not instantly know what will help them. I have to remember that, when in pain, advice is not always what is wanted, not always what is needed. When it is solicited, I may give it, but until then, maybe what they need is someone to sit in that pit with them, hold them, give them warm soup, let them destroy magical trinkets in Dumbledore's office, watch reruns of Boy Meets World. And after they've done that, maybe they'll need someone to make sure they're taking their medication, someone to make sure they're eating, someone who offers to take them out to a movie or to dinner, or to see their friends. Someone who shovels the driveway when they can't get out of bed, but then encourages them to go to work anyway. Support doesn't always mean advice. Sometimes it is a more subtle, more challenging thing to give.
I'm sure there are times, too, when it's not healthy for me to try to be that person to someone else. When I am personally wrestling with my own demons, I may not be able to adequately comfort someone else. When they're problems are too big and serious for me to try to tackle on my own, I should probably leave them to more experienced people. When that person doesn't trust me, or when I am the source of their problems, I may just make the situation worse by trying to personally help.
But like Leo, there may always be something I can do, even if it just to point them in the right direction.
What do you think? Is my theory of "helping" a sound one? Are there other times when you think it's not a good idea to help someone? Is there a limit to the help you should offer? Is this a subject that is close to your heart?
- The weather was snow and cold, which everyone was sick of, and late February and into March, the weather was never consistent, sucker punching us with 60˚ morning that turned into biting 30˚ evenings.
- There were fewer in-service days and almost zero holidays, not to mention very few fun, school-wide, social events to look forward to.
- Christmas was over, and spring break seemed eons away, even if it was only two weeks out.
This theory attempted to explain why there were more in-school fights in 3rd quarter than the other quarters, why grades tended to slump around February, why more break ups happened. I'm sure there is a correlation-does-not-imply-causation argument here. Nevertheless, it felt like a sound theory at the time, and it made us all feel more validated in our 3rd-quarter miseries.
I'm currently wondering if that theory can be applied to out-of-school life, too. I mean, Seasonal Affected Disorder is definitely a thing, there aren't more exciting holidays that come more often once you're not in school, and non-school-aged folk seem even more angsty about lack of social interaction than high schoolers ever were.
Regardless of the reason, I've been privy to the sadness and trials of several of my friends lately, more so than I remember being a couple months ago. I'd love to tell you that I've handled these privy-counsels with grace and love, but all I can really say is that I did my best, which is not as good as I'd like it to be.
[Caveat]
I remember in junior high, there was a group called "Natural Helpers." The administration passed out little questionnaires at the beginning of the year with questions like, "What would you do if your friend came to you with
After a couple of weeks, the administration notified certain people that they were now members of Natural Helpers. They would go to a training retreat, have monthly or something meetings, and be expected to help their friends with all their problems.
I was not asked to be a Natural Helper. Back then, I was just hurt and confused as to why I wasn't a good enough friend to be one. Now I'm legitimately upset because that would have been good training for anyone, and I didn't get it, and now I feel set back.
[/Caveat]
 |
| Evidently Natural Helpers is a national organization. Huh. |
I've been through hard times in the past. I've experienced painful loss, I've been through bad break ups, I've felt like a failure, I've been ashamed of myself, I've been disappointed in those around me, I've felt lost and confused, I've been unsure of myself, I've felt betrayed...suffice it to say that I've lived a life and haven't magically avoided issues. All of those trials have given me tremendous sympathy for people going through rough patches that resemble my own, (They have also given me a fair bit of empathy for people experience pain I can't even imagine, but that's a different story).
Once I find myself on the other side of one particular hardship or another, my first instinct [after celebrating hard with some video games and a good book or two] is to make sure no one else has to go through what I did/have/will. When you've been in a pit, felt it's cold, damp, darkness, and you see someone else about to fall in, you aren't about to sit blithely by and watch.
For a while, I thought this was enough. I thought wanting to help was what mattered. Especially as a Christian, I thought that if I wanted to help and I prayed to God to tell me the words to say, to give me the wisdom I lacked, I could be to struggling friends the comfort they needed.
But in this 3rd-quarter time of struggles for seemingly all of my close friends, I am finding that that is absolutely not true. Just wanting to help is not enough. Wanting desperately to lay myself over that pit like a net to keep someone from falling in, or fashioning my body into a rope to pull them out...neither of those is going to help them the way I want it to.
The reasons for this strategy's failure actually relates closely back to my last post, about non-profit volunteering. When I come into someone else's trial and think myself the expert in ways that they aren't themselves, I am doing what all those well-meaning education students do to the Boys and Girls Club, only I am doing it to my friends.
Worse than that, I am not sure that my net-stretching and rope-throwing is always right-intentioned. I fear that, like the pretty picture above says, I am more trying to help myself than I am trying to help them. Watching my friends in pain is not easy. Watching my friends in pain that I have personally experienced is even harder, because I almost feel that pain again. I want to end their pain so that I can end my own, or I want to end their pain in ways that I couldn't end my own back when I was personally in it.
Moreover, if I persist in trying to end their pain and their pain doesn't end, I might do them the immense disservice of blaming them for continuing to hurt. I've done everything I can for them, I might think. If they don't feel better, if they don't solve this problem of theirs, that's their fault. If they would only take my advice, they would feel better. I get frustrated with them and misplace my emotions. Instead of being righteously angry with the forces that put them in the situation they're in, I am frustrated with them for not getting out of it.
I have to constantly remind myself that I am not the expert on life's troubles. I have to remember that I am not my friend; I do not instantly know what will help them. I have to remember that, when in pain, advice is not always what is wanted, not always what is needed. When it is solicited, I may give it, but until then, maybe what they need is someone to sit in that pit with them, hold them, give them warm soup, let them destroy magical trinkets in Dumbledore's office, watch reruns of Boy Meets World. And after they've done that, maybe they'll need someone to make sure they're taking their medication, someone to make sure they're eating, someone who offers to take them out to a movie or to dinner, or to see their friends. Someone who shovels the driveway when they can't get out of bed, but then encourages them to go to work anyway. Support doesn't always mean advice. Sometimes it is a more subtle, more challenging thing to give.
I'm sure there are times, too, when it's not healthy for me to try to be that person to someone else. When I am personally wrestling with my own demons, I may not be able to adequately comfort someone else. When they're problems are too big and serious for me to try to tackle on my own, I should probably leave them to more experienced people. When that person doesn't trust me, or when I am the source of their problems, I may just make the situation worse by trying to personally help.
But like Leo, there may always be something I can do, even if it just to point them in the right direction.
What do you think? Is my theory of "helping" a sound one? Are there other times when you think it's not a good idea to help someone? Is there a limit to the help you should offer? Is this a subject that is close to your heart?
Wednesday, January 29, 2014
Tomorrow Will Be Kinder
It's not usually my style to post about my sadness on Facebook or Twitter. It makes me feel weird to be comforted by the internet, and I wonder if there isn't something unhealthy about going to the masses for solace instead of to specific people for support and emotional stability.
But today started out so bad, I didn't stop myself.
I did edit myself soon after, though.
Why did it feel like a Monday? Well, I didn't work yesterday, and I do work today, so that may have been part of it, but it wasn't all of it.
Then, after freaking out a bit about that, my computer told me that, Surprise! There are about 300 updates you need to install, and if you don't do it now, you're hard drive will become corrupt and you will personally self-destruct. (Okay, yes, that last bit was my brain's artistic additions, but they all looked like important updates and I was scared of not performing them immediately, due to some recent changes with my computer) Oh, and, these updates are so big, intimidating, and fundamental to your computer's survival that you're going to need to restart in order to complete them. This task will take approximately two hours and you will not be able to use your computer at all during that time.
If you've been following my blog for the past six months or so, you might have noticed the progressively downward-spiraling trajectory that I've been on. Starting with my graduation and gradually descending deeper and deeper into a crippling sadness, frustration, and feeling of crushing hopelessness, the latter half of 2013 did not go well for me overall.
If you've been following my blog for the past one month, you should have noticed that I have determined that 2014 should be much better than 2013, if for no other reason than I say it will be, dang it. I made New Year's resolutions to that end, I stopped going on Tumblr, I began consciously eating more healthily and limiting the number of Netflix hours I spent in a week. I even made a Super Spreadsheet about how I do want to spend my time and what I want to accomplish this month and every month to follow. I worked hard to make sure that 2014 at least started off much better than 2013 ended.
And then this day hit.
It may sound stupid, because all of these problems that I've had are very "first world" and fixable, but my first instinct was to crawl back into bed with my puppy, call my mom, and sleep for a while. For the past six months, the problems have been "first world," "fixable," "easily handled," problems, but there have been so many that I've stopped being able to see them in that perspective. It got to the point where I wanted to shut the world out and just sleep for a while, hoping that someone else would take care of the problems while I ignored them.
That, of course, is not realistic. But that, my friends, is depression.
Since I was still wearing my jammy jams, I felt no shame wrapping Fudge and me back up in my blanket. But when I called my mom, it went to voicemail. So I lay there for a bit, thinking about how terrible this day was turning out to be, mourning the loss of the morning of fun wedding planning that required a computer and candle making that required running water and Assassin's Creed playing that required that ill-shipped PS3.
But then, a miracle happened.
I remembered that, since I had started to hoard water in various vessels elsewhere in my apartment (my two electric kettles, my nalgene, some pots on my stove) Fudge and I aren't going to dehydrate today. I remembered also, praise God, my toilet is a beast that could probably get water from the surface of Mars. I had already used the toilet once, and I had already had some tea and filled Fudge's dish, but these little blessings had fallen from my mind after the other issues had piled on.
I remembered that I have angelic friends who still live in GR and have professed on several occasions that they are willing to do anything for me, including go to a complete stranger's house and retrieve packages that aren't theirs. I had already texted those people and called my old leasing company to have them warn the new tenants, but in my increased sadness and frustration, I had forgotten about that.
So I got out of bed, I called my current landlord to tell them about the pipes. I cleaned up the apartment a little in case the maintenance people came around. I started my computer's updates. I lit some pre-made candles. I had breakfast. I played with my dog. I surfed the web on my phone.
I got some perspective. My problems did not end my day.
2014 is already so much better than 2013. Praise God from whom all blessings flow.
But today started out so bad, I didn't stop myself.
 |
| Yes. My Facebook is in German. "Furchtbar" translates to "horrible," in case you were ignorant of that. |
I did edit myself soon after, though.
 |
| "Feeling horrible" sounded overdramatic to me. |
After about an hour of wakefulness, it already felt like the Universe had a case of the Mondays and was taking it out on me. All week, my pipes have been playing Wack-a-mole with me: one would freeze, but the other two would still be willing to trickle into use, then the frozen one would unfreeze, but one of the working ones would go out, then only the hot water came out so that any shower I attempted to take threatened 3rd-degree burns and washing dishes would have sufficed as a medieval punishment for stealing. Then this morning, all of the pipes decided they were done trying. I left all the working ones dripping last night, but to no avail. This morning, no water.
After cursing a bit about that, I then logged into my Amazon account to check on some stuff I ordered that suspiciously hadn't come yet (I bought a 6-year-old PS3 and some games with Christmas money) and learned to my horror that, due to my nostalgic reticence to delete my old Grand Rapids address from my Amazon account, I had actually shipped said orders to said address. I don't know anyone at that address anymore.
Then, after freaking out a bit about that, my computer told me that, Surprise! There are about 300 updates you need to install, and if you don't do it now, you're hard drive will become corrupt and you will personally self-destruct. (Okay, yes, that last bit was my brain's artistic additions, but they all looked like important updates and I was scared of not performing them immediately, due to some recent changes with my computer) Oh, and, these updates are so big, intimidating, and fundamental to your computer's survival that you're going to need to restart in order to complete them. This task will take approximately two hours and you will not be able to use your computer at all during that time.
If you've been following my blog for the past six months or so, you might have noticed the progressively downward-spiraling trajectory that I've been on. Starting with my graduation and gradually descending deeper and deeper into a crippling sadness, frustration, and feeling of crushing hopelessness, the latter half of 2013 did not go well for me overall.
If you've been following my blog for the past one month, you should have noticed that I have determined that 2014 should be much better than 2013, if for no other reason than I say it will be, dang it. I made New Year's resolutions to that end, I stopped going on Tumblr, I began consciously eating more healthily and limiting the number of Netflix hours I spent in a week. I even made a Super Spreadsheet about how I do want to spend my time and what I want to accomplish this month and every month to follow. I worked hard to make sure that 2014 at least started off much better than 2013 ended.
And then this day hit.
It may sound stupid, because all of these problems that I've had are very "first world" and fixable, but my first instinct was to crawl back into bed with my puppy, call my mom, and sleep for a while. For the past six months, the problems have been "first world," "fixable," "easily handled," problems, but there have been so many that I've stopped being able to see them in that perspective. It got to the point where I wanted to shut the world out and just sleep for a while, hoping that someone else would take care of the problems while I ignored them.
That, of course, is not realistic. But that, my friends, is depression.
Since I was still wearing my jammy jams, I felt no shame wrapping Fudge and me back up in my blanket. But when I called my mom, it went to voicemail. So I lay there for a bit, thinking about how terrible this day was turning out to be, mourning the loss of the morning of fun wedding planning that required a computer and candle making that required running water and Assassin's Creed playing that required that ill-shipped PS3.
 |
| What? This is exactly what I look like when I'm sad and in bed. |
But then, a miracle happened.
I remembered that, since I had started to hoard water in various vessels elsewhere in my apartment (my two electric kettles, my nalgene, some pots on my stove) Fudge and I aren't going to dehydrate today. I remembered also, praise God, my toilet is a beast that could probably get water from the surface of Mars. I had already used the toilet once, and I had already had some tea and filled Fudge's dish, but these little blessings had fallen from my mind after the other issues had piled on.
I remembered that I have angelic friends who still live in GR and have professed on several occasions that they are willing to do anything for me, including go to a complete stranger's house and retrieve packages that aren't theirs. I had already texted those people and called my old leasing company to have them warn the new tenants, but in my increased sadness and frustration, I had forgotten about that.
So I got out of bed, I called my current landlord to tell them about the pipes. I cleaned up the apartment a little in case the maintenance people came around. I started my computer's updates. I lit some pre-made candles. I had breakfast. I played with my dog. I surfed the web on my phone.
I got some perspective. My problems did not end my day.
2014 is already so much better than 2013. Praise God from whom all blessings flow.
Sunday, January 19, 2014
The Old Q vs. Q Argument with a Lemony Fresh Twist
I haven't slept well the past few nights. I think it's because of my unthinking untimely intake of tea (I can't help that I love tea and sometimes forget to go herbal after 3 pm) but it could also be due to my sudden enthusiasm for things that happen in my waking hours (a sort of new thing). Whatever the cause, the effect is that my extended waking hours have, of late, potentially at my loopiest.
So, this afternoon, when I was in my car, driving home from lunch with some friends, and I heard a fascinating story on NPR, I maybe got a bit more excited than I would have on a regular, non-sleep-deprived-and-over-compensating-for-it Sunday.
Such a surplus of excitement, today, means a blogpost.
The story was about a man who works very hard to make a living streaming music on Spotify. If you know anything about how not-lucrative online music sales are for the artist, you're probably wondering how he does it. Well, he does write about an average of 14,000 songs a year, so there's that.
Most of his songs are just catalogs of various nouns. He's got an album about things he found in his house with a song about a door, and one hit about the hot water heater. He's got an album of songs about transportation. He's got a whole "band" dedicated to (ironically clean) songs about defecation. The band's name is "The Toilet Bowl Cleaners" and "their" biggest hit is "The Poop Song" which...is exactly what you think it is.
An average of 14,000 songs a year, assuming he works 52 weeks a year, is about 269 songs a week. On the radio program, someone mentioned that he records these songs in his basement 4 days a week, which makes an average of about 67 songs a day, which, assuming he works 8 hour days, is 8 or 9 songs in a work day. That's written, recorded, mixed, and uploaded.
My brother is a musician who has been in the business for several years now, and he is just now putting together his second album. I have a feeling he'd have a few choice words to say about Matt Farley and the quality of that music.
But I think both Dennis and Matt would say that two artists so different can hardly try to compare themselves to each other. They don't have the same goals for their music, their outreach as musicians, or even their lifestyles and vocation, so why would their measurements of "success" be the same?
...or is it? Because, sure, Dennis works slower than Matt and his work is more fine tuned and probably has more longevity, and Matt has a volume that trumps Dennis' every time. He writes songs four days a week. He spends little if any time working on pre- or post-production stuff, he doesn't manage tour dates or book shows, and he never has to haul any of his equipment out of his basement. All he does is just write, record, upload, repeat.
I wanted to write this post without sitting on it or editing it, in one swift action, in the spirit of Matt Farley. When I was composing it in my head on the way from the curb where I parked my car, it sounded perfect and important. The bit about Quantity-Only-creations having value all their own really spoke to me on a deep level as I danced out of my coat and skipped into my dining room to sit down and write this.
So, this afternoon, when I was in my car, driving home from lunch with some friends, and I heard a fascinating story on NPR, I maybe got a bit more excited than I would have on a regular, non-sleep-deprived-and-over-compensating-for-it Sunday.
Such a surplus of excitement, today, means a blogpost.
[End Intro]
The story was about a man who works very hard to make a living streaming music on Spotify. If you know anything about how not-lucrative online music sales are for the artist, you're probably wondering how he does it. Well, he does write about an average of 14,000 songs a year, so there's that.
Most of his songs are just catalogs of various nouns. He's got an album about things he found in his house with a song about a door, and one hit about the hot water heater. He's got an album of songs about transportation. He's got a whole "band" dedicated to (ironically clean) songs about defecation. The band's name is "The Toilet Bowl Cleaners" and "their" biggest hit is "The Poop Song" which...is exactly what you think it is.
Put the calculator down. I'll do it for you.
An average of 14,000 songs a year, assuming he works 52 weeks a year, is about 269 songs a week. On the radio program, someone mentioned that he records these songs in his basement 4 days a week, which makes an average of about 67 songs a day, which, assuming he works 8 hour days, is 8 or 9 songs in a work day. That's written, recorded, mixed, and uploaded.
My brother is a musician who has been in the business for several years now, and he is just now putting together his second album. I have a feeling he'd have a few choice words to say about Matt Farley and the quality of that music.
But I think both Dennis and Matt would say that two artists so different can hardly try to compare themselves to each other. They don't have the same goals for their music, their outreach as musicians, or even their lifestyles and vocation, so why would their measurements of "success" be the same?
It's the old Quality versus Quantity argument...
...or is it? Because, sure, Dennis works slower than Matt and his work is more fine tuned and probably has more longevity, and Matt has a volume that trumps Dennis' every time. He writes songs four days a week. He spends little if any time working on pre- or post-production stuff, he doesn't manage tour dates or book shows, and he never has to haul any of his equipment out of his basement. All he does is just write, record, upload, repeat.
Artists--musicians, writers, painters, and all the rest--often talk about that process as a form of discipline. Just write, just paint, just play: it's not about inspiration, it's about sitting down and working on your craft, not neglecting your skills, your voice, your practice. It's about breaking through barriers like, "I don't know if I'm good enough," or "I have bad grammar," or "Am I tone deaf? I mean seriously, have you heard me?" and just get anything down.
It feels to me sometimes like we feel we have to go through periods where all we're doing is Quantity in order to get to the moments of Quality that will sustain a career, legitimize our talent, and/or bring meaning into the world through our art. It feels to me sometimes like we believe that the things we create in our periods of Quantity-Only are worthwhile only as part of a journey to the Quality we produce later. They don't have inherent purpose.
But Matt Farley doesn't think that. I mean, I guess I don't know what he does think. But I know that PJ Vogt thinks that Matt Farley's 14,000 songs a year do have merit on their own. They perform a service to the world beyond just getting Farley to a time where he can create fewer, but better overall work.
PJ tells the story about how he asked Matt to write a song for PJ's step-parents for a Christmas presents. He gives Matt five bits of information about his stepmom, Nan, and PJ thinks about it for a minute, comes up with some chords, and, BAM, records a song right there. PJ then takes that song around to his friends for the next few days and is clearly more excited than they are, and begins to worry whether his gift is going to flop. But then he gives it to Nan on Christmas day and she is over the moon. She listens to it multiple times, asks him twice to email it to her, and then sends PJ a note about how much she loved it, and how it touched her that he gave it to her.
PJ makes the connection that most of Farley's music does nothing more than acknowledge the existence of things--"This is a door," or "Poop is a thing," or "You're part of the family"--and step-parents often seek that simple acknowledgement without often receiving it. "[The song Farley wrote for Nan] uncomplicated a complicated situation."
It took seconds to write. It was based off of extremely little knowledge of its own subject. It made two people's Christmases.
If that's not Quality, What is it?
I wanted to write this post without sitting on it or editing it, in one swift action, in the spirit of Matt Farley. When I was composing it in my head on the way from the curb where I parked my car, it sounded perfect and important. The bit about Quantity-Only-creations having value all their own really spoke to me on a deep level as I danced out of my coat and skipped into my dining room to sit down and write this.
But as I try to round it out at the end here, I realize that the message is tried and true: quality is everywhere, and quality is what you make of it. You don't have to be the next J.D. Salinger to write a novel that is great and American to someone. You don't have to use your passions to pay your bills. You can Just Write, or you can write sporadically. There is no one, cookie-cutter right way.
Everyone has said that sometime in the past fifteen years, though, so now this post feels incredibly less perfect and important, even if it still speaks to me in my crazy, sleep-deprived-and-trying-too-hard mental state.
But damn me if I don't post it anyway.
EDIT:
EDIT:
@PKsDancingGirl Thanks for writing about me! Well done. (But, it's 14,000 songs since '08, not yearly (though now I have a new goal!).
— Motern Media (@MoternMedia) January 22, 2014
@PKsDancingGirl I google my name all the time! Check out my movie sometime: https://t.co/AymNwP0bNf
— Motern Media (@MoternMedia) January 22, 2014
It's the 19th! You know what that means...
That's right! Today, The Post Calvin posted a blog of mine that muses about the strange complexity of photographs that both capture and save a moment in the past, and yet most often have as short a shelf-life as their subjects. I also briefly mention flowers, in case that interests you.
Sunday, December 15, 2013
What is the best policy, again?
This morning, I read a blog post about modesty, and I have been musing about it in the back of my mind all day. You should read it and then come back to this post so we can discuss it together.
If you don't want to do that, I'll tl;dr it for you.
1) Women's bodies are policed in frustrating ways from both ends of the spectrum: in magazines, TV shows, movies, etc, women are told to be thinner, fitter, more pleasing to men in visual and sexual contexts, and in churches (as well as other, non-Christian arenas) across the world, women are told to cover up, to strive for plainness, to please men by not leading them into sin.
2) This is baffling to the Christian woman who wrote the blogpost (and to me) because nowhere in the Bible does God or Jesus say that women are are fault for their brothers' lustful stumbles, nor does the Bible ever lay the onus on women to prevent the sinful thoughts of others.
3) We, as Christians and a Church turn modesty into objectification by blaming women for the sins of their Christian brothers, and by making women ashamed of their bodies, telling them that their physical form has been corrupted by Satan into an instrument of sin.
4) The blogger finishes her post by saying "Dress for yourself in a way that is glorifying to God, not men. ... Prioritize strength, dignity and good deeds, and then dress accordingly. Find something that makes you comfortable. Find something that is ethically made. Find something that gives you the freedom to run with abandon into those incoming waves—and revel in this body and this world God gave you to enjoy." In the earlier version of the post that I read, she also included something along the lines of "Wear what makes you happy."
This, my sort-of response post, is something I've been writing in my head for many years, my thoughts on this topic that have been simmering for a long time, and are now coming to the surface because I think I've finally formed an opinion worth standing on.
-=-=-=-=-=-
First of all, I should preface this to all the non-Christian or not-religious readers I may or may not have. I realize that this whole argument may seem pretty dumb to you. The more I study Christianity and faith from the inside, the more I've come to realize how utterly ridiculous it must seem from the outside. I can appreciate the struggles non-Christian people have with both the Church and its faith. I've heard a lot of off-hand summarizations of Christianity that go something like, "A bunch of people who rely on a centuries-old text to dictate their every day life and hold way too much stock in a guy who asked them to drink his blood and eat is body." Our rituals, our beliefs, and our culture are hard to stomach, and I've even spent a lot of my Christian life struggling to get to the bottom of them.
That said, if you disagree with what I say here and would like to have a discussion about it, please remember that, if we come from different foundational beliefs, that discussion is going to be heavy and intimate, and will go deeper than just the words in this post, so maybe we should find a better place to have that conversation than in the comments section or on my Facebook.
-=-=-=-=-=-
I've always had a problem with the "Modesty is the Best Policy!" speeches that we got in church as kids and teenagers. For one thing, the youth group leaders would separate us into two groups--boys and girls--as if our trials in the arena of sexuality and self-expression were too different, and moreover, needed to be kept secret from one another. I always wanted to know what was going on in the boys' conversations about these issues, and I always wanted them to know what was going on in the girls', but that wasn't allowed for some reason.
I don't really think that men's and women's struggles with lust and objectification are vastly different, and I definitely don't think they should be trade secrets that separate us. It's that separation and miscommunication that leads to statements like, "Women shouldn't be allowed to be church leaders or pastors because their bodies will lead the men in the congregation to sin." The truth of it is that both men and women can be distracted by men and women's bodies. If I had a nickel for every girl whose crush on a male pastor or worship leader distracted her from the message of the church, I could probably pay for all the Christmas gifts I bought this year and get myself a little something extra, too. That fact would be more widely known and accepted if men and women in church talked together about things like sexuality and attraction.
The reason the idea of modesty has been on my mind a lot recently (more recently, anyway, than the Sunday School sex talks I got in high school) is because, in college, I became really gung-ho about feminism and gender equality, and it has since changed my view of myself and my role as a woman in Christianity. A lot of topics come into play with the discussion of women in the Church, and modesty is one of them that pops up quite frequently and in rather inconspicuous ways.
For instance, when I was 18 and younger, going to church with my parents or friends, I felt convicted not to wear tank tops. I felt uncomfortable with my shoulders uncovered, not because I didn't like tank-tops in general, but because I didn't think they were something a Godly woman should wear, and I didn't want people at church to think I was anything but Godly.
This attitude persisted for some time into college, but eventually, a fundamental change occurred, and I stopped thinking that showing off my shoulders was unGodly, but I still worried about what people at church would think of me if I did it. I worried, not about men lusting after me, but about women and pastors and indoctrinated children passing judgements about me and my faith because my skirt was too short or my cleavage was too exposed.
I can't attest to whether or not anyone at any of my previous churches actually did pass such judgements on me, but I can say that I was no longer trying to please God. I was trying to please God's followers. I was not even trying to protect men struggling with lustful thoughts; I was trying to protect myself from the scorn of anyone struggling with a judgmental nature.
And I think that was the sin I committed. Not only was I passing judgment prematurely on my brothers and sisters in Christ by assuming that they would think so poorly of me so easily, but I was also putting their opinion of me above God's.
I think the blogger from the above post said it well when she emphasized that women (perhaps specifically Christian women) should not be dressing for men--whether it be to please them sexually or to please them spiritually--or other people in our church congregations. We should be doing everything for the glory of God, and that includes the way we dress. That is different than wearing whatever makes you happy (which may be the reason she has since retracted that statement) because God doesn't think that our purpose on this earth is to merely be happy. But that is also different than policing our bodies or anyone else's bodies and making the argument that one person can prevent another's sin.
If, as we search through our closets in the morning (or, in my case, the pile of semi-clean clothes strewn across the floor...) we are too preoccupied thinking about how we are going to serve our Lord today, or about how our clothes are or are not going to get in the way of our worldly worship getting accomplished, isn't that more important than thinking about how many eyes we will or won't turn with our scoop neck top or our short shorts? This should also be true of men, whose bodies can also be distracting to those who see them. Shouldn't a man be more concerned with whether his T-shirt will be thin and breathable enough for him to do his work at Habitat for Humanity, than with whether the way it accentuates his shoulder blades may lead a fellow volunteer down the path that leads to destruction?
Most importantly, if a Christian does catch themselves objectifying someone who is made in the image of God, shouldn't they do whatever it takes for their own heart to undo that, rather than turn the sin and shame on that person who might not have had any malicious intent, or may have come from a culture where their chosen dress is the norm and is completely socially acceptable? Perhaps, when we catch ourselves in the act of objectification, we should pray to God for wisdom and clarity, to relearn to see that person as a unique individual who fits into God's cosmic plan for the redemption of the world. Perhaps we should find an unobtrusive way reach out to them, to have a conversation or share a meal so that we might come to know and see beyond their bodies. Or perhaps we should just remove ourselves from the situation, quoting scripture to ourselves and our inner demons, as Jesus did during his 40 days in the wilderness.
I think churches and Christians should focus as much or more of their energies on teaching their congregants how to avoid objectifying human beings as they do on teaching women how to cover up their sex-appeal. And I think that pastors and church leaders could make much more headway in the Biblical modesty department if they taught women and men fiscally and morally responsible ways to purchase, make, and wear clothing and bodily adornments instead of telling women that tank tops and mini dresses are the devil's playthings.
If you don't want to do that, I'll tl;dr it for you.
1) Women's bodies are policed in frustrating ways from both ends of the spectrum: in magazines, TV shows, movies, etc, women are told to be thinner, fitter, more pleasing to men in visual and sexual contexts, and in churches (as well as other, non-Christian arenas) across the world, women are told to cover up, to strive for plainness, to please men by not leading them into sin.
2) This is baffling to the Christian woman who wrote the blogpost (and to me) because nowhere in the Bible does God or Jesus say that women are are fault for their brothers' lustful stumbles, nor does the Bible ever lay the onus on women to prevent the sinful thoughts of others.
3) We, as Christians and a Church turn modesty into objectification by blaming women for the sins of their Christian brothers, and by making women ashamed of their bodies, telling them that their physical form has been corrupted by Satan into an instrument of sin.
4) The blogger finishes her post by saying "Dress for yourself in a way that is glorifying to God, not men. ... Prioritize strength, dignity and good deeds, and then dress accordingly. Find something that makes you comfortable. Find something that is ethically made. Find something that gives you the freedom to run with abandon into those incoming waves—and revel in this body and this world God gave you to enjoy." In the earlier version of the post that I read, she also included something along the lines of "Wear what makes you happy."
This, my sort-of response post, is something I've been writing in my head for many years, my thoughts on this topic that have been simmering for a long time, and are now coming to the surface because I think I've finally formed an opinion worth standing on.
-=-=-=-=-=-
First of all, I should preface this to all the non-Christian or not-religious readers I may or may not have. I realize that this whole argument may seem pretty dumb to you. The more I study Christianity and faith from the inside, the more I've come to realize how utterly ridiculous it must seem from the outside. I can appreciate the struggles non-Christian people have with both the Church and its faith. I've heard a lot of off-hand summarizations of Christianity that go something like, "A bunch of people who rely on a centuries-old text to dictate their every day life and hold way too much stock in a guy who asked them to drink his blood and eat is body." Our rituals, our beliefs, and our culture are hard to stomach, and I've even spent a lot of my Christian life struggling to get to the bottom of them.
That said, if you disagree with what I say here and would like to have a discussion about it, please remember that, if we come from different foundational beliefs, that discussion is going to be heavy and intimate, and will go deeper than just the words in this post, so maybe we should find a better place to have that conversation than in the comments section or on my Facebook.
-=-=-=-=-=-
I've always had a problem with the "Modesty is the Best Policy!" speeches that we got in church as kids and teenagers. For one thing, the youth group leaders would separate us into two groups--boys and girls--as if our trials in the arena of sexuality and self-expression were too different, and moreover, needed to be kept secret from one another. I always wanted to know what was going on in the boys' conversations about these issues, and I always wanted them to know what was going on in the girls', but that wasn't allowed for some reason.
I don't really think that men's and women's struggles with lust and objectification are vastly different, and I definitely don't think they should be trade secrets that separate us. It's that separation and miscommunication that leads to statements like, "Women shouldn't be allowed to be church leaders or pastors because their bodies will lead the men in the congregation to sin." The truth of it is that both men and women can be distracted by men and women's bodies. If I had a nickel for every girl whose crush on a male pastor or worship leader distracted her from the message of the church, I could probably pay for all the Christmas gifts I bought this year and get myself a little something extra, too. That fact would be more widely known and accepted if men and women in church talked together about things like sexuality and attraction.
The reason the idea of modesty has been on my mind a lot recently (more recently, anyway, than the Sunday School sex talks I got in high school) is because, in college, I became really gung-ho about feminism and gender equality, and it has since changed my view of myself and my role as a woman in Christianity. A lot of topics come into play with the discussion of women in the Church, and modesty is one of them that pops up quite frequently and in rather inconspicuous ways.
For instance, when I was 18 and younger, going to church with my parents or friends, I felt convicted not to wear tank tops. I felt uncomfortable with my shoulders uncovered, not because I didn't like tank-tops in general, but because I didn't think they were something a Godly woman should wear, and I didn't want people at church to think I was anything but Godly.
This attitude persisted for some time into college, but eventually, a fundamental change occurred, and I stopped thinking that showing off my shoulders was unGodly, but I still worried about what people at church would think of me if I did it. I worried, not about men lusting after me, but about women and pastors and indoctrinated children passing judgements about me and my faith because my skirt was too short or my cleavage was too exposed.
I can't attest to whether or not anyone at any of my previous churches actually did pass such judgements on me, but I can say that I was no longer trying to please God. I was trying to please God's followers. I was not even trying to protect men struggling with lustful thoughts; I was trying to protect myself from the scorn of anyone struggling with a judgmental nature.
And I think that was the sin I committed. Not only was I passing judgment prematurely on my brothers and sisters in Christ by assuming that they would think so poorly of me so easily, but I was also putting their opinion of me above God's.
I think the blogger from the above post said it well when she emphasized that women (perhaps specifically Christian women) should not be dressing for men--whether it be to please them sexually or to please them spiritually--or other people in our church congregations. We should be doing everything for the glory of God, and that includes the way we dress. That is different than wearing whatever makes you happy (which may be the reason she has since retracted that statement) because God doesn't think that our purpose on this earth is to merely be happy. But that is also different than policing our bodies or anyone else's bodies and making the argument that one person can prevent another's sin.
If, as we search through our closets in the morning (or, in my case, the pile of semi-clean clothes strewn across the floor...) we are too preoccupied thinking about how we are going to serve our Lord today, or about how our clothes are or are not going to get in the way of our worldly worship getting accomplished, isn't that more important than thinking about how many eyes we will or won't turn with our scoop neck top or our short shorts? This should also be true of men, whose bodies can also be distracting to those who see them. Shouldn't a man be more concerned with whether his T-shirt will be thin and breathable enough for him to do his work at Habitat for Humanity, than with whether the way it accentuates his shoulder blades may lead a fellow volunteer down the path that leads to destruction?
Most importantly, if a Christian does catch themselves objectifying someone who is made in the image of God, shouldn't they do whatever it takes for their own heart to undo that, rather than turn the sin and shame on that person who might not have had any malicious intent, or may have come from a culture where their chosen dress is the norm and is completely socially acceptable? Perhaps, when we catch ourselves in the act of objectification, we should pray to God for wisdom and clarity, to relearn to see that person as a unique individual who fits into God's cosmic plan for the redemption of the world. Perhaps we should find an unobtrusive way reach out to them, to have a conversation or share a meal so that we might come to know and see beyond their bodies. Or perhaps we should just remove ourselves from the situation, quoting scripture to ourselves and our inner demons, as Jesus did during his 40 days in the wilderness.
I think churches and Christians should focus as much or more of their energies on teaching their congregants how to avoid objectifying human beings as they do on teaching women how to cover up their sex-appeal. And I think that pastors and church leaders could make much more headway in the Biblical modesty department if they taught women and men fiscally and morally responsible ways to purchase, make, and wear clothing and bodily adornments instead of telling women that tank tops and mini dresses are the devil's playthings.
Wednesday, December 11, 2013
The War on Christmas
If you have completely read the header image of this blog, you have probably noticed that there is a "Lord" in it, which probably tipped you off (if you are someone who needed tipping off) that it was a quote from the Bible.
Secret's out (if you are someone who thought it was a secret): I am a Christian. I'm pretty deep into it, have been for a long time. It looks like there's no hope for my rehabilitation. The heavenly Doctor has given me only an eternity left to live. In lieu of flowers, please send food because I haven't gone grocery shopping in a while.
All joking aside, I am a Christian. Through and through, I believe in Jesus, I go to Church on Sundays, I pray as daily as I can manage, I read my Bible as daily as I can remember, and I study that Bible and my God in a community with other Christians. I take my faith seriously, and while I struggle, I do try to put my love and worship of God before all else in my life.
Which is why I really hate the wars that people--predominantly Americans, I believe--declare on various "Christian" things. Recently, it has been marriage, but I that's a whole post in and of itself. A more timely war, though, is The War on Christmas. This comes around every year at this time, and I am so sick of it.
I guess I should clarify: specifically, I'm sick of people saying it's a thing.
There are some tangentially-religious topics that the conservative media addresses that should be responded to with care, diplomacy, gentle words, and loving language. But I don't believe this is one of them.
From what I can tell, this particular breed of warmongers fear the "politically correct" army is soiling the holid--I'm sorry, the Christmas Season by using the word "Holiday" instead of the word "Christmas."
There have probably been lawsuits against public displays of affection for Christmas. I think I've heard of people suing to have outdoor nativities removed from courthouses and a quick google search turns up some other weird stuff about banners that said Merry Christmas and discussions pro and against the ACLU. It is unfortunate to me that Christmas, which has already become a time to celebrate capitalism and materialism, has also become the battle ground for free speech. But to a larger degree, the backlash against and the use of these lawsuits as proof that there is a war on Christmas (and therefore Christianity) is what really troubles me.
Ostensibly, the United States is a Christian country. A non-Christian has never been elected president, we swear oaths of office and honesty on the Bible, and people like to pretend that the founding fathers were God-fearing Christians themselves. But, in actuality, we are not a Christian country. Our country has morals and as a society we have a somewhat stable belief system, but we are hardly Christian on the whole, and I don't see that as a bad thing. We are made up almost entirely of immigrants who came here from hundreds of countries and many different religions, and it just makes sense that, even if our country started as a Christian nation (it didn't), is hasn't remained one and it can't try to become one again.
In actuality, Christmas is Christian (obligatory "CHRISTmas" comment). Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus, whom Christians believe to have been the incarnation of God who eventually grew up to die for their sins, thus making humans' reunion with God possible. Ostensibly, around the country, Christmas is more than that now. It, like the United States itself, has taken dozens of different cultures from around the globe and mashed them into something that Americans can all celebrate if they want to. The Christmas we get time off work for is based more on an amalgamation of Saint Nicholas's feast day and pagan celebrations of the winter solstice than it is on Christ. It is a holiday where people travel to see their families, exchange gifts under a tree and in giant socks, eat honeyed ham, and watch It's a Wonderful Life. If that family is Christian, they will likely also celebrate the birth of Christ, but if that family is not Christian (and even sometimes if they are) they will skip that part.
So doesn't it make sense that the not-actually-Christian State is a little loose with their actually-Christian-holiday terminology? People who get the time off work, who buy the gifts on sale, who put up the tree and lights and excessive lawn ornamentation aren't necessarily celebrating Christian Christmas, anymore than the people who buy the peeps and hide the eggs are celebrating Christian Easter. So what does it matter to us if they don't want to call it Christmas? Doesn't the term "holiday" fit it better, due to its ambiguity, its fluidity, and its ability to cover a lot of ground in a single word?
I guess my main beef with "the war on Christmas" propaganda is that I don't feel like wishing people "Happy holidays!" makes it harder for me to enjoy the holidays I personally celebrate (which are actually plural, including my birthday, Christmas, and New Year's Eve...). I'd feel the same way if I owned a company that sent out holiday cards, put up banners, or threw parties and I'd feel the same way if I were a teacher who wanted to decorate her classroom in December. Neither my company as a whole nor my classroom as a structure celebrates any holidays. No one is telling me how to celebrate them myself. No one is telling me I can't talk to others about how I celebrate my December holidays.
I do not see how my freedom is impinged, and I do see how my use of the word "Holidays" fits the mold of the season better that "Christmas" for most people that I talk to. It's not a matter of a war against that oh-so-terrible concept of political correctness. It's a matter of accuracy and efficiency. And you know who values efficiency?
Secret's out (if you are someone who thought it was a secret): I am a Christian. I'm pretty deep into it, have been for a long time. It looks like there's no hope for my rehabilitation. The heavenly Doctor has given me only an eternity left to live. In lieu of flowers, please send food because I haven't gone grocery shopping in a while.
All joking aside, I am a Christian. Through and through, I believe in Jesus, I go to Church on Sundays, I pray as daily as I can manage, I read my Bible as daily as I can remember, and I study that Bible and my God in a community with other Christians. I take my faith seriously, and while I struggle, I do try to put my love and worship of God before all else in my life.
Which is why I really hate the wars that people--predominantly Americans, I believe--declare on various "Christian" things. Recently, it has been marriage, but I that's a whole post in and of itself. A more timely war, though, is The War on Christmas. This comes around every year at this time, and I am so sick of it.
I guess I should clarify: specifically, I'm sick of people saying it's a thing.
There are some tangentially-religious topics that the conservative media addresses that should be responded to with care, diplomacy, gentle words, and loving language. But I don't believe this is one of them.
From what I can tell, this particular breed of warmongers fear the "politically correct" army is soiling the holid--I'm sorry, the Christmas Season by using the word "Holiday" instead of the word "Christmas."
There have probably been lawsuits against public displays of affection for Christmas. I think I've heard of people suing to have outdoor nativities removed from courthouses and a quick google search turns up some other weird stuff about banners that said Merry Christmas and discussions pro and against the ACLU. It is unfortunate to me that Christmas, which has already become a time to celebrate capitalism and materialism, has also become the battle ground for free speech. But to a larger degree, the backlash against and the use of these lawsuits as proof that there is a war on Christmas (and therefore Christianity) is what really troubles me.
Ostensibly, the United States is a Christian country. A non-Christian has never been elected president, we swear oaths of office and honesty on the Bible, and people like to pretend that the founding fathers were God-fearing Christians themselves. But, in actuality, we are not a Christian country. Our country has morals and as a society we have a somewhat stable belief system, but we are hardly Christian on the whole, and I don't see that as a bad thing. We are made up almost entirely of immigrants who came here from hundreds of countries and many different religions, and it just makes sense that, even if our country started as a Christian nation (it didn't), is hasn't remained one and it can't try to become one again.
In actuality, Christmas is Christian (obligatory "CHRISTmas" comment). Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus, whom Christians believe to have been the incarnation of God who eventually grew up to die for their sins, thus making humans' reunion with God possible. Ostensibly, around the country, Christmas is more than that now. It, like the United States itself, has taken dozens of different cultures from around the globe and mashed them into something that Americans can all celebrate if they want to. The Christmas we get time off work for is based more on an amalgamation of Saint Nicholas's feast day and pagan celebrations of the winter solstice than it is on Christ. It is a holiday where people travel to see their families, exchange gifts under a tree and in giant socks, eat honeyed ham, and watch It's a Wonderful Life. If that family is Christian, they will likely also celebrate the birth of Christ, but if that family is not Christian (and even sometimes if they are) they will skip that part.
So doesn't it make sense that the not-actually-Christian State is a little loose with their actually-Christian-holiday terminology? People who get the time off work, who buy the gifts on sale, who put up the tree and lights and excessive lawn ornamentation aren't necessarily celebrating Christian Christmas, anymore than the people who buy the peeps and hide the eggs are celebrating Christian Easter. So what does it matter to us if they don't want to call it Christmas? Doesn't the term "holiday" fit it better, due to its ambiguity, its fluidity, and its ability to cover a lot of ground in a single word?
I guess my main beef with "the war on Christmas" propaganda is that I don't feel like wishing people "Happy holidays!" makes it harder for me to enjoy the holidays I personally celebrate (which are actually plural, including my birthday, Christmas, and New Year's Eve...). I'd feel the same way if I owned a company that sent out holiday cards, put up banners, or threw parties and I'd feel the same way if I were a teacher who wanted to decorate her classroom in December. Neither my company as a whole nor my classroom as a structure celebrates any holidays. No one is telling me how to celebrate them myself. No one is telling me I can't talk to others about how I celebrate my December holidays.
I do not see how my freedom is impinged, and I do see how my use of the word "Holidays" fits the mold of the season better that "Christmas" for most people that I talk to. It's not a matter of a war against that oh-so-terrible concept of political correctness. It's a matter of accuracy and efficiency. And you know who values efficiency?
And, seriously. If you put yourself in a war against the Borg, I won't even wish you good luck. Luck is irrelevant.
Happy Holidays!
Mary Margaret
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Reading Makes me Question Myself
I have, once again, written somewhere else instead of writing here. I apologize (a little) and I hope you will check out the post instead of hating me forever.
Saturday, October 19, 2013
The Post Calvin
Just a reminder to check this blog on the 19th of every month to see an update from Yours Truly, if you don't feel like you get enough of those.
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Hold me, like the river, Jordan
So, I don't want to put any graphic images in peoples minds, but I'm sure it comes as a shock to no one, considering I live alone, that I don't close the door when I use the bathroom. I like to think of myself as an efficient person, or least someone who, like the Borg, strives for efficiency, so naturally I would not waste the precious seconds it would take me and the infinitesimal energy I would expend to close the door. In fact, I have two doors leading to my bathroom, so I would double those seconds and that energy if I really wanted privacy. I guess I just don't feel like that is a good use of calories.
For those of you who don't know, I own a dog. She's 50% dachshund, and 100% adorable, and for some reason, unless she is sleeping, she is of the mind that she can be no more than one room away from me at any given time. In fact, she usually seems to feel that she needs to be in the same room as me. This can get interesting as my kitchen is very small and she is easy to trip over.
It can also get interesting due to my aforementioned bathroom habit. What this basically amounts to is, periodically, if she is in the living room and here's me go into the bathroom she will immediately stop what she's doing (which, granted, is probably not much on any given day) and come and visit me, tail wagging, looking to be scratched behind the ears, while I am on the toilet.
It's one of those things where, if you think about it, its pretty normal, but if you don't think about it, if you just go with your gut, it feels kind of strange. Maybe a bit icky. But definitely awkward.
Last night, Fudge and I stayed up late watching The Office. She fell asleep on my lap as I lay on the couch, stroking her head absentmindedly. When the episode was over, I picked her up and put her on the bed, because she seemed far too tired to want to get off the couch walk 10 feet into the bedroom, climb the stairs up to the bed, and find a comfortable spot to curl up. Her eyes closed and she sort of shifted a bit to settle in to her little pillowy area, and she seemed comfortable, content to spend the night where she was. So I popped into the bathroom to complete my evening routine.
Now, even though Fudge was more tired than I was, and even though she's a pretty old dog and getting up and down her tiny pet steps into my big bed is not an easy feat for her, as I was brushing my teeth, I heard the tell-tale squeaking of the springs and, a few moments later, felt her cold, wet nose on the back of my leg, like a little greeting, like she was saying, "Don't worry. I'm still here."
When I turned to her, mouth full of minty foam, and cooed out my own faux-maternal salutations, her tail wagged and her eyes, lids still heavy in sleep, smiled brightly up at me.
Somedays, she digs through the trash and spreads apple cores all over the dining room, and I yell at her and then worry that she doesn't understand that I can be angry and still love her. And somedays, she sits and waits with me while I pee, or takes naps with me on Saturday afternoons, or does her little happy-dance jump circles when I get home from work, and I think how little it must matter to her whether I love her. She is almost always happy to see me, happy to be near me, and I love her for that. Even if it gets a little weird sometimes.
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
It's late. Don't judge.
So, like, what is the evolutionary advantage of the human nose? Like, what is the evolutionary reason that we are not all Voldemort's running around with two slits in our faces?
Or, better yet, if we came from monkeys, why don't we have monkey noses? What makes our nose evolutionarily superior to that of a monkey? Like, is it something about rain sliding off of it easier? Isn't that what are eyebrows are for...?
Guys, I seriously need to know the answer to this question. I can't sleep right now, and this is seriously why. Someone needs to answer this question for me.
I keep looking in the mirror, and the longer I spend staring at my nose, the less I understand why I have it. And the more I question whether I will ever be able to sleep again.
Only you can prevent wildfires.
The question is, does that unique ability have something to do with your nose?
Monday, September 9, 2013
What's Mine is Ours
The other day, my boyfriend Ben, his roommate Steve, and I went to CMU's campus to play some badminton. Steve and Ben picked up the racquets and net--because, strictly speaking, I'm not a student, per se, so I needed to fly under the radar if I could--and then we tromped around the athletic facilities looking for a suitable place to set up and play.
I don't know much about CMU's athletic facilities, and I was just following the guys around, going through doors they opened and up stairs they gestured to, but there are evidently only two areas outfitted for badminton play. The first place we went to was also outfitted for volleyball, and was evidently outfitted so well that the official volleyball team was scheduled to practice there, therefor we had to leave. So we went to another place (which, as I recall, was referred to by a set of letters that stood for some words, but I can't remember the letters or the words right now) that happened to be swarming with eager basketball players. They were just playing pick-up games, and there were four hoops, but evidently, one of the courts was designated for badminton-specific use. It wasn't being used as one; someone had taken down the net and a bunch of people were playing full-court basketball.
As I am, strictly speaking, not a student, I let Ben and Steve handle the court situation. Since the badminton-ness of the gym was officially sanctioned, both Ben and Steve felt that it was within their rights to ask the basketball people to split into half court and let them set up the net for play. They promised we'd only be there for an hour at maximum, and gave them ten minutes to wrap up their game.
Needless to say, it was an awkward arrangement; forgetting the fact that both halves of the basketball court remained in use throughout our little badminton match so that we kept nearly beaming people with our racquets, I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that we had just inconvenienced a bunch of people, not to mention that those people were all generally bigger and sweatier than Ben, Steve, or I. As my Girl Scout training helped tie the knots to secure the net, my escapist tendencies imagined a wonderful world in which such socially awkward situations could be avoided. "Maybe I could buy a badminton net..." I mused. "If I owned a badminton net, we'd never inconvenience big basketball guys again, and we could play whenever we wanted. That would be great."
Obviously, the thought was short-lived. I am not going to buy a badminton net. CMU has them, and I'm even allowed to use them as a guest of Ben and Steve (though I didn't, strictly speaking, follow protocol on this particular visit) and then I don't have to pay for any damages, I wouldn't have to find a place to store them, and I always have a place to play, even when it's raining or when I don't own a yard.
The longer we played, the less I cared about how we'd inconvenienced the basketball guys. I mean, yeah, I still felt bad about getting in their way, and I couldn't help but think how ridiculous it must have looked to them: three people pushing out ten people just to play some vaguely old-fashioned game with pathetic-looking skinny racquets and a dinky little birdie. But when they stumbled into our part of the court, they apologized and one of us would say, "No worries," and when we hit one of them with one of our gaming instruments, we apologized and they would say, "No worries." And at the end of 40 minutes, Ben was too tired to keep going (playing single to Steve's and my doubles) and we packed up and left, giving them their court back. The rules set down by the CMU athletic facility authorities did their work, the compromise was struck between us, and everyone survived and got to enjoy a bit of physical exertion.
Public goods tend to do this, I think. Public parks, public schools, public hospitals, public sidewalks...they force us to interact with each other, to practice compromise, tact, and civility. They may not explicitly teach us the inherent value of the people around us, but when fair rules are in place, they implicitly teach us to acknowledge other people's rights as designated by those rules. Public goods give us access to thoughts and feelings that are not natively our own, but that might help shape, redefine, or strengthen those thoughts and feelings that are.
Private goods are nice: I like owning a car, in large part because it means I am not at the mercy of the bus routes and schedules, and I don't have to worry so much about the size or shape of the things I need to carry from point A to point B, as long as they fit somewhere in my trunk or backseat. My car does probably cost me significantly more than bus fare would, between gas, insurance, maintenance, and depreciation, so I always have to make sure I'm getting what I pay for, that my car remains a better option than the public transportation system.
But sometimes I pass a bus stop where people stand waiting, or I watch people climbing on or off the sectional behemoths as they stop on the side of the road, and I wonder if I'd feel more connected to the people around me if I were forced to get that close to them every day. I live alone, I don't have a job, and my neighborhood is pretty quiet, so I can avoid human contact for days if I want to. Add my car into that, and the isolation only deepens.
For me, for now, this isolation is primarily just a sort of depressing reality. I don't see many people, and most people don't see or talk to me. But over time, such separation from society could conceivably become something more sinister. If public places teach us compromise and tactfulness, over-privatization could cause those skills to atrophy, perhaps to the point where not only am I not explicitly seeing the value in the lives of other human beings, but I start denying those human beings' rights as human beings. If I were to become completely self-sufficient, without need or desire for any public goods, that sufficiency might become my only goal, the only thing I fight for, in which case, the needs of others seem of little consequence to me. Suddenly, I don't care about the other people on the road, their convenience, or their safety; I only care that I have someplace to be and I've got to get there, so I'm going to do what it takes to get me there, no matter the cost to others.
I'm fairly certain this hypothetical is an exaggeration, an extreme form of isolationism that probably only occurs in concurrence with some form of serious social or mental deficiency. Nonetheless, as I played badminton that day, I wondered if, perhaps, there might be a connection between a person's consumption of public goods and their political leanings. Could someone who frequents their public library ever consider school vouchers to be a socially responsible response to the decline in public education? Would someone who only ever drank water out of a Brita filter think that Social Security needed to be completely revised, not just privatized?
Obviously, someone who uses public transportation has a vested interest in that transportation's funding and subsequent quality, but does habitual use of public goods and services influence a person's outlook on public goods more generally?
What about you? What public goods and services to you rely on most heavily, and how do you think they've influenced your understanding of the value of the public? I really want to know.
I don't know much about CMU's athletic facilities, and I was just following the guys around, going through doors they opened and up stairs they gestured to, but there are evidently only two areas outfitted for badminton play. The first place we went to was also outfitted for volleyball, and was evidently outfitted so well that the official volleyball team was scheduled to practice there, therefor we had to leave. So we went to another place (which, as I recall, was referred to by a set of letters that stood for some words, but I can't remember the letters or the words right now) that happened to be swarming with eager basketball players. They were just playing pick-up games, and there were four hoops, but evidently, one of the courts was designated for badminton-specific use. It wasn't being used as one; someone had taken down the net and a bunch of people were playing full-court basketball.
As I am, strictly speaking, not a student, I let Ben and Steve handle the court situation. Since the badminton-ness of the gym was officially sanctioned, both Ben and Steve felt that it was within their rights to ask the basketball people to split into half court and let them set up the net for play. They promised we'd only be there for an hour at maximum, and gave them ten minutes to wrap up their game.
Needless to say, it was an awkward arrangement; forgetting the fact that both halves of the basketball court remained in use throughout our little badminton match so that we kept nearly beaming people with our racquets, I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that we had just inconvenienced a bunch of people, not to mention that those people were all generally bigger and sweatier than Ben, Steve, or I. As my Girl Scout training helped tie the knots to secure the net, my escapist tendencies imagined a wonderful world in which such socially awkward situations could be avoided. "Maybe I could buy a badminton net..." I mused. "If I owned a badminton net, we'd never inconvenience big basketball guys again, and we could play whenever we wanted. That would be great."
Obviously, the thought was short-lived. I am not going to buy a badminton net. CMU has them, and I'm even allowed to use them as a guest of Ben and Steve (though I didn't, strictly speaking, follow protocol on this particular visit) and then I don't have to pay for any damages, I wouldn't have to find a place to store them, and I always have a place to play, even when it's raining or when I don't own a yard.
The longer we played, the less I cared about how we'd inconvenienced the basketball guys. I mean, yeah, I still felt bad about getting in their way, and I couldn't help but think how ridiculous it must have looked to them: three people pushing out ten people just to play some vaguely old-fashioned game with pathetic-looking skinny racquets and a dinky little birdie. But when they stumbled into our part of the court, they apologized and one of us would say, "No worries," and when we hit one of them with one of our gaming instruments, we apologized and they would say, "No worries." And at the end of 40 minutes, Ben was too tired to keep going (playing single to Steve's and my doubles) and we packed up and left, giving them their court back. The rules set down by the CMU athletic facility authorities did their work, the compromise was struck between us, and everyone survived and got to enjoy a bit of physical exertion.
Public goods tend to do this, I think. Public parks, public schools, public hospitals, public sidewalks...they force us to interact with each other, to practice compromise, tact, and civility. They may not explicitly teach us the inherent value of the people around us, but when fair rules are in place, they implicitly teach us to acknowledge other people's rights as designated by those rules. Public goods give us access to thoughts and feelings that are not natively our own, but that might help shape, redefine, or strengthen those thoughts and feelings that are.
Private goods are nice: I like owning a car, in large part because it means I am not at the mercy of the bus routes and schedules, and I don't have to worry so much about the size or shape of the things I need to carry from point A to point B, as long as they fit somewhere in my trunk or backseat. My car does probably cost me significantly more than bus fare would, between gas, insurance, maintenance, and depreciation, so I always have to make sure I'm getting what I pay for, that my car remains a better option than the public transportation system.
But sometimes I pass a bus stop where people stand waiting, or I watch people climbing on or off the sectional behemoths as they stop on the side of the road, and I wonder if I'd feel more connected to the people around me if I were forced to get that close to them every day. I live alone, I don't have a job, and my neighborhood is pretty quiet, so I can avoid human contact for days if I want to. Add my car into that, and the isolation only deepens.
For me, for now, this isolation is primarily just a sort of depressing reality. I don't see many people, and most people don't see or talk to me. But over time, such separation from society could conceivably become something more sinister. If public places teach us compromise and tactfulness, over-privatization could cause those skills to atrophy, perhaps to the point where not only am I not explicitly seeing the value in the lives of other human beings, but I start denying those human beings' rights as human beings. If I were to become completely self-sufficient, without need or desire for any public goods, that sufficiency might become my only goal, the only thing I fight for, in which case, the needs of others seem of little consequence to me. Suddenly, I don't care about the other people on the road, their convenience, or their safety; I only care that I have someplace to be and I've got to get there, so I'm going to do what it takes to get me there, no matter the cost to others.
I'm fairly certain this hypothetical is an exaggeration, an extreme form of isolationism that probably only occurs in concurrence with some form of serious social or mental deficiency. Nonetheless, as I played badminton that day, I wondered if, perhaps, there might be a connection between a person's consumption of public goods and their political leanings. Could someone who frequents their public library ever consider school vouchers to be a socially responsible response to the decline in public education? Would someone who only ever drank water out of a Brita filter think that Social Security needed to be completely revised, not just privatized?
Obviously, someone who uses public transportation has a vested interest in that transportation's funding and subsequent quality, but does habitual use of public goods and services influence a person's outlook on public goods more generally?
What about you? What public goods and services to you rely on most heavily, and how do you think they've influenced your understanding of the value of the public? I really want to know.
Thursday, August 22, 2013
Human in the end
I have no internet at my apartment and I still have scads of unpacking and arranging to do, so naturally, I am watching a lot of television. I'm limited to the shows whose seasons I own on DVD--DVDs I stopped collecting after I got my Netflix account three years ago--so I'm currently on side B of disc 1 of the first season of The West Wing.
For those of you not familiar with the show, it's a fast-paced, über-witty, Aaron Sorkin extravaganza that follows the administration of a fictional Democratic POTUS whose term is supposed to appear to take place around the turn of this century, when the show was on the air, but doesn't interact with almost any specific, real-time events or people in the real world. It's incredibly well written and intelligent, and, if my Poli-Sci 101 grade is any indication, it's pretty educational. I've seen the first season probably a good three or four times more than any of the others, in part because my mom has this morbid fascination with the first seasons of shows, and in part because it was the only one I was able to swipe from my parents' house.
The episode that I just finished was called "Mr. Willis of Ohio." It's a fascinating episode for many reasons and it's one that I gladly rewatch every once in a while, but I was engaged this time by something I'm not sure Sorkin meant to call attention to. (I mean, I can't be sure; Sorkin has always struck me as a man who walks a thin line between being a god among writers and being an arrogant guy who would claim coincidence as art to keep from looking too mortal, so maybe he does plan everything people experience while watching his shows, or maybe he'd swear he does.)
There's a particularly dramatic scene in "Mr. Willis" where The President is explaining to his 19-year-old daughter that she is a huge security risk, especially since she is about to start college. President Bartlet is a passionate man who uses eloquent and, in this case, terrifying rhetoric to make people see his points, so instead of calmly illuminating the situation, he enacts quite the display.
The look on Zoe's face as her father is reaming her out for being a teenager when he has a country to run made me think, in a way I hadn't before, about celebrity and its costs. Zoe Bartlet never existed, but Barack Obama does have a wife and two daughters, and their family existed before his presidency. Before the campaigns, the fund raisers, the approval ratings, before the late nights, the death threats, the "friends" coming out of the woodwork, they were a family. But trying to imagine even that family's camping trips that involve hacky sacks instead of cell phones and late nights that result in nothing more than children being grounded for a week seems unrealistic to me.
I don't like politics, I don't like reality television, and I kind of thought North was a nice name and definitely thought it was a stupid topic of conversation, but I would be a dirty hypocrite if I said I didn't understand and even relate to their popularity. I'm an avid reader and amateur writer, I understand and enjoy drama. Every time I'm in the grocery store check out line, I do glance at the excitement there, if only just to look smugly down my nose.
My derision doesn't make the stars of these big stages any safer, any more common, any less of a spectacle. It doesn't give them any more opportunities to take control of their own lives. Even in my entertainment snobbery, I am still a stranger inexplicably involved in a stranger's life, and it is the existence of vast groups of so involved stangers that necessitates that conversation between a president and his daughter, and that leads to that look on Zoe Bartlet's face. A girl fearing for her life and the influence it has that she never asked for and that now she doesn't know what to do with.
Some people do work to get that influence, but it always comes with unforseen if not undeserved consequences. What is the correct response, as a common person, to celebrity? Even when the phrase "they knew what they were getting into" applies, does it cover all the sins people in the public eye have to endure?
I was in London during the Royal Wedding two years ago. When asked to write my congratulations to the happy couple in chalk on the sidewalks outside Buckingham Palace, I wrote "Better you than me." Royalty, especially modern royalty, is the perfect example of celebrity without choice, and that little Prince George was a household name before the boy even had a name strikes me as sad and frightening. I can't put my finger on why, though.
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Have I lost my love on the wings I've found?
[Title Explanation Here]
I like to think of myself as strictly a not-heretic, but I have to admit that I have some heretical tendencies. I remember when I was a kid learning the 10 commandments, I thought there was a sort of hierarchy of easiness. My thought process looked something like this:
I like to think of myself as strictly a not-heretic, but I have to admit that I have some heretical tendencies. I remember when I was a kid learning the 10 commandments, I thought there was a sort of hierarchy of easiness. My thought process looked something like this:
1st Easiest #6 - Do not murder.
This one's kind of obvious. I don't think it's possible to accidentally murder anyone, and I figure I'll never want to do it, so there we go. Commandment in the bag.
2nd Easiest #7 - Do not commit adultery.
I think very rarely about any future marriage I might have, and even more rarely about sex, so I'll just skip over this one. Anyway, I figure no one my age could ever break this commandment, so again, in the bag.
Tied in 3rd #1 and #2 - No God but God and No revered images
Duh? How many other gods are there? And what sort of image are we talking here? Like that calf that Aaron, like, welded together? Between my lack of artistic ability and my lack of desire to pray to a cow, I think I'm ok.
Fifth Easiest #5 - Honoring mom and dad
I love my parents. Done and done.
Okay, getting challenging #8 - No stealing
I already broke this once at a friend's birthday party when I really wanted a tiny toy dog they had. But, hey, it was just a little dog, and I'll never do it again.
Fourth Hardest #10 - No coveting
Okay, my neighbor's wife is safe, but that tiny dog was coveted right out of its dollhouse soo...but again, just a dog, and I'll never do it again.
Third Hardest #3 - Don't take the Lord's name in vain
I'm pretty sure I can keep from saying "Oh my God," but peer pressure is a real thing. We'll see how long this lasts.
Second Hardest #4 - Keep the Sabbath holy
What does this even mean?
This is my holy struggle #9 - No false witness
There was the time I stole the dog and had to come up with a lie to cover it up. Then there was the time that that lie worked so well I realized I was good at it and then kept doing it, and then convinced (but really, did I?) my entire first-grade class that I was an alien. Then there was the time that I really wanted the forbidden M&Ms so I told my mom that Dennis had eaten them. And then there was the time I told my brother I'd eaten the horrid milkshake he'd made me even though I'd asked him not to, when really I'd poured it into his cup (he didn't fall for it, by the way). And I want to be a writer, does that mean I can only write boring non-fiction stuff about animals and members of Congress? God, I don't think I can do this. I just don't think I'm cut out to be your servant. I'm going to be confessing this sin every couple of minutes; I hope you're prepared.
After a few years of deep meditation on scripture (or, you know, just actually reading them once) I know I got a few things wrong about how the Big 10 actually apply to everyday life. But it wasn't until I got deep into moving into my new apartment that I realized where my biggest struggles really lie.
Maybe this shouldn't have come as such a shock to me, seeing as I did major in English Language and Literature in college, but as I unpacked my kitchenware, I was surprised by how much heavy and intentional symbolism I found there.
I've got Game of Thrones pint and shot glasses, Marvel Comics tumblers, mugs from London, Calvin's Festival of Faith and Writing, my semester as a student teacher, and even the academic database, JSTOR. I have plastic cups, bowls, and plates from my college dining hall.
It's not like I accidentally collected all of these items from places, things, and events that have meant a lot to me: I collected them because they came from these meaningful places. When I look at them, I don't just see kitchenware. I see all the time I spent enjoying the worlds they come from. When people give me gifts, especially if they're gifts I see or use all the time, I see the giver when I see the gift.
So all that graven image business with the calf and the goldsmithing that went down without God's approval...looking at my kitchen, that all makes a lot more sense. I know that, personally, I feel more connected to places and people when I have related stuff around me. And I have some cross necklaces given to me as gifts that I used to feel the need to wear every day because I felt, in some weird way, like I was wearing my faith.
But if I can see it, if I can touch it, it's not faith; it's knowledge. And if I can see it and touch it, then it was created and therefor is not the creator and doesn't deserve my faith or worship. According to 2 Corinthians 5:7, "we [Christians] walk by faith, not by sight."
In Knowing God, which my church group is reading together right now, Packer talks for at least a whole chapter about graven images. He says basically everything I said here, about how they don't lead to faith or to correct worship, but lead us to worship the creation in place of the creator. I'm not sure that I agree completely with that line of thinking. I think it might be one of those slippery slope conundrums, but I think you can use images and symbols of God to supplement correct worship without crossing over into worshiping the images and symbols themselves.
I don't know that I know what that true closeness feels like, but I bet it feels better than a tarnished silver cross worn begrudgingly day after day.
 |
| A Song of Ice and Tea |
So all that graven image business with the calf and the goldsmithing that went down without God's approval...looking at my kitchen, that all makes a lot more sense. I know that, personally, I feel more connected to places and people when I have related stuff around me. And I have some cross necklaces given to me as gifts that I used to feel the need to wear every day because I felt, in some weird way, like I was wearing my faith.
But if I can see it, if I can touch it, it's not faith; it's knowledge. And if I can see it and touch it, then it was created and therefor is not the creator and doesn't deserve my faith or worship. According to 2 Corinthians 5:7, "we [Christians] walk by faith, not by sight."
In Knowing God, which my church group is reading together right now, Packer talks for at least a whole chapter about graven images. He says basically everything I said here, about how they don't lead to faith or to correct worship, but lead us to worship the creation in place of the creator. I'm not sure that I agree completely with that line of thinking. I think it might be one of those slippery slope conundrums, but I think you can use images and symbols of God to supplement correct worship without crossing over into worshiping the images and symbols themselves.
 |
| My shrine to Michigan Microbrews, created when I moved to Pittsburgh. ...and gradually dismantled afterwards |
Jesus says to Thomas in John 20:29, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Thomas believed Jesus was the messiah...but he only believed because he could see. If we can only feel close to God through cross necklaces, rosary beads, and little tokens that we have come to associate with him, I think we are missing out on the great experience that is the true closeness of faith.
I don't know that I know what that true closeness feels like, but I bet it feels better than a tarnished silver cross worn begrudgingly day after day.
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Where am I from?
I was recently on an airplane, traveling from my parents’
house in the Chicago area to visit my boyfriend who has an internship with a
large computer-y company in California.
I’ve never flown alone before, so right up until I boarded the plane I
was on edge about something going wrong.
But as soon as that seatbelt sign came on, I felt that weird dry lump in
my throat dissipate and I suddenly felt much more extroverted than I really am. I had a similar experience during my first
week of college.
The girl sitting next to me was young, maybe 11. Too young to sit up with her father in the
emergency-exit row in front of us, so she had switched seats with the
Navy-boot-camp graduate. I asked her if
she had ever flown before, and though she hesitated before saying yes, I’m
pretty sure it wasn’t a lie, since her enthusiasm during takeoff and landing
was tragically lower than it should have been for someone of her age. As we were taxiing to the runway, I noticed
out my window the silhouette of the Chicago skyline, and, being a history
teacher at heart, I wanted to make sure she saw it if she was interested.
“Are you from Chicago?” I asked.
“No, I’m from California.”
“Oh, so you’re going home?
That’s nice.”
Before I could point out the Sears and the John Hancock to
her, she asked, “Where are you from?”
“Pittsburgh,” I said, without much thought. That came later.
A few seconds passed and then the skyline was in clear view
from her angle. I pointed it out and she
was clearly unimpressed, and I got a sudden pang of the kids-these-days
syndrome I’d seen strike so many other, much older people. I brushed it away, remembering that, when I
was 11, I would have been more interested in playing Super Mario on my DS than
in looking at the far off, foggy figure of some buildings in an unfamiliar
city—that is, if I had had a Nintendo DS and had spent much time in unfamiliar
cities.
 |
| If you're looking for Lake Michican, don't hurt yourself in the effort. This is not Chicago. |
That was when the thought struck me. Was I really from Pittsburgh? Had I just
lied to this prepubescent gamer?
Granted, she wouldn’t notice if I had, but the question still bugged
me. I’d spent only about a total of 2.5
weeks in Pittsburgh in my whole life, and during one of those, I was
practically hermited in my subleased apartment.
I wouldn’t recognize the Pittsburgh skyline if it wore a “Hello, my name
is” sticker and politely introduced itself.
I didn’t back the Penguins for the Stanley cup. I needed the Automated Annie on my phone to
get me to the nearest Aldi. No one would
accept that I was from Pittsburgh if they pushed me to defend myself.
So, the next likeliest place for me to call home base would
be Chicago. I know my way around—the
highway system, at least—I cheered on the Bulls back in the nineties and I have
strongly considered buying a Blackhawks celebratory t-shirt (which, if you know
how much sports paraphernalia I own, you’ll know is a big deal for me). My cell phone has a Chicago area code. The skyline and lakeshore still feel like
home when I see them, and when someone says, “Let’s go to Navy Pier,” I flinch
reflexively.
But I’ve been in the Chicago area for over a month now, and
though I’ve eaten about seven Chicago-style hot dogs in that time, I’ve been
living out of a suitcase and telling my family about how my move has been going. I was born here, I took field trips to all
the museums, did school projects on Fort Dearborn and the Great Chicago Fire,
and went downtown countless times with my father to take-your-daughter-to-work
day, but those were all decidedly past-tense events in my life.
How do we measure our connection to a place? Is it the existence of memories enjoyed there
or the way those memories work together to represent who we are? And if it is the latter, how can we even know
in this life where we are “from”? Can
we—limited as human understanding of the longue-durée
of our own lives is—see in any detail the ways in which a place has shaped
us?
If I were to guess, I’d have to say that Grand Rapids,
Michigan has really been the most formative city in my past. I came of age there, came into my faith, my
political efficacy, my social and cultural understanding of myself and the
world around me, and my concept of a vocation and the first questions I asked
of what mine might be. I’ve done token-Grand-Rapids
things, been token-Grand-Rapids places, and dreamed idly of what a long-term
life there might look for me, but when I went back a month after graduating to
attend the visitation and funeral of a beloved professor of mine, it did not feel like my city anymore.
Truth is, neither do Chicago or Pittsburgh. I feel like I don’t have a “my city,” which,
to me, makes it feel a lot like I don’t have a home.
This realization could be sad, lonely, even frightening
especially for someone whose strength-finder results said her number-one
strength was connection. And in fact, my
life has been more than the usual amount of sad, lonely, and frightening
lately, so it would be natural to let this realization—made while munching a
Tapas airplane snack that I paid too much for—sink in with all the rest.
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| Most of what I own. Stored in a Uhaul in Pennsylvania |
But back in January, somewhere around the time everyone else
was making resolutions to get in shape or to reconnect with lost friends, I was
singing along with John Darnielle of the Mountain Goats, proclaiming “I’m gonna
make it through this year if it kills me.”
And since the siege by lucky number 2013 is clearly underway, my best
defense is to look at this homelessness, this disconnection, as an opportunity
I’ve never had before. For the first
time in my life, I am no longer in school, and I am also not yet employed. I am renting an apartment to which I possess
no keys and I have the lion’s share of my childhood packed away in boxes in my
Prius. For once, I am as indefinable—by
most Western social standards, anyway—as I ever have been and perhaps ever will
be again. I am not alone; I have the
whole world as my home and all of its citizens as my company. While I make my way though this rocky period,
I am doing just that. Making my
way. I am as connected as I choose to be
to all the places, people, and experiences around me. What more could my strength-finder ask for?
“Where are you from?” asked the little girl, maybe out of
politeness or habit.
What I should have said was, “You know what, I don’t
know. Let’s find out, shall we?”
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