12/30/10

Listen to my heart, can you hear it sing?

You are altogether beautiful, my darling;
   there is no flaw in you.

My dove in the clefts of the rock,
   in the hiding places on the mountainside,
show me your face,
   let me hear your voice;
for your voice is sweet,
   and your face is lovely.

How beautiful you are, my darling!
   Oh, how beautiful!
   Your eyes are doves.

11/22/10

Ever noticed how every single sports movie in existence follows a very specific format? You have the team, the heroes of the story and usually they stink and are usually looked upon with scorn by fans and other teams alike. Then a protagonist appears on the scene, whether in the prescence of a new coach or a new player and demands change. Here's where it gets really predictable. After a period of training, there are two options for that team's first game. The first scenario is this: the team doesn't do very well at first but to the hymn of some bad bruce springsteen song (is there any other kind?) they manage to pull together and win. At this juncture, the team usually goes through a winning phase, usually depicted using a montage with some other bad psuedo rock band providing background "music". this team eventually reaches their respective champion match. But surprise, the other team is actually good! At halftime, the heroes are losing but due to an inspiring sideline/locker room speech they are inspired to do their best and they bring the score back to near even. Now back to the team that didn't do well at first, fear not movie goers, their turn isn't far behind. After losing a game or so, the team undergoes some experience that unites them finally and turns their losing into winning. Then they follow the same pattern as the team that won their first game, montages included up to the championship game. Then the same pattern happens with the losing until halftime at which point a speech convinces them to actually try and win. And now the finale: this can also turn out one of two ways. Either the team will win at the very last second by a very small incriment of points through an epic slo mo play or they will lose at the very last instant also by a very small amount of points via an epic slo mo play that is tragically foiled. The latter team will still be proud of their efforts even though they lost and will think of themselves as "winners", whilst the former team will actually be winners and have their slow motion victory celebration in the endzone/batter's box/forecourt.
Next time you watch a sports movie, think of this and judge the directors for having absolutely no imagination and choosing to make a sports movie instead of something worthwhile like The Silmarillion or Dante's Inferno.

11/15/10

As sip on the sweet nectar of a monster drink and listen to the soothing overtones of Fiest, my mind wanders to things of the past. How things once were and how they are now and how they may be someday. This retrospection is what I tell you now.
Lets go one year back; a year seems like a good standard sort of measurement. One year ago, inwardly at least and probably outwardly, I was a different man. Different doesn't always mean bad things but neither does it always mean good things. A year ago, I was lost, spiritually and emotionally. I had been falling away from my faith steadily over the past year and although I was going to a small group where I could interact with other Christians, my heart was not in it. It was more of a habit that I did because I was expected to show up. Emotionally, I was also falling steadily away from that which is desirable. Moodiness, depression, loneliness, you name it. I ran the full gambit of human emotion. Why was I like this? The loneliness was explainable (not that it made it any more bearable). I craved human affection and a relationship like Emperor Palpatine craved galactic domination. And the harder I tried to get it, the farther and farther away it seemed to get. I had become lukewarm, neither hot or cold. My relationship with God consisted of recited prayer and occasional browsing through random books of the Bible. And I didn't really care either. There was no motivation to open myself up to others or God and let my life be enriched. Looking back I find that, disturbingly, I was content with being lukewarm and unhappy. It felt familiar and I had no intention of changing that. God had other plans.
As I attended my small group, I came to know an amazing group of people. My fellow small groupers weren't perfect, nor did they have all the answers but they genuinely wanted to get to know me and as time went by that sentiment began to be reciprocated by me. Gradually, they cracked through my shell of apathy and self-pity. God stepped back into my life and gave me reason to care. I no longer wanted to be the "old" me. I wanted to live fully, in Christ, and receive all He has to offer me. Less than a year (a wonderful year I might add), I met a girl who right now is making all my past thoughts of loneliness and perpetual singularity seem distant and is helping me grow in my faith and become a better person as I hope I do for her. Far be it from me however to give the impression that a closer relationship with God immediately grants our deepest wishes. Yes, our wish should be to gain a closer relationship with Him but that doesn't mean that everything else will be instantly made right. The single will not instantly be "in a relationship" as facebook so simply puts it, the depressed will not be given a heavenly zoloft with which they shall forever remain happy. But know this, that He has our best interests at heart. We cannot see the flow of His plans but that does not mean they are not there. A year ago, I would have never, ever have seen where I am now and I have no clue where I will be a year from now. All I know is that our God is good and so is His plan for us.

11/7/2010

Its been awhile since my last post. About 7 months to be exact. Much has changed and much has remained the same.
Oh sleep. Its a great thing, although we don't realize it until around that time we go to college how much we want it. And yet I can't sleep. Truly my endocrine system has a sense of humour. I can be nigh unto comatose in class, but when I am in the appropriate time frame, location and mood, ye olde brain decides to stay up all night doing mental gymnastics. Maybe a reset button is needed.
Being into healthcare, I have a certain sense of cleanliness that others may find a bit extreme. I realize this and accept it. But some people are so hygeine unconscious that a 12th century peasant would feel an impulse to watch his hands. At work there was a party for a certain group of people who shall remain unnamed. What shall not remain unnamed is the amount of nasty that these people subjected me to. Pizza slices were on the floor. Bad enough by itself but most of these had been stepped on at some point, grinding their stale greasiness into the floor tiles. How could you STEP on a piece of pizza and not pick it up? Undergarments lying on the floor greeted my eyes, and just when i thought it couldn't get worse, I came to the men's locker room. Horrors greeted my admittedly jaded sensibilities like i couldn't imagine. As the pool is connected to the locker room, a large amount of wet people walked around in the locker room, mixing their runoff with the dirt from other people's shoes. The result was a quarter inch of a muddy sort of slurry covering the floor. Vomit in the trashcans, blood in the sink (how hard is it to rinse that down the drain?), and other unspeakable things as well. Truly, some human beings would be content to sit in the mud all day and pick their nose. Freakin gross.

4/22/10 Growing really old pains

In the field of nursing (which I am in, FYI), I am a unique position that allows me to see how people cope with their problems. Since I've been on a nursing home rotation, those problems I see are usually many fold. Problems that, if I myself was struck with half of what most of the residents have, I would probably get in my car and drive off an embankment or something. I don't think I could deal with that stuff, but these people manage to lead somewhat normal lives, albeit with a few caveats like diabetes, renal failure, COPD, hypertension, dementia...to name a few. It is amazing to me that they find the fortitude to keep going and to be happy about it! Once you have a resident cheerfully tell you that they are ready for their dressing change or ask you to help them go to the bathroom, it puts your problems into a different perspective.

4/21/10 Adagio for strings

In small group last night, the topic of conversation was baggage. Not the stupid wheeled boxes that only serve to trip those behind you and make you look like a twat. Emotional baggage. Everyone has it in some degree or another. Anyone who says otherwise is selling something. Many words were spoken about how to deal with this baggage that accumulates when someone wrongs you. But the topic that got me thinking is the baggage that we inflict upon ourselves. How do we go talk to the other person about what happened with the intent of righting any wrongs when that person is yourself barring having a Gollum-esque conversation complete with hissing and third person references? I would rather have someone else do the things I've done to myself to me that way at least I would be blameless in the misdeeds. And that is where this becomes so much harder. I am to blame for that which I've done to myself and frankly, that bites. But, as with all things, there is a bright side to this tale of woe. For one, unlike talking to another person one on one about something done, resolving things with yourself isn't unbearably awkward (unless you make it awkward, which would be a feat in itself and may indicate a multiple personality disorder). Also it is much easier to see what must be done to drop the baggage. And what must be done you ask? Since I walked down this road myself many a time, I think I can offer some decent advice. Don't try to tuck the baggage away in some dark corner of the mind. I've seen what happens to things hidden in dark places. They grow mold. And they stink. And rats make their homes in your carry-on. Like it or not, you will have to drag that baggage back out of the corner and lo, it will have festered and will be worse than ever. Rather, we must get rid of the baggage. And to do that, we have to give it to the Someone who can take it away from us. But even this is difficult, because as flawed beings, we need to be held accountable and without that we tend to fail, even in seemingly simple things. And so I stress the importance of community. With others supporting us and knowing our problems, it is so much easier to let go and move on. So crawl out from your shell and make thyself vulnerable. You won't regret it.

Until next time, fight the good fight and eat plenty of red meat.