Knights in Appledore

Exausted In My Brain

2010-02-02T12:34:00.000-08:00

I have spent the entire day so far looking at campaign websites, archived news paper articles, and weird blogs, and finally feel like I can vote in the IL primaries today (AHH!) and still look the Lincoln Memorial in the face- with the down side that I think my eyeballs are going to fall out of my head followed by my brain. Sheesh. All those stupid pictures that politicians post of themselves. In this area they usually put corn in the back ground and a gullible little dupe of a farmer who looks like he's going to fall into a hole in the ground if The Politician doesn't hold his hand through the next step he takes. Adding to this the fact that you can almost count on anyone who can get themselves elected is some kind of monetary reptile snake, no matter what they or anyone else says about them. Argh.

Anyway- in all my hopeless wanderings I wound up on the friendly atheist web site. the part I was in was talking about what some fink politician trying to get the nominal Christian vote had done or not done to friendly atheist christmas poster that was (Literally!) about how the religions of the world were out to enslave and deceive people and the atheists are about affirming and caring for people. Interesting. Not really to the point. But then, at the end of all my hopeless wanderings, I checked my email, and found a news article from Open Doors (not the same group that I got my previous horrifying post from). It was about how North Korea is reacting to the prospect of widespread famine by instituting "100 Days of Combat": nation wide intense labor, where anyone without a permit to be in the street is dragged off to a forced labor camp, and children are falling over dead in the streets. This was sufficiently horrifying that I looked up the 100 days of combat- all of the news articles that came up (before the list disintegrated into "Obama's first 100 days in office") were on Christian sites or by Christian groups- except one- and that one was Buddist!

My method is by no means conclusive, but just at a glance, and as far as human rights go- Atheists care my foot. Religion rocks.

Now I have to go vote. O sweet heavens, this is surely a mistake. But the Lincoln Memorial!

Can't really describe this

2009-11-14T12:19:00.000-08:00

This is a story I read today, that was put out by an organization called china aid. The President of China aid is Bob Fu, who was a proteseter at Tianamen Square.

Testimony for Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission Hearing
November 10, 2009
Wujian, citizen of the People’s Republic of China
- MY "LITTLE FOOT," MY LIFELONG PAIN -
My name is Wujuan.1I was born in a small village in northern China. During my daily life, I tried to smile at everyone while at the bottom of my heart there is engraved a record of an unforgettable experience from hell.
1 an alias.
It was the spring of 2004 when I found out that I was pregnant. It was beautiful to sense this life growing inside of me: what a miracle! Meanwhile, I was also very fearful since I did not have the Permit for Pregnancy the Birth Permit, which means, according to Chinese law, this baby was not allowed to be born into this world. This baby would have to die in my womb. During that time in my hometown, this was the law decided by the Chinese Family Planning policy which brought fear on every family. Not only were my parents and family at risk, but also my other relatives.
Time flew as the little baby grew daily in my womb. While the baby moved more and more actively in my body, the maternal love also increased. The word "MOM" was not just a word anymore; it became a reality in my life. My baby and I were one, sharing the same blood.
Pretty soon, my lower stomach began to bulge. In order to protect my baby, I had to hide myself in a very old, shabby house in a remote area. There was no electricity at all in the room, and it was very dark even during the day. Fear and loneliness filled me every day, but as long as I could have my baby, I could stand anything. Many times, I was wakened at night by nightmares, as I dreamed that I was hunted and arrested by the Family Planning government officials and forced to have an abortion.
Eventually, the Family Planning government officials found out about my pregnancy. So they searched all over trying to arrest me, and while they could not find me, then they caught my father instead. They put my father into the detention center and beat him every day. On the fourth day after they caught my father, one neighbor came and told me that my father was dying: they would continue beating my father – even to death – until I went to the local hospital to get abortion. My heart was broken into pieces as I faced this terrifying dilemma: either my father or my baby, one of them had to die, and I had to make the decision.
Very soon after this, the worst thing happened: when several Family Planning government officials broke into the house where I was hiding, and without any words, they drug me into their van.
As soon as I got into the van, I found that another Mom was already inside the van. She told me she was carrying her first baby, and that she was 28 years old. She did not have the Permit of Pregnancy or the Birth Permit, and she was 7 months pregnant. She was so eager to keep this baby that she was fighting with the government officers in the van. Suddenly, one government official at his 20's slapped her on the face and immediately her mouth began to bleed. Being thus insulted, she screamed like a lion and fought with the Family Planning government officials.
About one hour later, the van stopped in the hospital. As soon as I was drug out of the van, I saw hundred of pregnant Moms there – all of them, just like pigs in the slaughterhouse. Immediately I was drug into a special room, and without any preliminary medical examination, one nurse did Oxytocin injection intravenously. Then I was put into a room with several other Moms.
The room was full of Moms who had just gone through a forced abortion. Some Moms were crying, some Moms were mourning, some Moms were screaming, and one Mom was rolling on the floor with unbearable pain.
I was not very sensitive to the oxytocin injection, and then I was pulled into another small room. One nurse pulled out one, big, 8-inch long needle for intramuscular injection. I had never seen such big, long needle in my life. As soon as they pulled away my clothes, the nurse put her hand around my lower stomach; the fear and her cold hand caused my abdominal muscle to spasm. Because of that, for a while, the nurse could not do the injection.
At that moment, I was the only Mom in the room. I began begging the nurse while I cried, , "I have already had the oxytocin injection, please let me go; I will go as far away as possible and I will not tell anyone else what you had done for me and I will be grateful for you for the rest of my life." The nurse did not respond to my begging—she looked like wood.
Then I kept saying to her, "You are an angel, as a nurse or a doctor who is helping people and saving peoples’ life; how could you become a killer by killing people every day?" I could hardly see her face because she wearied a big mask. Soon she became very angry at what I said, and told me that I talked too much. She also told me that there was nothing serious about this whole thing for her. She did these all year. She also told me that there were over 10,000 forced abortions in our county just for that year, and I was having just one of them. I was astonished by her words and I realized that my baby and I were just like a lamb on the cutting board. Finally, she put the big, long needle into the head of my baby in my womb. At the moment, it was the end of the world for me and I felt even time had stopped. I hardly knew that something worse would happen later.
After the injection, my baby became very quiet for a whole day. I was so naive that I thought I could leave the hospital because I had finished the forced injection. I wondered if perhaps my baby was lucky enough that s/he could survive.
To my great surprise, the next evening I was drug into a surgical room. I was asked to lie down on a surgical table; it was the Guillotine for me and for my baby. While I was lying down on the surgical table I found that there was bloody fingerprint on the wall, left by other Moms during their surgery of a forced abortion.
One doctor told me that I brought too much trouble to them already because my baby was supposed to flow out by itself after the injection. Since it did not come out as expected, they decided to cut my baby into pieces in my womb with scissors, and then suck it out with a special machine.
What I had done in my life that made me deserve this kind of punishment? What evil thing was this all about? Even a wild animal like a tiger will give her life to save their own baby tiger. As a Mom and a human being, could I not even protect the life of my baby?
I did not have any time to think as this most horrifying surgery began by force. I could hear the sound of the scissors cutting the body of my baby in my womb. I could feel that, little by little,
my baby was cut into pieces; s/he was separated from my body. S/he was the flesh of my flesh, the bone of my bone, a part of my body. That kind of pain not only killed my body, but also killed my emotions and my feelings.
"How could I be a Mom? What’s wrong with me?" I cried while talking to my baby and I preferred to die together with my baby at that moment. Nothing sounded meaningful at all for me in this world: In fact, part of me had already died – part of me was already gone and gone forever!
Eventually the journey in hell, the surgery was finished, and one nurse showed me part of a bloody foot with her tweezers. Through my tears, the picture of the bloody foot was engraved into my eyes and into my heart, and so clearly I could see the five small bloody toes. Immediately the baby was thrown into a trash can…
Finally, I was allowed to go home from the hospital. I did not eat anything, or even drink any water, for several days. I barely talked with anyone. From time to time at home, I could hear the mourning of my father. He was released after I was caught, but he had been beaten terribly; it took him over a month to recover physically. Looking at my father, thinking of my dead baby, I cried day and night, and frequently the picture of the little bloody foot came up in my mind. Physically I recovered after about one month, but psychologically and spiritually – never!
At that time, I got a migraine headache, and it is with me up to today.
Some people have said that time is the best medicine and time can heal everything. But this is not the case for me: as time goes on, the suffering is getting worse and worse and memory is getting clearer and clearer.
Thank God I became a Christian; God did help me and healed me. The Bible teaches us that as long as we confess our sin, we will be forgiven. Frequently I come to the Lord, asking for forgiveness. I know God has already forgiven my sin, but very often I could not forgive myself. I do believe that I will meet my baby again in heaven. If God allows, I will ask the forgiveness from my baby when I see him/her in heaven.
As a Chinese saying says, whenever you have broken your tooth, you swallow it by yourself. I never shared this experience with anyone before, because the scars in my heart are one million times more painful than the scars on my body!
While I was writing this short testimony, several times I cried out and I could not continue writing. I knew that there are millions of Chinese sisters are suffering and will suffer the same thing that I suffered.
Who could help them? Who could save them? The one-child policy and forced abortion policy have killed millions of innocent lives in China. How could this inhuman crime be stopped? When could this inhuman crime be stopped?
May God forgive me, that on that day I will meet my baby in heaven!

Note for the Day

2009-11-09T13:59:00.000-08:00

And just because I'm into being morbid about famous dates in recent history, the Berlin wall fell today. (Despite so many people thinking that the Cold War would end with nuclear exchange. ) Happy birthday, Germany! Happy birthday everyone! I'm glad we're all alive!

Keep it real.

2009-06-03T17:56:00.000-07:00

The other day, someone at work was getting rid of a stack of slick magazines. I don't look at these very often, and I am curious about things I don't do, so I took some.

In the back of one of these there was a full page advertisement for Renewable Accessories. These were things like bracelets made out of old newspapers and cloth shopping bags with slogans about Green being Hip.

This amused me for three reasons. First, the magazine this ad was in was very mainstream and very entirely about movie stars- except in Illinois the people who I mostly see reading about movie stars- well, they don't care about the environment very much, to put it nicely. 2)As far as I know, newsprint would make terrible jewelry because the ink would rub off into your skin and give you blood poisoning or something, and "If You Were a Real Hippy/Punk You Would Make Your Own Newsprint Jewelry" And of course, 3) in the same magazine was a blurb about how people were reporting their clothing bags were much more unsanitary than disposable ones. The solution offered? Wash them between use, like you would any other soiled cloth article. Apparently the Star Chasing Get Hip Get Green crowd doesn't understand how to renew their own personal resources. I am forced to wonder what they know about the world's resources.

Now, I know there are die-hard recyclers out there who actually know what they are doing, and I am entirely in favor of not expending the environment for the sake of our petty and all consuming obsession with comfort. The popularized version of Green, though, that seems to be the rage right now is really getting on my nerves (Noooooo!!!!!! I sound like a Goth whining about Hot Topic!!!!!!!!). Its a fad like any other; a disguise used by people who don't care but want to appear attractive; and this particular fad/disguise is the disguise of caring about about something.

Tomorrow is the 20th anniversery of Tianamen Square.

If you happen to go walking in Tianamen square tomorrow, you can wear white- the color of mourning- and the police will arrest you.

Give to Caesar

2009-01-22T20:12:00.000-08:00

"Responding to the news, Patrick J. Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition told LifeNews.com that Obama's making taxpayers fund abortion takes away from his claims to want to govern from the center and find common ground on abortion.

Mahoney said "it would greatly increase abortions around the world. It would also create a scenario in which American evangelicals and Catholics would be paying for abortion referrals through their tax dollars."

"If President-elect Obama reverses this policy, it would show a complete and blatant disregard for the faith values of millions of American Christians as well as expanding the violence and tragedy of abortion worldwide. America should be exporting justice and human rights, not brutality and violence," he said."

http://www.lifenews.com/nat4559.html

I don't know what I think of this article. On the one hand, its hard to figure out if America is ever not exporting violence. Everyone seems to have their own least favorite form of violence, (wars, abortion, an imperialistic consumer mindset, violent video games, movies, whatever) and to them that is the real evil that America should be blasted by lighting from heaven for exporting. People who can justify the other guy's least favorite kind are perfectly willing to condemn him for liking their own least favorite. Was Patrick J. Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition this angry about Gitmo? If you listen to them all, we're just sunk- but maybe listening to everyone is too simplistic.

(But what makes 'them all' assume that violence is bad? I... am not sure.)

On the other hand, since I believe abortion is a form of disrespect for human life, and that human life ultimately should not be disrespected, more funding for it seems like a bad thing. Also, making people who believe that abortion is an evil against humanity (and God!) help pay for it, forcing them to go against their conscience and actually participate it what they believe to be wrong, seems like nothing short of oppressive ideology at work.

Then again, along with pet peeves about evil violence, anyone who gets into power and acts on their beliefs seems to have an ideology that oppresses someone else. For instance, many people feel the wars we are fighting now aren't right, and their tax dollars are paying for that. I almost wish there was some way of conscientious objection- so the individual could work for the perceived good of the community without taking part in its perceived evil. Of course, in practice, that would probably turn into either slave labor camps or terrorist acts against the state, so scratch that idea.

On the fourth and final hand, I wonder if funding for abortion really matters. All the funding in the world could only offer abortions. If no one wanted them, the abortion clinics would be the best funded empty places in the world. I don't believe this justifies abortion- since Saddam Hussein and his sons wanted to torture and kill dissidents and naysayers, and apparently so did we. Those things aren't justified. But are there CNA's at the nursing home where I work who aborted because they felt abandoned and that they didn't have a future? I honestly don't know. Of course, whether or not you believe you have a future is a choice I can't make for you. But if I knew I had done everything in my power to serve the people around me, born and unborn- if I knew that there was no need for abortion clinics, I would with a clean conscious give them any amount of taxes (though not with a very happy wallet!). If I have given to God what is God's, what can Caesar do?

But I have to ask, have I given it? That's the million dollar question.

Home again!

2008-09-18T14:55:00.000-07:00

Hello! I'm back from Germany! Just a few notes, because life is short.

1) In Germany, people don't cross when the crosswalk light is red- even if there are no cars. I suspect this is a metaphor for all of German culture, although the Germans were somewhat dismissive of the phenomena.

2)The Dom in Bamberg(?) is currently my favorite church building ever.

3)It was lovely to see Eugene people again, even for a couple days

4) Trollywood. Eisley.

5) My current plan is to find some way to make money, and to continue the War against Crickets.

6)If it is true that people are criticizing Palin for keeping her Downs baby (if its true she had a Downs baby), I think I'll vote for McCain. (my current level of political thought)(sad really. I should try to care)

That's all for now.

2008-08-13T10:57:00.000-07:00

After not blogging all summer, I am about to go to Germany. Today, I mean. I just wanted to tell you all that I will not blog in Germany either. Just so you know. When I get back though...

Worry

2008-06-14T12:36:00.000-07:00

I feel a need to study German very hard over the summer, fueled by sheer panic. I am going to Germany this fall, and I am really afraid of not being able to communicate over there. Not with the Germans really- but the Junior class, which is mostly who's going. I feel like I speak a different language when I talk to them in English. Seeing we're only supposed to talk German while we're there, I am rather worried.

?

2008-06-09T03:25:00.000-07:00

How wierd is it that music as we generally experience it is disassociated from a person actually performing?

void

2008-06-06T02:10:00.000-07:00

How dully in the mountains sound the feet
of them that bring good news
How dark are the mountains
and how wide is the void into which their words fall
how void is the heart into which they fall

They said if you spoke into the void
there would be light.
If you spoke into the void
a world would begin,
and a life would begin to unfold in the darkness.
But there is nothing here, and there is no light.

If there can be no light,
speak to the void
and make it empty
If there can be no life,
speak to the darkness,
and make it dark indeed
for you have separated the light from the darkness,
and named them each as you chose.

Shipwrecked

2008-06-01T00:37:00.000-07:00

This is by the Gothic Archies- and it goes out to my class. ( I love you all sooo much. )
This has been a great, if often disastrous ride, and though I'm not going to try and do it AGAIN, I would not have not gone through it for the world.

I can't think of a single thing I'd rather do
Than to be cast away on an island with you
No, I can't think of anything more heavenly
Than to have you shipwrecked on a tropical island with me

Shipwrecked with you
Shipwrecked with you
I can't think of a single thing I'd rather do
Than to be cast away on an island with you

Far from distractions and matters of state
We can quit smoking and quickly lose weight
Sleeping till noon and then staying up late
At latitude zero and longitude eight

I am a gentleman; should you get hurt
I'll make a tourniquet out of my shirt
You needn't do much, just sit there and flirt
And if it looks drizzly, I'll build us a yurt

I can't think of a single thing I'd rather do
And that's why I had to get rid of the crew
So I lopped off their heads
And dropped them into the sea
Just to have you
Shipwrecked on a tropical island with me

Shipwrecked with you
Shipwrecked with you
I can't think of a single thing I'd rather do
And that's why I decapitated the crew

How could I know there's no island nearby?
If I don't eat something soon, I'll just die
I wouldn't eat you, oh, never, not I!
So let's catch a shark and I'll make us a pie

What shall we use for bait? Lend me a hand
I'll sew it back on when we get to land
But if the shark takes it, that would be grand
(Because we won't starve to death, you understand)

I can't think of a single thing I wouldn't do
To end up shipwrecked on an island with you
No, there's nobody I wouldn't kill, nobody
Just to have you
Shipwrecked on a tropical island with me

Shipwrecked with you
Shipwrecked with you
I can't think of a single thing I wouldn't do
To end up shipwrecked on an island with you
Again...

Observation worthy of note- not that the others weren't.

2008-05-31T23:52:00.000-07:00

Katie my classmate and Katie my house mate both had birthdays today. My soccer team had a game, and Mckenz-he had a show at Jo Fed's. (I missed it. And he sang Shipwrecked too!) Also Ann had a breakfast for the graduating girls this morning- which was artful and tasteful in every way. Also I found out that another of the freshmen is engaged. Further I heard in a round about way that I had got an overdraft fee for reasons not immediately intelligible, which was a little frightening (this, fortunately, was later sorted out).

So there was much rush to and from various places today, in additions to many many things to think about. But I will tell you what I saw.

There is a bridge over the Willamette where the river opens up suddenly as you bike over it. Suddenly, where you were moving through a city, you find yourself on the brink of a smooth floor, water flat and glassy and gray as the clouds it mirrors. Its fenced in only by trees and and the guard rail, but it is fenced of from the city none the less. In the center, standing among rocks was the most immense bird. A heron.? It stared up at the bridge, and I realized that it was bothered by me. The thousands of cars that were going by it was used to. Being watched? That was another story.

Eventually, I did the polite thing and left.

unexplained blog hooky

2008-05-29T18:55:00.000-07:00

I. Passed. my. Thesis. Defense.

With. Distinction.

!?!

All roads lead to it... I guess...

2008-05-20T02:28:00.000-07:00

"What travels all the way around the world without leaving the corner?"

"A stamp"
"Chelsea!"
"Chelsea on a magic carpet"
"A hat rack on the equator"
"A man I knew once... it was really cool to watch"
"YOUR MIND ON DRUGS"

(from the MSC chalkboard)

I also felt retarded...

2008-05-19T01:23:00.000-07:00

I felt fat all day. This in itself is a pretty common and not very serious malady, but I was thinking about my sister and my nickname too. When we were all young, and I was a bony teen and she was a round pre/early teen, she called me twig. Cause I was twiggy. Now, I am bordering on frou-dom, and she is a cute Skipper doll.

how did twig survive the transition? At some point in our mutual youth, I started absolutely adoring her, and wanted to be called whatever she called me. It really didn't occur to me at the time that there might be other things going into the nickname.

Folly. What folly.

It's weird how these details are. Our pasts are like the rings of a tree; the events and progress of that particular summer and fall may be over grown by years and years of other things, but they are still down there under it all. The shape of each year and each layer of bark determines how the next year is to grow, and the next by that one, and so on...

Weather

2008-05-17T23:15:00.000-07:00

"What is stronger than God
More evil than the devil
The poor have it
The rich don't need it
And you die if you eat it?"

"Duh. Nothing"
"Chelsea!"
"Um, I'm not sure how to take that."
"You die if you eat Chelsea? WTF?"

-MSC chalk board

In other news, Eugene has become incredibly muggy, hot and sunny almost overnight. Three nights ago. Every year when this happens I find myself completely shocked that such things are possible in Oregon. Also unprepared. Once I get retroactively prepared, I think I will be very happy about it. My brain dies in heat and a little cloud of happiness fills the empty space. I vegitate in alternately shady and sunny parts of the heat, and for once am getting enough sleep to remember my dreams. Bad for school work. Good for me. Yay.

A nice evening of genocide.

2008-05-16T23:56:00.000-07:00

http://www.gendercide.org/darfur01.htm

Outside my window is passing a slow steady stream of drunk frats.

My despair is so petty. How can the affirmations I make in the face of it possibly be anything more? How can I possibly understand what is good about the world- ignorant as I am of its evil? I feel so incredibly inadequate.

And this even leaves aside the question of actually doing anything...

God.

The face of God

2008-05-15T23:54:00.000-07:00

When I was young, they told me that a human couldn't look on the face of God and live. Then and now, I wonder if life is worth having if you don't die from that- from having finally seen God.

(What's the only thing worse than finding a worm in your earth? Finding half a worm in your earth!)

2008-05-15T01:16:00.000-07:00

This evening (or, should I say, morning) it's just me, my hard apple cider and the Gorillaz. This question has been bugging me for a while. Why is it that so much art is concerned with the struggle of artists with art? I mean, maybe its mostly writers, but from Harriet the Spy to JtMH to Emily of the New Moon, to Almost Anything Written By Stephen King, the plot revolves around a creative person trying to find some way to express their creativity. Is it simply narcissism- in an time where no one seems to be able to relate to anyone else, are writers left with with only themselves to write about? Or has it always been this way? Or perhaps is it just that, currently, with all other real and basic human activities like starting fires or making clothing or tilling good rich wormy earth usurped from us by machines and Chinese slave labor, art making is the only really human activity left to us, and thus the only thing left to to write about?

tire fires

2008-05-14T01:32:00.000-07:00

ah, cursed hours, fly slowly, for you each take a piece of my soul with you...

I think that in a few years when School is paid of (if the world doesn't end, which is sort of touch and go) I want to work with homeless people for a while. Its kind of selfish, because I doubt I could really make much of a difference unless I spent my entire life at it, and I can't do that, and I simply would not be doing it for that reason, etc.

But their world seems like some other world, outside of my comprehension. Do the things I think here, hold true there? What's this stuff I've learned worth- anything? Does it have any value in what looks like the absolute bottom of the world?

I smell the smell of distant rubber meeting road... Unless of course the world ends and I get to find this all out the easy way.

(and here I figured this post would be about Cthulu!)

A Minor Resolution

2008-05-13T00:50:00.000-07:00

The thought occurred to me today that, since I have this blog just sitting here and the internet just pooled around it at all times, I may as well get in the habit of posting. I am going to try to put one coherent thought on here, be it small or massive, every day, and see how long the fad lasts. I want to see if I can make it to Graduation.

I give it a week.

Aaand, that was my thought for the day. Cthulhu fhtagn!

Strange Late-night Obsession

2008-04-17T02:35:00.000-07:00

Every now and then, something reminds me that Rorschach is dead and that Dr. Manhattan killed him. It's nothing personal, but I detest Dr. Manhattan for that. Would that he were not imaginary and/or immortal... !

Spencers Butte?

2008-02-10T16:12:00.000-08:00

A couple of days ago a group from the house went hiking up Spencer's Butte. I believe that is the right name of the thing we hiked. I am now awed by the length of the thin and ghost like thing passing for existence that I've have in this town without hiking said Butte.

There were six who went altogether- Kari, the Alaskan girl, and a couple of guys she knew, Emily(a Freshman) and me, and Pavan(a guy who lives at the house). It was so warm that Kari wore shorts. I have it in my mind now that she was skipping alot, but that is probably just an impression. Most of the way Emily, Pavan, and I were together going more slowly, and Kari and the guys were ahead someplace. We went through the belly of the woods at first. The trail was a bright brown mud, and the rest of the world was dark green and pillars. Higher up, the trail was still coated with snow. Those bits were a little bit scary going up, because the snow was neither melted nor solid, and there was absolutely no traction(and it was quite steep). Pavan and I helped Emily, because she was freaking out a little. Just after that, we got above the trees, and the trail disappeared in piles of big rocks and slopes of short grass. All around was wind going through empty space. I think we went even slower then, because we kept stopping to look and/or take pictures. The horizon finally opened out- a ring of hill tops, and the white peaks of mountains jutting through here and there. As we went up, the view got wider and deeper. It was so lovely- you could see so far... At the very top was a peak of rocks, and on it a concrete triangle where the others were sitting. We all sat up there and basked in the wind and open space for a long time.

"distance has a way, of making life, understandable"

2008-01-16T02:50:00.000-08:00

In case anyone is wondering, Noah is right, or nearly so. Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, by Wilco, is one of the best albums ever. Why this is or what its about, I can't say just yet, though. I need to listen to it at least eight or nine more times, but I will get back to you.

In other news, I think I've spent too much time in my room with only music for company lately. I've been getting to the point that the lives of the people around me seem kind of far away and unreal. Then in a natural progression, I too feel like I'm living in a dream.

Yay for reality. Yay for pain.

but also Yay for waking up from dreams, when ever that happens.

I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day

2007-12-25T22:14:00.000-08:00

This is by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Appearently, he wrote it during the Civil War, after his son was badly wounded in the fighting.

I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

I thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And in despair I bowed my head
'There is no peace on earth,' I said,'
For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.'

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
'God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men.'

Till ringing, singing on its way
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Sea of Glass

2007-12-13T20:32:00.000-08:00

There were ice storms the day I flew home. It didn't stop the planes, thankfully, but it did create delays. First there was a small hour's delay at Pheonix, then in the air over O'hare (and they kept telling us, we may get to land within twenty minutes. twenty minutes would go by and they'd say the same thing) then on the runway at O'hare (becuase they didn't have a gate free. and they kept telling us twenty more minutes. ten more minutes.). But it was all not objectively very long, and the politely chatty wife of a businessman was sitting next to me and we chatted. After that was a couple hours waiting for the bus, a couple hours of bus ride, and about an hour of white knuckled driving over roads like long skating rinks.

At some point, on the runway, it occured to me that there really is no use in waiting for anything. Everything that we hope will bring us relief from our problems, when we get it, creates another set of problems.
-When we're kids, we think growing up will make our lives easier (maybe?) becuase we'll have power, but it doesn't; it puts us in a position to have to deal with a lot of crap. Because we have the power to.
-When we're single, we think that Finding Someone, or Getting Married will solve all our problems, but it really just seals us into dealing with our problems and their consequences in one particular situation. We hope it will grant us all our desires, but it only traps us with the fact that our desires often can't be fulfilled.
-When mothers have young children, they think their lives will be easier when the children grow older and they don't have to lull them to sleep at night and wipe their rear ends. When the kids grow older though, they start doing terrible risky and/or stupid things, and the mothers are wracked by worry that they can do nothing about. And they look back fondly on the days when they could solve all their children's problems by lulling them to sleep.
-When men have bad jobs, or bad bosses, or are just bored with working, they wish they could retire, relax, and enjoy life. But they forget that the other term for Retirement Home is Nursing Home. And a nursing home is a place where people who are no longer able to work sit around, pretend that Bingo is important because its distracting, and if they're lucky, get visited by their children for a few hours every other weekend.

I don't mean to paint a gloomy picture. I think that all of these troubles have a point, and provide chances to trust God in ways that we would get nowhere else. But it doesn't seem worthwhile to wait for the situation to change. That won't solve anything. We deal with the problems we have, and if we can do that, good. If we make a habit of just dealing with what we're given, we stand a chance of dealing with what we're given, and getting the good out of it. If we continually evade our problems, to chase after some bright future, we wind up at the end of our lives having done nothing. Isn't there a fairy tale about that? A boy with a silver ball and a golden thread? It would allow him to skip forward in time through anything he felt was unpleasent, but at the end of his life, he begged the fairy with tears to take the magic thing back and let him start his life again. Fairy tales aren't stupid, you know.

And I suppose by all those 'we' s just now, I can only mean 'I'.

At any rate. My grampa appears to be dying. He has been in a slow decline for years now, and has thought that he was dying, but in the last week he has taken a turn for the worst, and this looks like the last turn. He had cancer years ago, and it relapsed? came back? It is now spread in his bones all across his back. They have given him enough morphine to dope him up and let him sleep for the moment. My mum is helping my granma take care of him (she and he still live at home together) as much as she (my mum) can, and my sisters (and me) take care of our younger brothers as much as is needed. Which is not even different than normal. Nothing on the surface is really different. Except that he's dying- and it's kind of odd. I have spent my whole life, for the most part, in and out of his house, and, for the most part, with him.

I don't know how to explain the importance of this exactly. For the past few days since I got home the fields have been smoothed with ice. Whenever the sun comes out, it pours into them, till they become a sea of molten glass. Every tree and every dead weed looks like its made out of transparent fire.

That was the end result of all the delays. That was why I secretly didn't mind having to sit in the plane, on the runway.

Nonsense

2007-12-05T20:59:00.000-08:00

Is this entertainment for you Gentlemen? This spectacle which arises before your very eyes, fools and wolves, diamonds pretending to be jades, and meres imagining themselves to be firm yet tender earth, avoided by all except the gullible. The real flask of character is yet unpoured, the real trial undrunk in its full. For time will crack the jar of the world and unleash meaning- which flows by various streams through air and earth, running, and pooling at last in the cup of the soul. This change has never been complete, and never, never will be. The jar is never as broken as we thought it was. The wolf becomes a jade to a diamond is a fish, and out of the strong, Gentlemen, out of the strong. We will ring in every change until the last, and even then. There are things that haven't tried us yet.

Notes of a Wandering Mind II

2007-12-03T16:56:00.000-08:00

Our kingdom is eternally incomplete. Its borders are never certain, the capitol never settled. Go West today, go East tomorrow. This city is a pilgrim city. You live in it by packing your knapsack and leaving.

The god-like Camus

2007-11-29T14:13:00.000-08:00

This last weekend I spent obsessing over the god-like Camus for my thesis. He called himself an Absurdist, and one of the main themes in his writing is, naturally, the Absurd. When he talks about life being Absurd, he doesn't mean that everything is a crazy and nothing matters. He means that humans must live as if there is meaning, but that the universe is meaningless (or humans must live rationally and the universe cannot ultimately be captured by rationality). He seems to be saying that the best way to live in such a world is to continually be aware of both the ultimate irrationality of the universe and, at the same time, to continually revolt against that meaningless-ness in the creation of human meaning. The true temptation, in this world, is to be lured away from awareness of this disjunction between what is human and what is ultimate. This can be either by ignoring the irrationality of the universe and believing only the meaning humans create, or by ignoring human meaning and saying that everything is completely irrational. The point, for him, was to live in both, without letting go of either.

Camus and I live in different worlds and believe quiet different things, but I resonate to this. It seems as though there are similar incongruities in the world I live in. As a Christian, I want to do what is right, or to do the will of God. As a human I also know that it is always possible that I am mistaken in my understanding of what that is. If I let go of either, I will fail. Or to put it another way- Our knowledge of the world is always incomplete and indefinite, but we are constantly having to make definite actions. What gets you through? In my life, so far, it seems as though you just have to guess and act and hope for the best.

I lived in these thoughts like a body all weekend (or maybe they were living me). Tuesday or Wednesday I wound up holding Baby for Janelle (for about an hour?). She fell asleep in my arms. The question presented itself to me then, walking back and forth; how can this be doubted? How is any uncertainty possible? She smiled in her sleep.

I don't know how to resolve all this.

From Ash-Wednesday

2007-11-18T17:40:00.000-08:00

"Under a juniper-tree the bones sang, scattered and shining

We are glad to be scattered, we did little good to each other,

Under a tree in the cool of the day, with the blessing of sand,

Forgetting themselves and each other, united

In the quiet of the desert. And neither division nor unity

Matters. This is the land. We have our inheritance."

Empty Weekend

2007-11-18T13:10:00.000-08:00

Yesterday Chelsea said something about the weather that was rang true. "I like the rain- its the constant cloud cover that gets to me" Isn't that the truth!

And in life too I guess. I could take disasters with definite limits a lot better than I can take this continual gnawing void. Now maybe I should be glad that I'm not having both!

Yesterday (and yes, this is where the title came from) was one of those days when every one disappears to study and the house hums with the lack of people. Maybe it's just growing up in a house with millions of kids, but large empty houses nerve me out. On top of this, on Friday, Josh officially dropped out of school and Karl got fired. Karl had apparently been planning to quite anyway, so its not objectively that bad, but its depressing. And now he's gone to Washington. And Josh... I guess... I guess. So close to the end. It seems such a waste.

I don't know if I'm justified, but I really feel like the muddy and tired surviver of some war. What's left is so little- the grand hopes we started out with, dispensed with one by one in our disasters. What's left? Only a handful of people, too scattered and involved in their own lives to even say goodbye to each other. I guess we are setting out into the real world. But if this is it's harbinger, the thought doesn't comfort me.

lots of vodka

2007-11-14T02:58:00.000-08:00

"If we had remembered earlier our Father's house
Where we grew together, and that old kindness,
You would not be dying now, oh my sister, my spouse,
pierced with my sword in the battle's heat and blindness."

C.S. Lewis

Concluding Mythological Postscript

2007-11-13T20:45:00.000-08:00

The Noface. I identify with him a lot. In the story the Noface is creepy and eats people. (Note to self: am I creepy and do I eat people?) If you pay attention, though, he simply seems to be mirroring the people around him. In the bad witch's house everyone is consumed with greed, and shows it by begging for the gold he can give them. If they accept his gold, he, well, consumes them. Greed for greed. He is sort of determined by the people he's around.

Despite this, I think he really is just looking for a good person (and maybe a friend?). When Sen comes along and is nice to him and wont accept anything from him (though he offers quite persistently) he follows her, and lets her led him back to the good witch's house where people aren't greedy and he doesn't have to eat anyone.

Anyway. I went to Halloween as the Noface. It was a wonderful costume to have because for once I didn't feel like I had to act. That was just how I felt.

Kaonashi; Noface

2007-11-12T12:06:00.000-08:00

2007-11-11T01:28:00.001-08:00

And just because I'm pretty sure no one is reading this (PARANOIA:exceptforyourworstenemies
whoreadingiteverydayandaregoingtousethisinformationtodestroyyou), here's about Iraq.

You know every one is saying that the war is a conspiracy or that it was a mistake in the first place, or that Bush is a nut case cowboy, and therefore we should pull out. I am willing to grant all that, but it doesn't seem like that means we should pull out. For the simple reason that once upon a time Iraq had a government that could keep civil war from breaking out and keep other countries from subjugating its people, and we destroyed it. It may have been an evil dictatorship, but it did the things any government is supposed to do. How can we think that somehow the chaos which will ensue if we pull out before they have a stable government again wont be on our heads? That's like 'freeing' an animal that has been trained to never ever eat food that isn't in its dish by tossing it out in the wild. It has the wrong training for survive in the wild and it will probably starve to death.

If we pull out before they can handle it, is there any reason why the shit (that will go down) wont be our fault?

Unless of course you think that this is all a scheme to control the oil and therefore the nefarious orchestrators of this plot mean us to stay in Iraq indefinitely. But I really must know- if the war is really about oil- why in heck are gas prices still so high?

Thou, Nature, art my goddess

2007-11-08T22:52:00.000-08:00

All in all, this was not a bad day. I woke up on my own. The day was unhurried and pearly sunny. I got a decent amount of schoolwork done. And I got to read two acts of King Lear out loud with friends, and we all didn't hate each other- and it was a good time. And Kristen did the Fool awesomely. It wasn't the best day ever. It wasn't horrible.

As traumatic as everything can be, it is sometimes comforting to be reminded that the bare minimum of being alive is... a good thing.

notes of a wandering mind

2007-11-07T14:08:00.000-08:00

I was looking over some of my notes from class today. Here are some of the things I found.

(This was from the beginning of the term. It reminds me a little bit of The Snowman, by Wallace Stevens, which is suspiciously hanging on my wall. The 'you' is actually me.)

Judge for yourself the silence you must live by
Live in, and live unending
This becomes clearer everyday
As it grows greater
It is more than an escape or an action
More than a solution
It's a mighty ocean,
That you drift into day by day.
For it takes you into itself
Like a gull in the distance,
And you, the silent one, become the soul of silence.

Later in the term.

I've cut myself afloat, and drift in pain
escaping the land, it's burning rain
it's rolling banks of smoke, it's smog,
it's corpses lolling, it's smoldering logs,
it's rubble unending, it's cables and trash-
by the edge of the sea I lashed a raft
and cut myself off from the life I shared
though I surely die here, I wont gangrene there.

At some other point- chronology uncertain.

Lost from flights and fights uncertain in which very
many souls have been withdrawn, and hid beneath their stones
to pass the time I dally with leaves and skulls and berry-
ozzing bottles, uncorked and dripping over bones.
And by a foaming cup I dull the babble
of the lying dead that despise their place together
blown by cold fear like a wind in eddying rabbles
each gibbering its proof that he still will live forever,
and he alone. Far through the trees, rooks
are shaken up into the sky, as old bells speak
of battles heightening in the ruins where once men took
their war with heaven out in brick to build a tower and a keep.
To this riddle an answer I'd obtain
do I desert those fighters most to go or to remain?

Yesterday.

The oldest of brothers blubbered-
but not over his brothers grave-
why can't I fail more freely?
whoever finds me might not like me,
and it's more than I can bear.

Pillar of Cloud

2007-11-06T22:11:00.001-08:00

First. Tonight there was thick fog and low clouds. I saw this from the fire escape on the loft. Looking over roofs towards the campus, the fog was lit up into pillars of orange or yellow or blue, wherever there were lights. There was a game at the U of O tonight and the sidewalks were streaming with people, but all sound was hushed and drifted in from far away. Even the saxophone. A bum was playing the saxophone on the street corner, playing, I guess, to the passers-by and the fog.

Second. I looked back over the last few posts, and they don't seem particularly clear to me. It is too much work to edit them. I don't know if this will help.

The problem that has been bothering me the last few weeks is this. How do you forgive people who doesn't think they have a problem? I may not be actually dealing with this situation, but it sure seems like it. One tearful night after much dislike of God, I was forced to admit that you do, in fact, have to forgive them. This is probably painfully obvious, but it occurred to me that Jesus forgave people who were in the process of killing him. You don't get much more unrepentant than that. This was hard to argue against. This is also why Reid (Hoover)'s definition of Christianity struck me- not only because I expected him to be much more verbose than that.

Anyway, that being agreed to, I am still left with the problem of what to do. What does forgiveness even look like if the person doesn't think they need it? Do you embrace them as brothers who God is working on at a different rate and manner? Do you refuse to accept something blatantly wrong? Do you hide in a corner and wait for it all to blow over? What does love look like in a body? No idea.

At any rate. I really wish that all the problems in my life were resolved and that life was all fluffy and pink, but there's no point in even saying that. One time, Nigel Cottier, my German teacher, tried to illustrate German humor for us. He said that in Berlin, the situation maybe serious, but it's never hopeless. In Vienna, the situation may be hopeless, but it's not serious.

I think I may be Viennese at heart.

(on the error-os arrow-boy)

2007-10-29T19:30:00.000-07:00

yea, lord, your power is great.
with all the wind of fortune you fill the sails of endless ships
you carry them each to disaster for you carry
each to the wreck of self on the toothed shoal of another
be the teeth hidden by waves or bare
with the bodies of sailors lodged and rotting in every cruel gap.
be the shore beyond inviting or disdainful

lord, your power is mighty
for you turn the wheels that grind the world's grist
you scatter the chaff of desire like filth upon the ground
you have gathered of us seeds unspeakable for your flour
you scatter our lives like filth upon the ground
you grease your turning stones with blood that we weep
and call carelessly for more grease

the mills of the gods grind slowly
for they grind exceedingly fine
the bread of the gods gives life
life to some other world
we don't live there

lord, your fires are exceedingly white
and the heat of them has melted great dross away
him who is made of dross is destroyed
and he who has metal is changed beyond recognition
beaten by blows into the shape of another's purpose
made worthy to live a life he would not have chosen

we are the seed you crush, we are the chaff you throw away
i submit me lord to your power for i can do no other.

I see with my human eyes oh lord
the seething hungry rocks your winds have driven me to,
I see oh lord the the shore
so lovely with unstomachable fruit.
if I am to be destroyed by your flames
work the bellows lord and let them tower
if my life can give life to a world I can't live in,
make your bread, and feed the world of your choosing

"Oh love that fires the sun, keep me burning"

Last Night

2007-10-25T09:48:00.000-07:00

Rather late last night I walked into the kitchen, and discovered Reid sitting alone. He was listening to music on the big speakers, and just seemed quiet. On a whim, and from a long train of thoughts that I didn't mention, I asked him what he thought the essence of Christianity was. Ridiculous Gutenbergean question that that is. After protesting a little bit about the unfairness of the question (perfectly justified), he went all quiet again for a while.

In the end he surprised me He just said mercy. Then after another pause he gave a long definition involving merit and ability and it was rather a run on sentence and I wasn't surprised anymore. But it was food for thought. The mercy part.

Sad Clown

2007-10-25T02:11:00.000-07:00

This was a crying sort of night. It came after a gnashing-of-teeth sort of day. I spent most of the evening in Tuesday Night Class On Wednesday, and helping a bunch of freshmen cook things in the kitchen. They all wore aprons. It was so cute. I like them. And also in the coldest, most people-less places I could find. Because acting happy sucks.

'Say how's the weather, so I look out the window
To brighten my soul, but I can't control the rain
That keeps falling
Smile on the outside that never comes in
A comedy, mystery, irony, tragedy
So I scream "let the show begin"'
(Jars of Clay)

Fortunately it was rainy, cold, and dark in Eugene today, so I had the right backdrop.

Its so weird. It's not at all easy to admit you aren't God. But it solves sooo many problems. Except I still don't know how I should treat the people I will be sharing the universe with tomorrow morning. That bothers me. But I think (now) that I will live.

"Peter Pan will save me."

Note

2007-10-15T02:49:00.000-07:00

On the way back from church today, I saw a yellow house. Calling it a yellow house might mislead you. The truth is it was a yellow house with sun shining around it, and clouds smeared above it. The clouds were so high and thin that they sharpened the blue. There was also wind, which is important because the lawn had gone wild and was all restless. A tree in the front yard was restless too, and leaves were scattering from it one by one. In the driveway an old man and and old woman were sitting in lawn chairs. They were watching traffic and you could telling even from the car that they were laughing and talking. They both had white hair, mussed up in the wind. That's what kind of house I mean. It was sitting in all this, and was bright yellow.

Seven

2007-10-13T01:58:00.000-07:00

I just saw the movie Seven with Karl and a couple other people. I would like to point out the fact that though most of the people who watched it did so because Karl decided to watch a movie, Karl left before it started and didn't come back. Ha. Ironical world.

Seven was pretty disturbing. I had never seen it before. Through a fog of disturbtion that hasn't quiet settled yet, I think I think it was a good movie. The killer pointed out that people treat horrible things as normal or innocent when they are apathetic and cease to care what's good and what's not. This plus the fact that the old cop had spent the whole film wondering whether he should give into the apathy of the general public and (apathetically) quite his work (this being the 'bad' option). It makes me think that the film makers were in some sense agreeing with the killer. And even agreeing with his method (disgusting murders aside); they did what he was trying to do. They made a shocking spectacle that, possible, would make you reassess your normal life.

The mind boggling twist is that the young cop, the only person other than the killer who is firmly against evil, turns out to be one of the sins as well. And in a way, this is true to life. No matter how good anyone tries to be, they are going to wind up committing vileness. It's the warp and woof of our natures.

The main thing that makes me dislike this movie is that it's world is limited to these select truths. The world is a twisted screwed up place, all people have sin, and apathy is wrong, all that I can agree with, but there's more to life than that. There is a way out of sin and out of the corruption we exhale that is more than burying your head in the sand.

I read the Brothers K this summer and got obsessed with it, so I'm going to throw a quote at the problem without explaining myself anymore.

"'You take too many sins upon yourself' mother used to weep. 'Dear mother, my joy, I am weeping from gladness not from grief; I want to be guilty before them, only I cannot explain it to you, for I do not even know how to love them. Let me be sinful before everyone, but so that everyone will forgive me, and that is paradise. Am I not in paradise now?'"

So maybe I think this isn't a good movie? hm. It could be applauded for getting the situation right, but it also implies that there is no solution, which I don't think is true. Which is worse? Telling an outright lie, or telling a misleading truth?

Good or bad, I know this is not a movie I would watch for fun. Or again, anytime soon.

Subterfuge

2007-10-05T01:14:00.000-07:00

Ask them what your name is.
Do whatever they say.
The darkest subterfuge, the deepest secret lie,
is in you asking;
they wont understand that they didn't tell you.

2007-09-23T23:26:00.000-07:00

The Knight Whose Armour Didn't Squeak

Of all the Knights in Appledore
The wisest was Sir Thomas Tom.
He multiplied as far as four,
And knew what nine was taken from
To make eleven. He could write
A letter to another Knight.

No other Knight in all the land
Could do the things which he could do.
Not only did he understand
The way to polish swords, but knew
What remedy a Knight should seek
Whose armour had begun to squeak.

And, if he didn't fight too much,
It wasn't that he didn't care
For blips and buffetings and such,
But felt that it was hardly fair
To risk, by frequent injuries,
A brain as delicate as his.

His castle (Castle Tom) was set
Conveniently on a hill;
And daily, when it wasn't wet,
He paced the battlements until
Some smaller Knight who couldn't swim
Should reach the moat and challenge him.

Or sometimes, feeling full of fight,
He hurried out to scour the plain,
And, seeing some approaching Knight,
He either hurried home again,
Or hid; and, when the foe was past,
Blew a triumphant trumpet-blast.

One day when good Sir Thomas Tom
Was resting in a handy ditch,
The noises he was hiding from,
Though very much the noises which
He'd always hidden from before,
Seemed somehow less....Or was it more?

The trotting horse, the trumpet's blast,
The whistling sword, the armour's squeak,
These, and especially the last,
Had clattered by him all the week.
Was this the same, or was it not?
Something was different. But what?

Sir Thomas raised a cautious ear
And listened as Sir Hugh went by,
And suddenly he seemed to hear
(Or not to hear) the reason why
This stranger made a nicer sound
Than other Knights who lived around.

Sir Thomas watched the way he went -
His rage was such he couldn't speak,
For years they'd called him down in Kent
The Knight Whose Armour Didn't Squeak!
Yet here and now he looked upon
Another Knight whose squeak had gone.

He rushed to where his horse was tied;
He spurred it to a rapid trot.
The only fear he felt inside
About his enemy was not
"How sharp his sword?" "How stout his heart?"
But "Has he got too long a start?"

Sir Hugh was singing, hand on hip,
When something sudden came along,
And caught him a terrific blip
Right in the middle of his song.
"A thunderstorm!" he thought. "Of course!"
And toppled gently off his horse.

Then said the good Sir Thomas Tom,
Dismounting with a friendly air,
"Allow me to extract you from
The heavy armour that you wear.
At times like these the bravest Knight
May find his armour much too tight."

A hundred yards or so beyond
The scene of brave Sir Hugh's defeat
Sir Thomas found a useful pond,
And, careful not to wet his feet,
He brought the armour to the brink,
And flung it in...and watched it sink.

So ever after, more and more,
The men of Kent would proudly speak
Of Thomas Tom of Appledore,
"The Knight Whose Armour Didn't Squeak."
Whilst Hugh, the Knight who gave his best,
Squeaks just as badly as the rest.

~ A A Milne, Now We Are Six 1927