Corn Syrup

With my new job, I'm on the road much of the time, with plenty of time in the state van by myself and plenty of time in hotels by myself, which is nice for me, because I need my introvert time just as much as the next introvert whose job requires interacting with large groups of people day in and day out. At the same time, that extra solitude also means that I spend more time thinking about things when I'm on the road than when I'm at home. It's not really soul-searching; it's more analyzing my life, because I'm the one who has to live it and I should be responsible and reasonable about it.

Even while being responsible and reasonable, I get discouraged when I don't make the changes I want to see in myself. I'm discouraged often enough that I figured it was worth thinking about. Why can't I do all the things I want to do, be the person everyone wants me to be, fix my faults and be a healthier, happier individual? I think the problem I have is that I'm stuck in a rut, but it's a more advanced rut than I've ever been stuck in before. It's a rut that fills up with water and covers you and expands so you're under an ocean of unmanageable water. But drowning in the ocean is metaphor tired with use, so this is what I came up with to explain what I feel when I'm not who I want to be:

It's like, it's like I'm in this ocean, this big pool of corn syrup, this vat of corn syrup, like all my fears and worries and problems and iniquities and doubts and faults and failures have liquefied and turned into corn syrup. And I'm swimming around, you know, and I've got this breathing apparatus and this corn syrup swimsuit that is ideally suited for living in corn syrup and, you know, I'm functioning. I just don't think about the fact that I'm in corn syrup, that it's gross and it gives me these headaches and it's not good for my body and I wasn't made to swim around in corn syrup- I was made to walk around in air. As long as I keep all those truths out of my mind, I'm OK in my corn syrup. Besides, it's what I do. I swim around in corn syrup. Anything else would be changing the status quo, doing something that has previously been undone and that's not a task I relish.

I'll look up, though, and I'll see all the things that are outside of this vat of corn syrup. There's music and books and sports and friends and people, all these people, outside of the corn syrup. And I think it'd be pretty cool to be up there, you know. I mean, the corn syrup, it's not that bad. There's the occasional piece of fruit suspended in the fluid, like with Jell-O or fruit cups, and it's pretty static, so stuff says where I left it, but the fun things, the stories and the monsters and the stars and the romances, those things are outside of the corn syrup, so I think about getting out. I even swim up to the edge, but then people come over and they see my swimsuit and my breathing apparatus and they look down on me. "We'll talk when you've changed. You'll be able to handle the adult things we deal with out here on the land then." And they walk away, so I stay in the corn syrup, embarrassed and ashamed.

But, still, all the good things are up there, out of the corn syrup, so I think harder about trying to get out. When no one's looking, I'll get right up to the edge, lift my hands out of the water, and get my arms ready to push myself out, but then I think of how hard it'll be. I mean, it'll take everything I've got just to get out of the corn syrup and then, once I'm out, it'll still be all over me. I mean, can you think of how much time it'll take to get the corn syrup off of me, out of my hair, out of my ears, out from underneath my fingernails, between my toes? I'll have to get used to breathing regular air, standing up on my own two feet under this crushing naturally-occurring gravity. I'll have to get new clothes. I don't even know where you'd get new clothes. I don't know how everyone else got what they have, I don't know how to get clean, and I don't know how to walk. I'd just look dumb if I got out. I mean, at least in the corn syrup, I can swim away from them, from the people with the cutting words and the looks that lack any kind of understanding or empathy. It really is my own little world down in the corn syrup- safe, even if it's not right. And anyway, even if I tried to ask for help getting out of the corn syrup, they wouldn't be able to understand what I'm saying- the corn syrup would distort the sound waves like water does and it'd come out in a jumble and I'd stay stuck.

Even if I did get out, I'd want someone there who'd been in the corn syrup and knew how to get out and how to get it off of me, or at least someone who'd studied corn syrup. I mean, I'd want someone who knew the exact viscosity of corn syrup so they'd know how much force I'd need to get out of the vat of corn syrup. They'd need to know the chemical composition of corn syrup so they could find the best way to clean it off of me. I mean, I guess I'd take home remedies as well, but they'd have to be proven, no old wives tales about how badgers are really good at detecting the last vestiges of corn syrup and can sniff it out of the creases in your elbows or the corners of your eyelids. I'd need someone willing to help me stand up for the first time and teach me how to walk without judgement. I'd need someone there coaching me until standing and walking were second nature. Then I'd want someone to stay beside me and help me find the right clothes so that I could fit in and figure the rest of it out, and french the llama, there better be someone there with a musical instrument and packed bookshelf, because I didn't climb out of that corn syrup for the oxygen and concrete.

And I don't think I'd go back near the corn syrup for a while. I'd probably stay away from sodas and juice and stuff too. It's not like my memories of the time swimming in and getting out of the corn syrup would disappear and memories can paralyze you, you know? Just the thought of being back in the corn syrup would be enough to keep me a touchdown away the edge of the vat for a long time, because it's so easy to picture yourself back inside. It's so easy to want to be back inside. I mean, you're supported by the corn syrup, you don't have to talk to anyone, you don't have to try to figure anything out at all- it's the apathetic atrophy of your muscles, heart, and mind and it's nice and easy. You have to fight for things out in the air that were never even a problem when you're in the corn syrup, and the promises that were made to you back in the corn syrup, the completeness that you think is out there with the people, that takes a while to actualize. Not only do you fight to stand, but you have to wait in hope. It's not easy.

That lack of ease is exactly why I would be there the next time someone swam up to the edge of the vat of corn syrup. I'd be there, fear and all, because they'd have no idea what kind of beautiful mess they were pulling themselves into.

Intentional Beginnings

(Disclaimer: I live in a world that is totally comfortable with words that that are normally bleeped out of cable TV and that, while I encourage you to click on the little blue links, that you should aware that there are people out there who make use of those little words to punctuate their sincerity and if those words aren't your thing, maybe think again about clicking on the last link.)

I spend most of my evenings having things pour into me. I check Facebook and see what people have posted, read articles, shake my head, smile, click through pictures, and respond to messages. I shudder when I look at my gmail and avoid deleting the extras among the 800 unread messages because there's a link to a new video from one of my youtube subscriptions. I catch up on videos with headphones in because only nerds subscribe to channels on youtube (nerdfighters, that is) and I have to pretend I'm not a nerd (though the word nerd is not an insult- John Green). I check Twitter and spend what must be an hour loading new tweets, clicking on content, reading articles, looking at picture sets, and following conversations down through my twitter feed. If you have the misfortune of following me while I'm watching a movie or the Friends finale, you see that I spend much of those hours tweeting quotes from what I'm watching. And if Twiiter, Facebook, TV, movies, and roommates can't feed my emptying brain enough, I'll switch over to my tumblr and reblog the first twenty awesome pictures, articles, or John Green quotes I see. Also squids. There's this girl on tumblr who's like me and is even named Addie except she has this thing for Matthew Gray Gubler and squids. Not together. That would be weird. But I'm giving squids a try because my doppelganger thinks they're cool and I like her taste.

Squids aside, I spend most of my time at my new awesome townhouse with awesome roommates doing anything except making something. And I think it's great that there's so much good content out there. There's such opportunity to make things and design things and put it out there for people to look at and evaluate and admire and ascribe importance to. I really like that there's this international underground of creativity that isn't necessarily recognized by the media powers that be. Basically, I'm an internet hipster. Like, I think etsy is an awesome idea, I think you could give some of the artists on DFTA records,  the NPR tiny desk concerts, or the free new artists list on Amazon a listen, and I think that there are beautiful and funny and insightful blogs on tumblr and other places on the internet. Even though there's a lot of pointless things out there, I think that the magical land of the internet is a sweets and joy and joyness. My only problem with the internet is that I spend more time watching than contributing. Then again, I do that in life a lot too, so I'm not sure that I'd expect anything too much different.

But making something means putting yourself out there. I mean, I had an impromptu accoustic guitar session with my roommate, whom I trust and love, and I couldn't pick a single song for us to play for fear of picking something I couldn't play at all or something that my roommate wouldn't know or like. It's one of the safest environments possible, outside of being alone, and I just had nothing to give. Or, I started organ lessons on Friday and had to stop and talk  and make a joke every single time I messed up. I'm starting to think that I contain a world of insecurities just waiting to be unleashed on people. But making something, whether it’s music or writing or other arts, means putting your talents to use and making things that are distinctly you and allowing people to take and use them however they want. It's difficult and scary and something I totally want to do right now.

I have this weird, awesome amount of confidence in things I do because I am now good at something, that something being planetarium shows. I mean, I never intended nor thought that knowing so many puns about stars and planets and stuff would give me confidence to do other things, but recognizing that feeling of accomplishment, of knowing that in a particular situation you could excel like no other, helps you recognize that feeling in other situations and helps you to be proud of yourself, to have the right kind of pride. So I'm going to run with that and take Ira Glass's advice and just continue making things. Now, I paint like a one year old (that's unfair- I draw stick figures on, like, a seventh grade level at least) and I sing like someone who deserves to have the choir hide them (also unfair- I mean, I'm only squeaky after close football games which I attended and which I think we should have won) and play guitar like a noob, but I write pretty OK, so I'm going to start intentionally writing again. It's part of an intentional series of life things I have going on right now and I figure if I can succeed at something I want to do, maybe I'll figure out how to succeed at things I have to do.

I'm drawing up a list of topics and at least weekly I'm going to write a new blog about different ideas. I recently spent a summer deeply discussing the attributes of superheroes, so maybe I'll write something smart about that. I've had a lot of questions about why we've landed a laboratory on Mars, so maybe I'll rehash that. I've thought a lot about what I think about social, economic, and religious issues, so maybe I'll muster up some courage and tackle some of those things. And I've experience a lot of funny sound bites in my recent life, so maybe I'll curate a collection of those to present to you. I mean, I totally appreciate my coming-of-age things, because I'm stuck in that phase where I'm definitely an adult but am unsure about how I feel about that, or how other people feel about that, but there's much more to me than that, and I want to express that.

So raise a glass to beginnings, to the infinite set of numbers in that terrible place between zeroand one that I'm going to brush by (Ze Frank). Let the potential for awesome thrive. 

Moving (Or, Life Confusion)

D'you know, I've spent much of the last month looking for spare seconds when I can sit down and get my thoughts together. I mean, other than that week that I didn't do much moving at all due to a fall and back injury. Can we talk about that? It's just scary that you can miss one step and end up in pain that reaches at least a 7 on a scale of 1 to Bane breaking Batman's back. And it's scarier that you could have pain like that perpetually. It's scary that there are unfixable pains out there, and that they can become realities in your life. It's scary that I can hurt like this. 

But, aside from all of that, I think the last month has been an exercise in worrying and plugging in everything I can to block out the worry- worrying that I'm an unbearable burden, worrying that I'm a frustration in other people's lives, worrying that I won't be good enough, worrying that I'll never be healthy again, worrying that things aren't going to work out, worrying that the transition from this plan to the next is going to be more than I can handle. The problem with my worries is that I don't know which ones are realistic and which ones aren't. My worries live in a mind of freedom and opportunity- they're all created equal as far as I'm concerned, and only time will tell which ones are going to grow up into big, important problems. Then again, certain worries are subsidized by the department of self-doubt, so they're probably going to succeed anyway. It's just easier to avoid all these potentials and realities and just watch Friends or go watch movies and fill up the schedule until you think you're squeezing seconds out of your day to do anything outside worrying and avoiding worry.

Along with several people in my acquaintance, I have a gap between when my lease at my old apartment ended and when the lease at my new apartment begins. For a lot of people, it's like hitchhiking through the weeks- one night here, three nights there, only staying as long as it fits in with other people's schedules and contemplating the possibility of sleeping in their car. Luckily, it's more like catching a ride with me, where I'm spending my entire time without an address at a friend's apartment in a mostly-empty room. But I can't help feeling that everyone else is just as lucky, because they're hardly a problem, a momentary obligation, rather than a perpetual burden. It's just difficult, to get used to not possessing a space after having nearly a year of a having a place that was mine. I mean, currently, I have a room to stay in, and my stuff's there, but it's not mine. This gap in housing is just something I'm dealing with, a temporary thing, like having to wear a cast on my independence until it's functional again.

When I think about all of this, though, I get a little weighed under by the nostalgia of a summer spent never owning a space and never having to move anything larger than a backpack and the thought of people who have nowhere to stay and why I had so many offers of places to sleep when others have none. It's this weird, depressing spiral where I feel guilty for my blessings, wonder why the world isn't fixed enough so that everyone can have the same things I have, and wish that this dumb idealism with which most of us post-college purported world-changers are saddled would either go away or push me enough to do something that secures good in the world outside of my own self interest. I also want to get rid of half the stuff I own and I want to be able to move at a moment's notice just by packing up my car and I want to walk lightly upon the earth and I'm so confused, because I don't know that you can live deeply and walk lightly and I think that conversations like that are best held when the day is just waking up and not many of us have the motivation to stare down the dawn and dare it to blossom into another day that will leave us with more pain than we started with. Probably.

All I want to do right now is move into the new place on Friday and Saturday and settle into a routine. I want to hold still for a few weeks before something new starts. I want someone to sit beside me and listen to me rant and ramble and then tell me how to make things happen, to push me, to send me on a mission, and to watch me while I finish it. I want to understand the length and depth and breadth of universe and then I want to tell someone else about it and call that my contribution to humanity.

So, that's all a little too much to ask, you think? Anyone want to help me move instead? I'll give you pizza and beverages and my lasting thanks. That's what I've got right now. 

Cockroaches (Or, Friends and Difficulties)

So I've been bouncing around a lot of places recently, between Chapel Hill and Hickory and Granite Falls and Boone, and I've been visiting friends and congratulating and bemoaning and all sorts of things. It's been a red letter kind of month/year/week/thing.  I've been, at times, as good of a friend and as bad of a friend as I can be, and I wonder how a person can equally regret and admire the same expanse of time.

In one of my more admirable periods, I was at a friend's apartment, celebrating graduation and pet-sitting and any one of a number of remarkable things that have happened in this friendship, and my friend discovered a cockroach in her kitchen. Of course she screams and of course she yells for me and I respond with a "What am I supposed to do about it?" And she goes on and describes how big it is and how terrible it is and how I have to kill it, just kill it pleasepleaseplease. So I walk into the kitchen to find it and I don't see it. I move the trashcan and the recycling and the bag of plastic grocery bags and no monster cockroach. I declare that it's gone back where it came from, but she's not convinced. We have to drive this thing out or kill it trying because it is a freak of nature and also gross. So I go back to the kitchen and then check out the laundry room and HOLY APPLES AND NUTELLA THAT IS A GIANT COCKROACH RUNNING UNDER THE DRYER.

After several minutes of panicking and laughing and not wanting to show very real fear and convincing and kicking the dryer, I persuade my friend that the cockroach has gone back where it came from and that she can sleep safely tonight. We watch a few episodes of Friends and call it a night.

Then tonight, after returning to my apartment, I walk through the living room to my bedroom in the dark, because I'm lazy and because it's kinda awesome how the human memory can prevent me from stubbing my toe on our couch, and then I flip on the lamp in my room and go into my bathroom and look up because in the top corner of my bathroom is the largest cockroach I have ever seen in my life ever.

What follows here is a real conversation held via text messaging.

Me (11:39pm): [sends picture of the Hulk of cockroaches] This is on my bathroom wall. AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

Me (11:46pm): Sarai, I don't think you understand the gravity of the situation. THERE IS A GIANT COCKROACH IN MY  BATHROOM. MY BED IS ON THE FLOOR.

Me: [definitely regrets the decision to not buy a bed and refuses to consider the continuing metaphorical symbolism of this moment because THAT THING COULD SURVIVE A NUCLEAR HOLOCAUST (DON'T THINK I HAVEN'T CONSIDERED IT YOU INVASIVE SPECIES FROM THE BEYOND.)]

Sarai (11:46pm): OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD YOU HAVE TO KILL IT!!!!!!

Sarai (11:47pm): BE BRAVE AND STRONG. I KNOW YOU CAN DO IT.

Me (11:48pm): BUT WHAT SHOULD I DO? AND HOW DID IT FIND ME?

Me (11:50pm): IT'S UNHUMANLY LARGE. THERE'S NO WAY TO KILL IT.

Sarai (11:50 pm): IT SNIFFED YOU OUT BECAUSE IT REMEMBERED YOUR SCENT FROM WHEN IT WAS AT MY PLACE. HOW THE HELL DID IT CRAWL UP THREE STORIES. DO YOU HAVE A GIANT SHOE?

Me: [goes to bathroom. Faces off with cockroach. Thinks momentarily about how the first thing I wanted to know was what action I could take and the second thing I wanted to know was how this happened to me and how that's really kinda how my life goes. Realizes I'm going to need a bigger container if I'm going to capture this sucker. Drops the plastic cup. Goes to get bucket o' markers from closet. That'll do. Dumps markers on bed. Balances on rim of tub and toilet. Squeals like a tiny scared child when the cockroach moves like the ninja it is when prodded by magazine. (I know I'm an adult now because I'm using one of my roommate's old Victoria's Secret catalogues to potentially destroy this threat to my safety.) Traps the cockroach. Runs it outside. Dumps the bucket. Watches it crawl down between the boards in my porch. Closes porch door. Double fist in the air. I AM THE MASTER COMMANDER! Returns to phone.]

Sarai (11:56pm): DID IT EAT YOU BEFORE YOU COULD KILL IT?

I responded just before midnight with confirmation of a successful capture and release ("CAPTURE AND RELEASE? IT'S GONNA COME BACK HERE!") and accidentally tweeted my promise to call in case more cockroach situations arose and generally felt accomplished for the night.

Now, I tell you this because I basically ran back to my computer to write about this little adventure. It's just that I can't decide what I want the cockroach to stand for. Part of me wants to say something like, "Hey, why do we all just diametrically hate cockroaches anyway? I mean, they don't bite.* They don't really affect our lives. All they do is freak us out and if I'm applying this kind of banishing logic to things that freak me out, then I'm not the kind of person I want to be." Because, after all, getting rid of something that freaks me out but isn't going to hurt me isn't the best use of my time. Especially if it was already illegal and I decided to put a poorly-phrased amendment to a popular vote just to prove how much work there is to be done still.

Or, I could make the cockroach a metaphor instead of a talking point. Make it something completely different. I mean, it's something I reacted poorly to, and then did my best to get rid of. Maybe I could make it be sin in my metaphor for life. I like that. I helped my friend address her sin, but let it get away, giving her the opportunity to conquer it on her own once she knew it could be conquered. Yeah, I like that! But no, that won't work because when I was in my own apartment, I stood there and talked to it for a good couple of seconds, thinking that would either scare it or convince it to leave me alone. When that didn't work, I closed my eyes and wished it would go away. Twice. In the end, I actually had to do something to make it go away, and before I could do that, I had to admit to someone that there was a problem in the form of a giant, scary cockroach. I had to admit that my apartment, nice though it is, still has the potential to have cockroaches and I'm sorry, but that's too difficult of a message to hear if the cockroach were going to be a metaphor for sin.

(Plus, cockroaches don't eat you from the inside out until you can't think straight anymore and make you want to go back to the days before you even knew what a cockroach looked like, not in real life anyway. They don't make you sit up nights thinking or lose days dreaming ways out of messes that you didn't even think were possible for you. They don't make you shake your head involuntarily while you chorus I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry can I take it back I didn't mean to I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I never did anything just please I'm sorry. Plus, there's nowhere you can go that's guaranteed to be cockroach free. And, most importantly of all, cockroaches never make you feel warm and happy on the inside, even just for a second, so that you think hey, this side of innocent might not be so bad. It just wouldn't work; cockroaches are not complex. But, like sin, they'd survive a nuclear holocaust. So there's a point in the positive category.)

It's just that I need to go back to thinking, you know? So if I made the cockroach the equivalent of some problem I was having my everyday life, or dealing with it a symbol of my burgeoning adulthood (I also got the oil changed in my car and put money in my savings account!), it would just be this tacit acceptance that cockroaches are a part of life, that everyone has to deal with them sometime. But let's face it- some people never come of age, and some people's coming of age story is much less interesting and cockroach-free than books and movies would like to imply. When you realize that your story falls into that category, it makes you want to go out and get a testimony, go live and do something and not make the safe choice. Then again, it might not matter what you do. Cockroaches find you anyway.

All of this is to say that even though this is a weird, difficult, awkward, and awesome time of life, and even though I don't know what's going on and can't figure out what things mean, if they mean anything, it's still great to have friends who can go through all of this with you. Even if all you really want is someone to come in kill the cockroach for you with his giant shoe. 

*(PS- I have since learned that cockroaches eat the eyelashes of sleeping children. I retract this idea for cockroaches. But I stand by the sentiment that goes along with the original thought, pre-eyelash-eating-revelation.)

Why I Was Upset About Being a Hufflepuff

(Warning: Contains Harry Potter and Christianity. For just Harry Potter, click here.)

When I got sorted in Pottermore and that badger surrounded by a yellow badge popped up, it was literally the worst outcome possible. Gryffindor was clearly what I was going for because all the cool, important kids are in Gryffindor; Ravenclaw would have been fine because I've rocked the intelligence vibe for a long time and would be happy with that as my defining characteristic; and, though I would have been slightly upset, I would have been OK with Slytherin because there's something to redeem there, there's a history and a conflict and something of interest, at the very least.

But Hufflepuff? Hufflepuff? Here, I'm just going to let the internet do the talking for me:

From A Very Potter Musical: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OyAnhDO9v4
"I can't digest lactose- I'm a Hufflepuff": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0Z5_wipT2o
"Sorry, I know how you must be feeling." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXF4JuA6tcg
"An organizational equivalent to the Redshift Army": http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HufflepuffHouse

You can see why this would be a little devastating for me. It's been a long year. There's been a lot of soul-searching, a lot of wondering what I'm even doing with my life, and a lot of re-evaluating what I think of myself, the things on which I pride myself, and the things about myself that I would like to change. It's a difficult process, sorting through the junk and treasures of your collected character attributes, and all I was looking for was a little affirmation, even if it was from a website based on a fictional world in a bunch of children's books. I mean, come on. Throw me a bone. It's not too much to expect.

Remind me of how brave I am, what a good leader I can be, and how I can change things and fight for good. Put me in Gryffindor. Remind me that, hey, I am smart, that I have the ability to use the knowledge I've gained plus the way of thinking I've developed to solve problems around me, and that it's fine to like to know things. Put me in Ravenclaw. Remind me that I want to be important, that I can be manipulative, and that I quite enjoy having a fatal flaw. Put me in Slytherin.

Pause for a second, before you start hardcore nerd judging. I need everyone reading this to remember that, even though we're talking about a fictional world here, I'm an absolute sucker for metaphors and symbols. I look for meaning in places that might not actually contain it and I analyze situations that don't actually require analysis. So as I've been complaining about being a Hufflepuff for the past two days, there's more here than just being a petulant child about all of this. I mean, first off, it's funny and it gives me a topic of conversation and attention- everyone likes a good Hufflepuff bashing session. (Plus, our mascot is a badger. This is just begging for a honey badger treatment.) Secondly, and more importantly, it's given me a chance to think about myself. (Warning- Jesus and rambling ahead. Feel free to stop reading now and watch the Which House Are You video again, or start A Very Potter Musical. See what a good Hufflepuff I am? Always thinking about the sensitivities of my friends.)

There are important reasons about why I was upset about being a Hufflepuff, and it says a lot about who I am. I want to be seen as brave and smart and Hufflepuffs aren't known for that. I want to be important and Hufflepuffs often allow themselves to be pushed to the side. I want people to take me seriously and... I mean, do I even need to finish that sentence? At first blush, being a Hufflepuff is just not an ideal thing for anyone whose opinion of themselves can be crippled by other's opinions of them. The defining trait of the Hufflepuff House is loyalty, and they're known for being fair, kind, and faithful friends. They're also humble, which is why no one knows that the founder of Hogsmede was a Hufflepuff, that, after Gryffindors, Hufflepuff House had the most people stay to fight for the castle, or that several of the historically most liked Ministers of Magic were Hufflepuffs.(Thank you, Harry Potter Wiki.) It's easy to boil down those solid character traits into a trite word like "nice" and never thinking beyond that to realize that those are all qualities you should want to have. I want to be fair and kind and faithful. I want to be loyal. I want to be caring and humble. I do, I swear I do.

Just not that much.

And that's what bothers me and pushes me over the edge and into existential crisis mode. Because when you talk about Hufflepuffs like that, they sound awfully Christian. Basically, that's all the best qualities of a Christian rolled into one House. That's why I can't fit in here. I'm not like that. I'm absurdly, terribly, cripplingly prideful. It's my cardinal sin of choice. Being sorted as a Hufflepuff offended my pride. I want a House of which I can be unreservedly proud and I want people to be able to recognize me as a member of that House and, in general, approve.

But then I spent all this time feeling bad about how bad I felt about being a Hufflepuff. I mean, they're not bad people. (Tonks was a Hufflepuff, and if I get to be like Tonks, this will turn out to be a positive thing after all.) In fact, from the way they make it sound, they're very good people. It's just that I don't want to be that good. I don't want to be known for being that good. I want my goodness hidden away in a little box so I can deal it out whenever I want to, in secret, for fear that there would be a mad rush on it if everyone knew about it. And I don't want to sustain mockery based on the fact that I am good and kind and make an effort to be that way. (Well, I don't actually want to make an effort for any of this- hence wanting to be a Gryffindor or a Ravenclaw. Being sorted into one of those houses basically tells you want to be and people expect you to be it and, frankly, people see what they expect to see, even if it's not really there.) I'm perfectly happy to be cynical and bitingly witty like the rest of you. I'd rather you expected something else from me, so I could distribute my fairness, kindness, caring, and loyalty at my discretion. I'd rather be seen as interesting and important. I want to matter to more than just my friends and I want people to know how much I matter.

This is not something that I should be wanting. I should not be prideful. I should not want to have something tangibly wrong with me. I should not want to be a broken vessel that constantly needs fixing. I should delight in the fact that I've been told that the things most valuable about me line up with who I've told people I want to be instead of delighting in my hubris. I should be content if not joyful that I'm the House that lines up so well with the fruits of the Spirit. It should not matter to me what other people say. I should view this as a victory.

But I didn't think of this as a victory when I first saw it, and most of the time, I still don't. This is the core reason. This is why I'm upset. Because I should be happy about this on principle and I just can't get that happiness past my pride. But I'm working on that. Because Hufflepuffs are brave, smart, and ambitious too. We aren't limited by stereotypes just like real human beings in the real world aren't limited by what people think or say about them. It's just that we get to hope that things will be better and rest in the knowledge that our hope is not in vain. We get to believe that people are really good at heart. And that's our defining moment, that hope and that belief. I can do that.

That's why I'm not upset about being a Hufflepuff (or a Christian) anymore.

12 Reasons Why Hufflepuffs Don't Suck

I'm not here to defend Hufflepuff House, because we'll take your crap. It's OK. You go on being brave, smart, and snakelike and we'll sit back, comfy and safe in our common room nearest the kitchens (Reason 1 why Hufflepuffs don't suck).

2. When the Goblet of Fire had to pick one student from all the Houses of Hogwarts, it picked a Hufflepuff.
3. Tonks was a Hufflepuff. (Sidenote: Tonks was awesome. Did Harry Potter give birth and then go fight the Dark Lord? Didn't think so.) If you don't like Tonks, you belong in Slytherin.
4. The founder of Hogsmede, Hengist of Woodcroft, was a Hufflepuff. Without us, there'd be nowhere to go outside the castle and no way for third years and up to feel superior to second years.
5. Hufflepuff House has produced the least number of dark wizards.
6. The Hufflepuff common room is the only common room that's never been broken into by outsiders.
7. We play fair.
8. If there was ever a need for a designated flyer after a wizard party, you know that kid was a Hufflepuff. We're just keeping you all safe here.
9. You'd think that, since we're all such nice people, we'd be the House That Was Friend Zoned. However, it's a well known fact that Cedric got Cho Chang first.
10. Hufflepuff's record against Gryffindor in Quidditch: 4-1.
11. Professor Sprout, Head of Hufflepuff House, was the one who brewed the Mandrake Restorative to save everyone who was petrified by the basilisk. That's right- Harry and Ron would have failed out of Hogwarts in their third year because Hermione wouldn't have been around to save them.
12. We're particularly good finders.

So laugh on, internet. We'll just continue being awesome.

Good You Can Do

I don't want to comment on Invisible Children's Kony 2012 video. If you haven't seen it, google it and spend some time reading about Invisible Children's projects. They are amazing at raising awareness for people in Central Africa.

Before you share petitions around, though, make sure you know what you're supporting. There's been a lot of negative or questioning response to IC's video, including this Tumblr blog (the page linked has a collection of thoughtful responses, and the previous post has IC's official response to the internet's objections). Personally, I think peace and safety in the region is going to require more than bringing one man to justice- here's just one editorial that speaks to that.

This discussion that's been taking up the internet (on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, YouTube, etc) could just be one more thing that makes you want to throw your hands up in the air and write a petition to ban comments sections on websites, but I think it's really a good thing. The best part about all of this dialogue about how we should work to bring peace and justice to people all around the world is that it exists. A cry for action was posted and people heard that cry. Then other people, wanting to present a fuller, more complex view of the world, responded, affirming some things and correcting others. Then we, as privileged people of the world today, are left to make judgments and decisions for ourselves.

So read articles. Make judgments. Make decisions. Help out the people and the organizations that best work to alleviate the problems that tear most at your heart. There's a lot of bad in the world, but the great thing is that there are so many ways to counter it with good. If supporting Invisible Children's entire mission isn't what you want to do, find other places:

-Aid for Africa is a partnership of 80 charities, giving you the opportunity to look for organizations with missions you fully want to support: http://www.aidforafrica.org/about-us/
-Charity Navigator evaluates charities and non-profit organizations so you can give to the ones that most efficiently use your money. You can search by location, by ranking, or browse through their top-10 lists. http://www.charitynavigator.org/
-Water.org works on providing clean drinking water. This is just one quality way of making the world a better place. http://water.org/
-Kiva.org is a microfinance organization that enables you to give loans to entrepreneurs in the developing world. It's another one of those highly-ranked organizations, and it's building lasting solutions to poverty. http://www.kiva.org/

Donating to these organizations is something you can literally do while sitting on your couch. It's an immediate good you can do in the world, something detailed and concrete. It's a step you can take when you're bothered by the things that are wrong in the world. If an organization speaks to you, don't hesitate to get involved, with your money or with your time. If you feel like you should focus on something closer to home, look into supporting the organizations in your community that do good. Talk to people. Find places to volunteer. Don't let this flame die down into a memory of a momentary interest. Run the marathon, not the sprint.

Sometimes I feel like the world is a china shop and all of us are toddlers left alone inside, knocking things over and getting hurt, yet somehow still expected to fix it all. The good news is that people are already working to fix things, and that we can help.

Let's do this, guys.

Thinking

You ever notice how much we impose our own thoughts on others? You talk to someone you've known for years and you just assume that you still share a lot of common thoughts that changed with you as you grew to understand the world in a different way. We think everyone sees what we see- have you ever tried to explain algebra to a sixth grader who's never seen it before? Solving for a variable is more difficult than you remember. It's the same thing with learning to read music or cooking for the first time or anything like that. We forget, or at least I do, that other people have brains of their own, containing different thoughts and opinions than I have in mine.

I do the same thing with my emotions and fears. If I'm upset, everyone else must be too. If I've had a great piece of news, it should make everyone else's day too. If I'm afraid that someone's mad at me or disappointed in me, they must be furious and ashamed of me. If I notice someone looking at me, they must have feelings for me. I'm really good at backing up all of this with facts I notice, twisted to make irrefutable, fit for what I think is true.

There's no good way around all these biases. The best I can do is recognize that they exist, when I'm thinking about things and hope to discredit them in my stronger moments. The fact is, I can't get out of my brain to understand what's inside yours or his or hers or theirs, any one of the thousands and millions and billions of thems out there. I can try, but it'd take effort. I'm not good at effort. I'd rather run the same rut over and over again, and complain about why I can't get out.

And if I can't get out of my head to understand you, who is human and rather fundamentally similar to me, how can I pretend that I can understand what's going on in God's head? Answering questions of Why Creation is the way it is, Why we're given what we have, all of those require understanding what goes on in God's potentially metaphorical head.

I mean, it's not like God hasn't tried. Beyond giving us all of these amazing things to look at and study, God's also endeavored to have people try to explain God's thoughts to us. God even gave us Jesus. We've had a couple millenniums to grapple with all of this. It's difficult.

But I do think all of this requires grappling. We have to try to understand these things, and I know I haven't tried enough. I think I've looked at the Bible like I look at dirt- on a surface level, I understand what it is and how it functions in everyday life, but it's kinda always been there, and I don't really understand what it means to dig in it, how to use it to make things grow. I need to, though.

I've been thinking a lot about the way I see God. From the sermon two Sundays ago, when I was introduced to the quote, "God created Man in his own image and Man, being a gentleman, returned the favor," to a conversation with a quasi-friend, when he defined the attributes of God and I realized that I was afraid to answer, because I'd be wrong. How can I try to understand how other people think if I don't even know what I think?

I need to define what I think. I need to think about what other people think. I need to understand the ways I've been creating God in my own image, and the times when I've seen God for who God is, because I'm sure those times must exist. (And while I'm doing all that thinking, I still have to work and interact and coexist and try to bring good into the world, because if I'm not acting, my brain won't let me just think. It's a fault.) But I need to try. And in trying, I need to do. I don't need to be dragged down anymore.

Intentional

I was walking down one of the hallways after church with a friend and we were talking about what to give up for Lent, whether I should try out giving up meat this year, what my friend should do, et cetera. Sometimes in life, some spirit of good takes over my thoughts and my mouth and my emotions and at the exact moment when I want to curl up on the floor and cry, a good word pours out of my mouth. This happened as we were walking apart (I assume I was late for a meeting or a show and that's why I didn't stop to finish the conversation). I said something like, "Maybe you can give up thinking bad thoughts. You know, be more intentional with the way you think."

Be more intentional. Don't let yourself think those damaging thoughts. Be more intentional.

Yesterday, as I was trying to make something happen between my brain, my fingers and the keyboard, the word maintaining kept coming up. I've just been maintaining; you know, maybe maintaining isn't so bad; sometimes maintaining takes just as much effort as excelling; I feel like I'm maintaining this life, stuck in this cage, unable to make anything happen. I do think that's what I've been doing recently, maybe for most of this year: maintain, just get through this stretch, keep it up, just stay at this altitude, we can do this. There's no climbing or sinking. Just maintaining.

In a way, I think being intentional is the opposite of maintaining. Being intentional means having a purpose, and working to accomplish that purpose. Maintaining is just staying the course. It's that boring part that movies and books skip over because no one wants to read about the three years you spent just making ends meeting, just keeping things together. When you're intentional, you're making changes that are propelling you in a new direction. You're thinking your way through things. You're making things happen. You're acting. You say no (oo-oo) to status quo.

So I'm being more intentional for Lent. I'm putting my brain back into my faith. I'm watching the things that I think and say and do, and I'm questioning the thoughts I've let run ruts into my mind. I'm also giving up things (which I won't list, because then you'll think less of me) but they're mostly places where I've let myself hide, things I don't actually need. See, the great thing about the Christian year (in tandem with my regular year) is that it gives you so many chances to start over: Pentecost is the birthday of the Church, the chance to start a new year there, and it's often followed by the summer, a chance to start something completely different than the school year; fall comes around and it's a school year again; then Advent and the chance to think about the coming of Christ in new ways; then Christmas and the New Year; then Lent, this chance to re-focus yourself, to understand anew what Christ's life means; and finally, to top it all off, Easter. If Easter's not a new beginning, I don't know what is. So this chance to try again is the perfect time to be more intentional, to stop maintaining and to begin to take some actions.

Just as long as I can get grace to do that, since maintaining was taking all that I had.

Lenten Tweets

I am having absurd amounts of difficulty writing anything that isn't in some way pathetic, whining, and sad. So, instead of writing, I will offer you some potential Lenten tweets, because 140 characters is a good limit for people who like to use too many words.

I only knew it was Mardi Gras because Ash Wednesday was the next day. #churchkidproblems

I was wearing purple and I felt very in tune, liturgically. #HappyLent

This year for Lent, I'm flat out giving up all the bad things I do. It's a short list. #humblebrag

Staring at my plan for Lenten devotions, looking at the readings from the BCP. Too much. #smh

Now, the year I gave up yelling at basketball games. That was a mistake. #goheelsgoamerica

Those ashes definitely came off more easily than my mascara did. #notsurewhatthatmeans

Can't we just skip Lent this year? I mean, February certainly thinks it's Easter already.

I already gave up Facebook for Lent! Can you do repeats on that? #Lentenseconds

But really, 40 days? Who does that? #seriously

So this whole forgiveness-of-sins thing. You can get that done weekly, right? #thingspileup

RT If you gave up Twitter for Lent. #ohwait #jkguys

I think up the best tweets during church (esp. the sermon) but I forget them by the time I get to my phone. #cruelirony #firstworldproblems

You know, if Jesus were to die today, Twitter would probably crash with all of the expressions of sadness and tweeting great quotes of His.

#FF means Fasting Fridays. #yougottawalkbeforeyoucanrun

Really? Chocolate, caffeine, and Facebook are the things keeping you away from God the most? #doubtful #harshtweet

So does this mean we can't smile until March? #Lentquestions

RT @EveryTweetEver Poignant Tweet to end a rant

A Letter to the Little Old Ladies Beside Me at the Duke Game

February 8th, 2012

Dear Little Old Ladies Beside Me at the Duke Game,

First, let me apologize for my behavior. No doubt you have heard your share of profanity in life, as it is inescapable in this broken world in which we live, but I feel that it is necessary to apologize for the creative and vociferous brand of basketball-induced curse words you were subjected to tonight. I also acknowledge that I could have stood up less violently and less often, clapped more quietly, and created noise for defensive possessions in a much more court-centered manner. I hope that my behavior did not detract from your game-attending experience, such as it was.

However, I do feel a need to explain this behavior to you. I don't need to remind you that this is the second time I'm apologizing to you for my actions during the game- I'm sure you recall the moment during halftime when I turned to you with a kind smile and a hoarse voice, informing you that I was used to being in the lower level, surrounded by students doing almost all of the same things I was doing- being loud, being supportive, and being totally engaged by the game. It was indeed my first time up in the section I was in tonight, and I was unaware of how things worked up here- how you don't stand unless it's an important possession, how you don't cheer along with the band or the student section, and how you don't stay to sing the Alma Mater. I clasped my hands in front of me and sang Hark the Sound by myself after you left, unable to believe how the game ended, unable to apologize for the ridiculously loud scream that escaped me as that final shot from that remarkably talented freshman, who had the intelligence and self-confidence to give himself a nickname, went smoothly into the basket. I was shaking after you left. I was shaking from the emotion and passion and disappointment and virulent hatred that the game had caused to mix and flow throughout my core. I hope you made it safely to your car, and were able to listen to the post-game report as you sat in the admittedly horrible traffic after the game was over.

I had some time to reflect on the game afterwards as I walked back to my apartment. It was a rather long walk in the cold and I had it all to myself, thinking about why this game meant enough to me to be inconsiderate to you. It's not just that I didn't understand how things worked in your section of the Dean Dome. It's not just that I proudly attended this university and cheered for this basketball team for what constituted the happiest years of my life so far. It's not just that I hate Duke with the same passion that all true Carolina fans hate Duke, for their flops and their disgusting control over the referees and their smug, asinine faces. I'm sure that you feel the same way. Even if you didn't attend Carolina, you have some link to the school. You're season ticket holders, so you clearly care about the outcome of this game and feel some kind of dislike towards the players who wear that darker blue. Yet you were able to contain yourselves and enjoy the game, able to leave that wonderful room in a sustained and unshaken manner.

I think this game in particular meant more to me as an individual because I worked for it. All through my years at Carolina, I played in the band. I didn't get tickets to the Duke game my freshman year, which was understandable and bearable. I honestly didn't know what I was missing out on, though I still had memories of Tyler Hansbrough's broken nose from the year before ringing through my head as I watched it on my tiny dorm TV, the Smith Center clearly visible out my window. The next year, I got to go to the game, playing with the band and cheering with all the rest. It was a wonderful win in a championship year. The year after that, as a junior with senior status and a guaranteed ticket to the game next year through the band, I gave up my phase 1 ticket to a friend who was a senior who had never been to a Duke game. This was fine, because, really, I wasn't yet a senior and I think everyone deserves a chance to watch these two great teams play one another. I watched it again from my dorm TV. Really, it was OK to have missed out on that one, since it was the NIT year, though that was a bad year to give up yelling at basketball for Lent.

Then, last year, I went to the game with the band again, already completely proud of my team for the way they pulled together over the course of the season. In my last home game as a student, I got to watch our team beat Duke in the Smith Center on my senior night. I played in a televised pep rally before the game and I stood and cheered through every second of both halves. It was such a great time- really, I am not the person whose words should be used to describe the intense atmosphere of this rivalry game and the absolute elation of winning. I was signed up to go to the ACC tournament with the band, and so I did, being allowed to take a couple of days away from student teaching for this opportunity. I honestly thought, with a sinking heart, that the loss to Duke in the final of the ACC tournament, having to stand there and listen to their band play all of their songs when we should have been playing ours, I honestly thought that was going to be my last in-person experience of our team playing Duke.

I think it's important to note that all of these experiences were given to me. Through the generosity of alumni of the university and through the money of the good people of the state of North Carolina, I was able to attend Carolina and graduate debt free. Even though I dedicated four years of my life to the band to be able to travel with the team for a tournament, I gained so much from my time with UNC Bands that it's unfair to say I earned it. I really view my entire time at Carolina, like almost everything else in my life, as a gift and a blessing, a gift and a blessing of which I have taken full advantage.

But this year, I didn't expect to be at the game. Through a few well-placed happenstances, I found myself in the standby line outside the Smith Center right after five in the afternoon. I stood there, with around fifty other people, for four hours, watching the rest of the students file by in their phases, commiserating about the cold and the mud with the other people in the standby line. It was surprisingly amusing, getting to laugh with these grad students around me, talking over the situations that led us to be there, tweeting and jumping and chanting. I was surprisingly excited when they held out those tickets as we lined up outside the entrance where we had seen so many people walk in before. I grabbed the ticket that was held out to me and turned back to see half of my new friends stuck outside, my ticket being the last one they had. I can't say that I deserved that ticket any more than the people who got there minutes after me did. But they smiled hopefully (or at least the ones I had been standing beside did) and I went inside to find my seat, beside you two, right after the National Anthem.

I stood there for four hours. I had something invested in this. And as I walked back, I realize that that's what's different about my life now. A year and a half ago, I was ready to hand it all over to God and just see where He dropped me, totally accepting of whatever it is that was in His plan for my life. But over this year, things have changed. It hasn't been a gift anymore. I've made decisions, some right and some wrong, and I've traveled and made money and spent money and worked towards goals that I set for myself in a plan that I made all on my own. I have a soul now, you know? I have something I've earned, something I'm proud of, something that took effort from me, so much more effort than I've put in in the past. This year has been the standby line of my life, where I've watched other people's lives blossom while I strove for the same thing, just without that gift. But I'm grateful and happy for that standby line of a year, because now, for the first time in my life, I have something to give up. Now, it actually means something when I give my life away. It actually takes some effort, because I have things that I don't want to lose.

So when that ball went through that hoop at the end of the game, it wasn't just losing a game. It was losing a game and losing that effort that went into getting to the game. Because you want your life to be worth it. You want the things you work for to work out for the best. You want joy and happiness just like everybody else. I honestly don't care if the fates let someone else just have good things while I work for them, but I do care when we're all deprived of good things (even when that good thing would have come at the expense of that rat-faced, foul-mouthed coach and his legions of classless, obnoxious players and fans). It's a blow and an injustice, though admittedly on one of the smallest levels possible. But sports help us see the metaphors in life- they teach us to never, ever, give up; they teach us that if you work hard, and if you're lucky, you can go far; and they let us see how passionately we can come together to support a cause.

I hope this letter finds you well, and enables you to better understand my emotional state as I stood beside you at that game, jumping up and down, cheering, screaming, yelling, laughing, smiling, and finally, shaking, watching my team lose a game that should have been theirs. May life grant you a game next year with a better seat partner and a better outcome.

Best wishes,
Addie Jo Schonewolf

Conceptual Difficulties

I really want ideas that you can hold in your hand, that you can examine at your leisure and test and react to, I want things you can do and things you can see, events you can watch unfurl and initial conditions you can change and set how you want, and I want an unlimited amount of time to figure stuff out. But really, beyond experiments and things like that, I want to be able to take the concept of gravity or orbital dynamics and put my fingers around it, toss it up in the air and pull it apart and have it impart the facets of its existence into my brain without an equation or a lengthy explanation. I want something different from the way I have to learn things now.

It'd make explaining things easier as well. Instead of comparing a complex and abstract idea to something more simple and concrete, you could just hand students an idea and say, "Here. Take this, play around with it for an hour or so, come back tomorrow to check and see that you didn't miss anything, and then you can go on to the next thing." Actually, can we get on that, science? Just find some way to impart facts without pencils and papers and diagrams and graphs and extrapolations.

I just spent a couple of hours today doing something that I haven't done in a while: trying to understand something. Part of it was trying to dredge of memories of things that I'd thought I'd learned before, but most of it was staring and graphs pretending like I had never heard the words Galaxy Rotation Curve used together before, and doing algebra and avoiding unit conversions and thinking thoughts like, "Galaxies behave like fluids, right?" and "That's an elliptical orbit, so you can't use Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation, yeah?" There was also a lot of, "I hope I'm not wrong. Please don't let me be wrong. I'm going to look so dumb if I'm wrong. Oh, shhh...oot, I'm wrong."

Now, I can tell you the approximate number of miles in a light year and I can explain moon phases and seasons like no one's business. I also have a propensity to spout random facts which are, in general, scientifically or historically accurate. But people expect you to know everything about science when you work in a planetarium and science center and that's just not the case with me. And even with things I'm supposed to understand, like the general expected shape of rotation curves for galaxies, the observed shape of rotation curves for galaxies and why that implies the existence of Dark Matter, I don't really. I just have a phrase or two that will clear up a commonly answered question, and hope that there's not much more than that that's required of me.

Part of the problem with being an astronomy educator is that astronomy concepts are so abstract. You can't pick up a planet, you can't hold a star in your hand, and it's rather difficult to get a sample of an asteroid or a comet to study it. I mean, moon rocks might just be rocks, but they've got a substantial cost of shipping- that's why you have to go through a training on how to handle and treat these little pieces of outer space. Most of us haven't been off of Earth to see that the Sun actually floats out there in the void among the stars. No one's been out beyond our solar system, over to even the nearest star, to see the vast expanses of space that separate us from the things that twinkle when we turn away from the Sun.

I mean, think about it for a second. Imagine walking out of the room you're in and going to the next room. Now walk out of your house. Now out of your neighborhood. Do you still have a good concept of the distance you're traveling? Great, now go to the grocery store. Head over to the nearest mall. Now, can you imagine walking to the next town over? How about to the nearest city? Not driving- don't hop in your car and let the world pass you by. Actually walk the distances, let your mind get lost in the trees, realize how far away your eyes see on a clear day and realize how close that is. Now, the distance to the nearest big city for me is around eight miles. I don't have in my head a good concept of what eight miles is. The Moon, the nearest natural thing to us in space, is almost a quarter of a million miles away from us. I can't properly conceive of what a hundredth or a thousandth of that amount of space is. If I can't get a handle on it, how can I explain it to someone else?

So we use words and we use analogies- if the Earth was a size of a basketball, then a tennis ball would be the Moon, except the tennis ball, to be to scale, would need to be around 24 feet away. On that scale, the Sun would be the size of a house and it would be almost two miles away. If you shrunk the entire Earth down to the size of a basketball.

What. Even.

So yeah, I want something easier to understand, something I can actually wrap my head around and explain without props. Then again, nothing else has the same awe and wonder thing with it as contemplating the universe does, so I guess we take what we can get.

Whale

So in church today, the scripture was from the book of Jonah. It was actually the most cheerful part of the book, I think, where Jonah preaches a pretty simple sentence to the Assyrians about how they need to repent because they're all going to die because of the terrible things they've done. (Please note in the link the Prisoners of War and More Prisoners of War pictures- they edited out the various decapitations and general dismemberment. It's for kids, after all.) So Jonah preaches his word and the entire city of Nineveh and the king all repent and wear sackcloth and ashes and God sees their repentance and they're saved. One possible Moral of the Story: Even the terrible people can be saved.

But I got distracted by Jonah. I mean, this is not hard to do- most children's Sunday School lessons get distracted by Jonah too. So the whole time, I listening to the pastor talking about the discussion between the Israelites about how exactly to live out being God's chosen people and what we can take from that today, but I'm what I'm thinking is, Where's my whale?

You ever think about that? I mean, Jonah up and leaves, just ignores the word of the Lord and heads away on a boat. There's a storm, he figures it's his fault and, to save the ship and everyone on board, he asks to be thrown into the sea and there's this big fish there who swallows him and gives him three days to think about what he's going to do. And after being spit up by the fish/whale, he gets up and he goes to Nineveh and saves the whole city. Now, at the end of the book, Jonah's totally missed the point, because he's sitting on a hilltop waiting for God to destroy the Assyrians, but that's a whole other part to the story. Let's go back to the whale.

Because the whale is the turning point for Jonah, I guess. He has three days and nights of solitude, three days and nights away from his duty or running from his duty. In the whale, he can't do a thing except sit there and think and pray. No one can demand his time, no one can make him push his thoughts away until tomorrow or the next day or the next. He knows why he's there, he knows what he has to do, and he knows how to do it. It's all a matter of a change of heart. And even though he still doesn't get what God is trying to show him (that even bad people can have God's grace), he still turns back to God and does what he's supposed to after his time in the whale.

So where's my whale? Where's my time to get it straight? Where are my three days without the world peeking in to figure out where I have to go next, what I have to do? I'm sure being in the belly of a whale sucked, but at least it was safe. And I'm not saying that I'm running or that I particularly need a Come to Jesus moment or that I have so specific of a call that I know exactly where to go and how important I am. But I just, I feel like I'm wandering and after indeterminate time spent in the desert, a specific transformative process seems very appealing.

But in my own journey I've been able to find a reason for most things and I'm sure all of this year will prove no different. I mean, I do get a lot of time to think, now that I have evenings off. I get to delve into the depths of my mind and character and find out that those depths are not particularly places I want to be. I mean, I get to know me better than anyone else and it almost gets difficult to hear the word of grace to the Assyrians, not because I don't think they deserve it, but because I start to think that I know that I don't deserve it. (I guess the actual point is that no one does, and that's what makes life not fair.)

Listening over the course of the service, I wasn't sure how the last hymn fit in. I mean, I love The Summons beyond all reasonable measure so I was happy with the choice, but it didn't fit snugly like a puzzle piece into the sermon or scripture, you know? And as we went through the verses, I still didn't see it, but I did find something struck me as being difficult and wonderful at the same time. So even if it doesn't fit in at all with whatever it is I was trying to say, it's worth copying and pasting and thinking about. Even if you don't have a whale.

Will you love the ‘you’ you hide
If I but call your name?
Will you quell the fear inside
And never be the same?
Will you use the faith you’ve found
To reshape the world around,
Through my sight and touch and sound
In you and you in me?

Bed

So I've been spending a lot of time in my bed recently. Not that I've been sick or anything, it's just that I've had a lighter week at work and I've been taking full advantage of the ability to be lazy, so I'll sleep in and lounge around, etc. For those of you who don't know, my bed really just consists of a mattress and then a memory foam thing and a pillow top. It's exorbitantly comfy. It's also just sitting on my floor. I find very little wrong with that. I mean, I don't need a bed frame just yet and I have slept several a comfortable night on my floor-bed. So I'm good, really.

But last night I didn't fall asleep right away and I started thinking about my bed. I mean, I really can't complain in the first place- it's a really comfortable bed. I have, like, four pillows and it's a queen sized mattress, so it's really a great bed. But it's kinda a mess. I mean, I never make it up, and I sit on it most of the time I’m doing work, so there's papers and books and computers scattered around it. And I don't love the comforter or the sheets on it. I mean, they're OK, but they're just something I had from home, you know? They're not anything I'm in love with. I do have this quilt that I took from home, though, that I am in love with. It just doesn't go with the other sheets on the bed.

And I got to thinking about my bed and I just kinda cracked. Because I can change the things I don't like about it- I have the funds and the transportation. I can have a nice bed. So I went to Target today and I bought new sheets and a new comforter and new pillow cases to go with the quilt I like. I came home and dropped them off and, after working for a couple of hours and helping out with the youth group for a couple more, I came back and made up my bed with my new sheets and cleaned my room. Look. Problem solved.

Except I didn't buy a bed frame for my mattress to sit on. That I need a little help on. I mean, I don't have a box spring, so I'd have to either buy one of those or get a platform bed and I think I'd have to drive to Ikea or somewhere for that and even if I got a used bed, I wouldn't really know if it was good or not, so I'd need some advice on that from someone who knows about beds or someone who's bought a bed before. And that's the fundamental thing wrong with my bed, you know, is that it's currently just a mattress on the ground. It's in the wrong place. And, I mean, it's fine and I can sleep there for now, but eventually, I want a bed. A real bed. A real, respectable bed. And I like that when I do get one, it'll be one that I've paid for, one that I've worked for.

And you know, there's always that hopeful, winking thought that says, One day, you'll have a new bed that you're sharing with someone. But I don't need that yet. I mean, it'd be nice, of course, but for right now, I still think I have plenty of time before that happens. I haven't even bought my own bed yet, not really. I know I've been sleeping alone for twenty-three years, but I'm sure I'd be fine for a couple more. I do kinda love my personal space, so I'd really have to find a worthwhile reason to give that up.

So, to summarize, I'm now happy with the state of my bed and I'm going to try to make it up more often. After all, if you want to keep your nice things nice, you have to maintain them. And I do have plans for future improvements, it's just that I have to wait until I know what I need and where I have to go to get it, and then I'll be able to save up for it. Then I'll move it to the right place, where it's supposed to be, and we'll let the future roll from there.

So yeah. That's where my life is now.

(You do realize I wasn't really talking about my bed the whole time, right?)