At the beginning of October I heard about this video contest. This business guy named James Altucher wants to see if normal people can make commercials that are as good as ones made by professionals who make a ton of money. So he picked a random brand--Crest--and said, Go make a commercial, and the best one wins $2000. That's a big enough incentive for me to try it. Being an English major, inspiration hit me that night and I jotted down the elements to a script. I'm no good with a camera, but my friend Ben Rush is, and joined forces. I had the vision, he had the skills. I think the skills are more evident than the vision, but Altucher is a nationally ranked chess master and hopefully won't be confused by our abstract message.
I now present, after weeks of hard work, "My Share of the Prize."
I'm really happy with the way it turned out, but Ben and I have been involved in it for so long that we can't tell if it's any good at this point, so if you don't hate it, let us know by commenting on YouTube. The winner will be announced November 3rd, so if I seem on pins and needles until then, I'm just waiting to see if my fate is in writing commercials.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Why I Voted for Obama
Deciding breeds rationalization. I initially favored Hillary over Obama, but was impressed that he won. When I read his book, I decided that he understood America better than McCain did. He wrote his own book, see. On the other hand, from what I understand, McCain was written by his book (which made me want to read it, but not vote for him). As an English major, I value the ability to encapsulate America in words. From Indonesia to America to the black movement to Columbia University to Chicago's poor to Harvard Law. Spending several years as a community organizer convincing people that their landlord really will give them a new heater if they all work together gives a man a kind of experience that isn't reflected in military warfare and years in Washington.
I have other reasons now, too. I've rationalized quite well my decision. I shudder at Palin's make-believe, playing-house approach to life in which sincerity equals rationality. I can imagine her talking to her dolls in much the same way she conducts interviews: "Oh, my $150,000 suit? Thank you, I like it, too. It's not really excessive, you know, since I'll be campaigning all over the country. A girl's gotta have clothes to wear, don't you agree Mr. Teddy? It's not like I could walk out there in my normal-person clothes! That would be ridiculous."
I've even developed a distaste for McCain, who as my friend Mike says, seems like a "cantankerous, stubborn old guy." I predict that if McCain wins, we'll all start using the word "doddering."
But I'm voting for Obama still, and not just against McCain. I lean Republican economically, because I think I can manage my money better than anyone else, but there are things that I can't do individually (ensure health care for everyone; wean car makers off a dependency for oil; restore a responsibly distributed military; etc.) and when I see someone who looks capable (Obama) asking to be in charge, I'll let him.
It's strange how much support he has in other countries, too. I don't trust the Chinese view of anything outside one person's experience, but this whole spring and summer it was only O-ba-ma and Xi-la-li. I tried to explain that there was another party, but they didn't get it. (It might also have been because I couldn't say "government", "party", or "McCain" in Chinese.) Obama went to Germany and wowed a crowd of 10,000.
Most striking to me is this one Obama supporter I met at here at UF at the beginning of the semester. He was pitching Obama to me, and I asked him about his accent. "Oh yah," he said. "I'm from Ialand." Ireland? Then he can't actually vote, right? "Yah," he assented. "Boot this is the most important election of our lives." It turns out he is a poli-sci major who came to America to work for the Obama campaign for a semester unpaid. He's not American, see, so he's not allowed to be paid.
The world loves Obama, and while I'm voting and "the world" isn't (couldn't declare an address, I'd imagine), it's still striking to imagine that we could be really proud of our next president. I'm not a Bush hater, but I'm sad that our figurehead acts like a bobblehead.
You notice, of course, that the one piece of Obama's mind conspicuously absent from his book (the first one, right out of law school) is his ambition. He's America's Ender (pun unavoidable).
I voted for Obama for President because I won't be able to vote for him when he becomes emperor. I'm pretty happy with that line, myself.
I already arranged to have my vote cancel Elizabeth LaBoone's. So if I can keep her from voting, Obama should have it in the bag. November 4th, baby...
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Debating and not
Last night I went to a debate Accent put on over the origins of the universe. About 1000 people came, I think. Most of the time debates like this are like football games: no one is going to think less of themselves if their school loses, but you sure will think more of yourself if your school wins. At the beginning, the Christian debater, Dr. Jacoby, asked the audience how many were open to the idea that God could have created the universe. About half raised their hands. I thought he made a good move by establishing that about half the audience were lying to themselves, because then he knew where to go with his presentation. You don't go to a debate to decide, you go because you want to hear your thoughts amplified smartly.
Dr. Jacoby did a good job amplifying my thoughts. Why do people think that evolution and the Bible are at odds with each other? Well, Dr. Jacoby was trained as a historian, so he gave us a very interesting historical answer: apparently the dominant thought was a long-earth theory, and after Darwin published his answer many Christians were in agreement with it, until one of Darwin's proponents aggressively came after people as if it were a choice. Ever since, people have had to choose between God and evolution. After that five minute historical overview, he spent the rest of his time talking about how evolution was unlikely without a God.
The other guy, Dr. Shermer, did a really good job amplifying Alex's thoughts: you can't prove God doesn't exist, but you can keep pushing him back. Why do planets orbit in a plane? God. Until you figure out the math behind it, and then God has to be crammed into the next smallest unsolvable problem. You can claim Christianity and evolution can coexist, but if the mechanism for the origins of life can be explained by repeated observation (that is, science), what does "God" even mean?
Dr. Jacoby framed the debate well by saying (in different words), "How the world came to be is important, but not really." Religion doesn't exist to compete with science; it competes for our souls.
Then they had a question-answer time. I lined up and listened to ridiculously stubborn questioners press their enemy for answers: "But if life can't come from nothing, then where did that first cell come from? Huh? Huh? Where did life come from, then?" And so on.
I had a reasonable question. One other person had a good question, too. There weren't any good questions to ask the athiest; we've had our whole lives acclimating to that mentality. The one guy's question had to do with the theological implications of evolution: doesn't evolution mean that things died, and that in the time of Eden (whatever that means) the world wasn't perfect?
Dr. Jacoby said that sin results in spiritual death, and that physical death isn't that big of a deal. In a way, I can see what he means: just eating breaks down plant life. However, God killing the lamb to cover Adam and Eve's sin wasn't new just because it was killing. It was new because the lamb died. To me, the problem is still unresolved.
My question was similar in spirit. I wrote it down so I wouldn't fumble at the mic, so I can quote exactly: "The Biblical account of creation details six days of God working and one day of his rest, and that's the foundation for the Israelites observing the Sabbath. So whether we interpret the days of creation literally as days or figuratively as eons, the process according to the Bible is finished. But as soon as we accept any level of evolution, species are no longer static. If God used evolution until now he still is today. Are we in Day 6 of creation?"
Dr. Jacoby answered unsatisfactorily by saying that if God doing anything is him creating, then obviously he's still creating. (But I wasn't calling anything God does "creating"; I was talking about species of animals.)
I do want to say that the part I remember most about the entire evening was the girl in front of me. I actually didn't deserve to ask my question. Time was running out and the moderator said there was time left for three more questions. I was the fourth one, and lightly pressed the usher guarding our mic to extend it one, which he said was out of his power. But then the girl in front of me, who I had talked to a little bit ("There haven't even been any girls!" she said when it looked hopeless for us. "Yeah, I think they should just move you to the front," I agreed.), turned around and asked what my question was. I gave her the gist of it, she thought for a second, and then she declared, "Your question is better than mine" and walked away to my faint protest.
And I remember her kindness more than I do the athiest's jabs at Bush or the Christian's facts and dates. Who knew that the best part of the debate for me was the part furthest from debating?
Dr. Jacoby did a good job amplifying my thoughts. Why do people think that evolution and the Bible are at odds with each other? Well, Dr. Jacoby was trained as a historian, so he gave us a very interesting historical answer: apparently the dominant thought was a long-earth theory, and after Darwin published his answer many Christians were in agreement with it, until one of Darwin's proponents aggressively came after people as if it were a choice. Ever since, people have had to choose between God and evolution. After that five minute historical overview, he spent the rest of his time talking about how evolution was unlikely without a God.
The other guy, Dr. Shermer, did a really good job amplifying Alex's thoughts: you can't prove God doesn't exist, but you can keep pushing him back. Why do planets orbit in a plane? God. Until you figure out the math behind it, and then God has to be crammed into the next smallest unsolvable problem. You can claim Christianity and evolution can coexist, but if the mechanism for the origins of life can be explained by repeated observation (that is, science), what does "God" even mean?
Dr. Jacoby framed the debate well by saying (in different words), "How the world came to be is important, but not really." Religion doesn't exist to compete with science; it competes for our souls.
Then they had a question-answer time. I lined up and listened to ridiculously stubborn questioners press their enemy for answers: "But if life can't come from nothing, then where did that first cell come from? Huh? Huh? Where did life come from, then?" And so on.
I had a reasonable question. One other person had a good question, too. There weren't any good questions to ask the athiest; we've had our whole lives acclimating to that mentality. The one guy's question had to do with the theological implications of evolution: doesn't evolution mean that things died, and that in the time of Eden (whatever that means) the world wasn't perfect?
Dr. Jacoby said that sin results in spiritual death, and that physical death isn't that big of a deal. In a way, I can see what he means: just eating breaks down plant life. However, God killing the lamb to cover Adam and Eve's sin wasn't new just because it was killing. It was new because the lamb died. To me, the problem is still unresolved.
My question was similar in spirit. I wrote it down so I wouldn't fumble at the mic, so I can quote exactly: "The Biblical account of creation details six days of God working and one day of his rest, and that's the foundation for the Israelites observing the Sabbath. So whether we interpret the days of creation literally as days or figuratively as eons, the process according to the Bible is finished. But as soon as we accept any level of evolution, species are no longer static. If God used evolution until now he still is today. Are we in Day 6 of creation?"
Dr. Jacoby answered unsatisfactorily by saying that if God doing anything is him creating, then obviously he's still creating. (But I wasn't calling anything God does "creating"; I was talking about species of animals.)
I do want to say that the part I remember most about the entire evening was the girl in front of me. I actually didn't deserve to ask my question. Time was running out and the moderator said there was time left for three more questions. I was the fourth one, and lightly pressed the usher guarding our mic to extend it one, which he said was out of his power. But then the girl in front of me, who I had talked to a little bit ("There haven't even been any girls!" she said when it looked hopeless for us. "Yeah, I think they should just move you to the front," I agreed.), turned around and asked what my question was. I gave her the gist of it, she thought for a second, and then she declared, "Your question is better than mine" and walked away to my faint protest.
And I remember her kindness more than I do the athiest's jabs at Bush or the Christian's facts and dates. Who knew that the best part of the debate for me was the part furthest from debating?
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Phrasal Verbs are Low-Class
What is a word? Normally, it's easy to tell because we separate them by spaces. There were eleven words in my last sentence. But we also have the idea that if something is a word, you should be able to look up what it means in a dictionary. So what about "to look up"? It's one unit of meaning: here "up" doesn't indicate the direction opposite to down; it is a preposition you add which changes the meaning of the verb. You have to look at the phrase as a whole. "To look up" is a phrasal verb.
Phrasal verbs get pretty tricky in English because they often have multiple meanings. For example, "to hold up" means either "to delay" or "to rob." (Jokes follow easily: "Sorry I didn't call you back until now. David held me up." "I didn't know he had a gun.")
I've compiled a list of all the phrasal verbs I can think of that come from "to put." I lifted two or three from here, but my list is more complete. Check it out:
That's 32 meanings of "put + preposition." I even left out uses in which the preposition is used as a preposition, like putting clothes on. But notice that these meanings are defined differently than usual: they are exact synonyms. Substitute any phrasal verb with my definition and there's no denotative difference. (The only exception is "to put back" which I glossed as "to spend," but compare "I spent ten dollars on a meal" and "Buying the meal put me back ten dollars.")
Since phrasal verbs have exact synonyms you never need to use them. In contrast, most words have a niche. I use the word "hover" because I don't want to say "to hang fluttering in the air or on the wing" every time I want to talk about a helicopter. But in America culture, where there is similitude, there is ordering. "Big" and "enormous" mean the same thing, but "enormous" is considered a more educated word. Each phrasal verb is exactly equivalent to another verb, but since the phrasal verb is simpler, it is considered casual, informal, and lower-class. Just think about it. Presidential candidates these days try to relate to the average Joe--explicitly--so think of their aides instead. Can you imagine a McCain aide letting out a press release to say Senator McCain was "put up to" selecting Palin as his running mate? Of course not. Phrasal verbs aren't dignified.
I phrase my verbs sometimes to give this blog a conversational tenor, so don't think it's me being picky. I'm just suggesting that parents teach their kids how to use silverware and how not to use phrasal verbs so when they're on a date with the President's daughter they won't be embarrassed.
Phrasal verbs get pretty tricky in English because they often have multiple meanings. For example, "to hold up" means either "to delay" or "to rob." (Jokes follow easily: "Sorry I didn't call you back until now. David held me up." "I didn't know he had a gun.")
I've compiled a list of all the phrasal verbs I can think of that come from "to put." I lifted two or three from here, but my list is more complete. Check it out:
| put | ||
| aside | to save: "Ever since they got married, they put aside half their income every paycheck and now they're millionaires." | |
| at | to estimate: "I put the painting's value at about six dollars." | |
| away | to incarcerate: "After he murdered that girl a few years ago, he was put away for life." | |
| to tidy: "Put away all your toys once James leaves." | ||
| back | to delay: "If the construction guys don't finish today, it'll put us back a whole week." | |
| to spend: "Filling up my tank put me back over a hundred dollars." | ||
| to return: "When you're done borrowing my computer, could you put it back where it was before?" | ||
| back together | to repair: "Dad's going to be home in five minutes and I don't know how to put the TV back together." | |
| behind | to forgive: "Even though you ate my last Oreo, I'm willing to put it behind us." | |
| down | to criticize: "Why do you put me down all the time?" | |
| to commit: "Put me down for a batch of cookies." | ||
| forward | to suggest: "I put forward the idea that we should market to the elderly, but it didn't go over well." | |
| in | to submit: "I put in for reinstatement yesterday." | |
| to expend: "But I've already put in fifty hours of community service!" | ||
| off | to tarry: "I've put off doing the dishes for so long they're starting to grow moldy." | |
| to be offended: "I was really put off by his comment about my weight." | ||
| on | to deceive: "Front row tickets to Anberlin? Are you putting me on?" | |
| to blame: "You're the one who said we should try the gallon challenge. If you feel sick, don't put that on me." | ||
| to perform: "Tomorrow I'll be putting on a magic show in my living room." | ||
| to organize: "Madame Fleury is the one putting on the event, so ask her if you can bring guests. | ||
| out | to extinguish: "Put out the fire now!" | |
| to give sexual favors: "I like going on dates with her because I know she'll put out." | ||
| through | to connect: "Please put me through to the principal." | |
| to pass: "He was failing, but I put him through to the fifth grade anyway." | ||
| to make suffer: "We're breaking up because I couldn't put her through a long distance relationship." | ||
| together | to assemble: "I put together this report like you asked me to, Sir." | |
| toward | to contribute: "We each put $75 a week from our jobs toward a nice car." | |
| up | to score: "In the basketball game last night, Wilkins put up seventeen points." | |
| to house: "Maybe Jenny could put you up for the night." | ||
| to post: "I put up fliers, but no one's found Fluffy!" | ||
| up to | to convince: "Did your brother put you up to this? I can't imagine you'd steal on your own." | |
| up with | to endure: "I put up with your shenanigans every day." |
Since phrasal verbs have exact synonyms you never need to use them. In contrast, most words have a niche. I use the word "hover" because I don't want to say "to hang fluttering in the air or on the wing" every time I want to talk about a helicopter. But in America culture, where there is similitude, there is ordering. "Big" and "enormous" mean the same thing, but "enormous" is considered a more educated word. Each phrasal verb is exactly equivalent to another verb, but since the phrasal verb is simpler, it is considered casual, informal, and lower-class. Just think about it. Presidential candidates these days try to relate to the average Joe--explicitly--so think of their aides instead. Can you imagine a McCain aide letting out a press release to say Senator McCain was "put up to" selecting Palin as his running mate? Of course not. Phrasal verbs aren't dignified.
I phrase my verbs sometimes to give this blog a conversational tenor, so don't think it's me being picky. I'm just suggesting that parents teach their kids how to use silverware and how not to use phrasal verbs so when they're on a date with the President's daughter they won't be embarrassed.
Friday, October 24, 2008
The Three-Day Weekend
Sometimes people blame time for the amount of things they get done. "If I had more time, I'd be way more productive." Three-day weekends exist to show that, for the most part, this is a lie.
On three-day weekends, you have more time and do less. I'm fairly regimented in my approach to the week: Monday through Friday I have class and take of homework, Saturday I rest, and Sunday I go to church, hang out with people, and get a good start to my upcoming week. But when we have Friday off, I'm confused. Is Friday a work day or a play day? If it's a play day, then is Saturday still a day of rest or can that take the load for some of the homework that I need to get done? And even if I count Friday as a half-work day, then I probably won't feel very rested by the end of the weekend.
Here's how it's playing out now. This weekend is UF's homecoming, so we didn't have class today. I woke up around 10:30, had breakfast by 11, and got some things done by the time I was ready for lunch. By "things", I mean clearing my inbox (since I use Gmail, I can "archive" emails so they still exist but aren't in my face all the time, leaving my inbox with messages that I still want to respond to) and replying to a Facebook message. I read about ten pages of my assignment for Medieval Lit and felt accomplished because the story is in English that's really similar to modern-day language, so it won't be hard to read when I do commit time to it.
And that's it. I couldn't be bothered to make lunch, so I walked to Papa John's for pizza and accidentally saw five minutes of the homecoming parade. I played racquetball with Dan. And then my fun began and I went to a guy's house for dinner, then to somebody's birthday party.
So now I'm unsure where I stand with my workload. By the time I decide that I should stop trying to work and just relax instead, the weekend will be over and I'll have to lurch back into school mode.
Don't misunderstand me: I'm not advocating that we have class to avoid this problem. I'm more lamenting the presence of transaction costs in vacation time. I hope that's the right word. I mean that students can't fully enjoy the time because, in its novelty, vacation time is wastefully allocated.
Not every break is this way. I measure time by weeks because my schedule repeats weekly. When spring break comes and we have a whole week off, it's easy to adjust to because there's one whole week which you can wipe off the map. With only one day, though, the week's rhythm is thrown off. For example, I realistically am too busy Friday and Saturday night to have time to blog, but I like to post a new entry at least every two days, so Friday afternoon when I have some free time I'll blog, or something. But today I let my time slip away because when you don't have class you assume the day will last forever, and now it's 3 am and I'm tired.
But it's a three-day weekend!!
On three-day weekends, you have more time and do less. I'm fairly regimented in my approach to the week: Monday through Friday I have class and take of homework, Saturday I rest, and Sunday I go to church, hang out with people, and get a good start to my upcoming week. But when we have Friday off, I'm confused. Is Friday a work day or a play day? If it's a play day, then is Saturday still a day of rest or can that take the load for some of the homework that I need to get done? And even if I count Friday as a half-work day, then I probably won't feel very rested by the end of the weekend.
Here's how it's playing out now. This weekend is UF's homecoming, so we didn't have class today. I woke up around 10:30, had breakfast by 11, and got some things done by the time I was ready for lunch. By "things", I mean clearing my inbox (since I use Gmail, I can "archive" emails so they still exist but aren't in my face all the time, leaving my inbox with messages that I still want to respond to) and replying to a Facebook message. I read about ten pages of my assignment for Medieval Lit and felt accomplished because the story is in English that's really similar to modern-day language, so it won't be hard to read when I do commit time to it.
And that's it. I couldn't be bothered to make lunch, so I walked to Papa John's for pizza and accidentally saw five minutes of the homecoming parade. I played racquetball with Dan. And then my fun began and I went to a guy's house for dinner, then to somebody's birthday party.
So now I'm unsure where I stand with my workload. By the time I decide that I should stop trying to work and just relax instead, the weekend will be over and I'll have to lurch back into school mode.
Don't misunderstand me: I'm not advocating that we have class to avoid this problem. I'm more lamenting the presence of transaction costs in vacation time. I hope that's the right word. I mean that students can't fully enjoy the time because, in its novelty, vacation time is wastefully allocated.
Not every break is this way. I measure time by weeks because my schedule repeats weekly. When spring break comes and we have a whole week off, it's easy to adjust to because there's one whole week which you can wipe off the map. With only one day, though, the week's rhythm is thrown off. For example, I realistically am too busy Friday and Saturday night to have time to blog, but I like to post a new entry at least every two days, so Friday afternoon when I have some free time I'll blog, or something. But today I let my time slip away because when you don't have class you assume the day will last forever, and now it's 3 am and I'm tired.
But it's a three-day weekend!!
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Hardcore Blogging Skills
Imagine you're in the woods putting the finishing touches on a passionate picture of Nature in All Her Glory, when you hear your brother call from the house. "Jean-Claude!" he says, since artists need artistic names. You don't reply because you're contemplating the effects of that crinkled leaf in the lower left corner of the canvas on the human condition, but he repeats, "Jean-Claude!"
"What?" you shout shortly, sending flocks of nature-filled birds scattering.
"There's this guy just in town today who's looking for paintings!"
"The legendary art critic Tomas Refian?" you ask, since every artist knows his art critics.
"I don't know," your brother says, "but he has a nice blue suit on."
You snatch up your supplies, blow on the paint to make it dry faster, and run to meet fame himself in a blue suit.
I feel kinda like that, except the only woods near UF have signs for the girls that say "Don't go in at night or you'll be raped" in more polite language, and I don't paint masterpieces in them day or night. Rather, I heard about a blogging scholarship today and I'm checking myself out for the man in the blue suit.
"Do you maintain a weblog and attend college?" the website queries. Why, yes, I do. "Would you like $10,000 to help pay for books, tuition, or other living costs?" Hey! Over here! Judge me! The deadline to enter is the end of the month, and I'm scrambling to make my blog presentable to the ten-grand-giving powers that be.
I took the first step and bought a domain name for myself. (A domain name, if the old geezers don't know, is something so complicated we just buy one for ourselves instead of using others'.) That's right, you can now read this blog at www.willgoestocollege.com without a trace of Google in the address. Don't think I'm too hardcore; I paid $2.50 more so Google could give me the convenience and Googly austerity of a Google-bought domain name. I was even logged in to GoDaddy.com with my selection checked, with another tab detailing how to link Google's hosting to a domain name bought through GoDaddy, and I chickened out.
I'm not just making urgent cosmetic changes, I've started the blog death march of explaining everything I've ever said on my blog. Someone who makes a joke and then explains it isn't a comedian; he's a bore. But still: old geezers? That's just a joke, see! I use it as a conscious stereotype. And my parenthetical explanation of a domain name? That was a joke, too! I linked to the Wikipedia page, see, which gives about as good an explanation of a domain name as you can get, but then I also linked to the defining document--which is incomprehendible, and that's a joke, see, because in a way the words were correct, but not in the way old geezers would take it to mean, so for those in the know who clicked on the links, it's a funny way to defend the statement I made about the sil--
And the subtitle of my blog? Facebook readers won't know, of course, but my blog's title is "Will goes to College" followed by "Your mom goes to college." What's that about, right? No, see, that makes sense, too, if you think about it! There's this movie Napoleon Dynamite, 'kay?, and if you haven't heard of it that's okay because I like explaining culture to people and Napoleon Dynamite is definitely culture. In the movie, Deb is going door-to-door selling boondoggle key chains ("a must-have for this season's fasion") to raise money for college. Napoleon says he doesn't want any and from the background Kip, Napoleon's brother, shouts, "Your mom goes to college." And you think to yourself, "That doesn't mean anything and probably isn't true," but Deb is mortified that her already embarrassing endeavor has been mocked. See, because "your mom goes to college" is a retort, only no one is sure why. And that fits perfectly with this blog, because you read the title "Will goes to College" and you're like, "So what?" And then BAM! you see the subtitle and you're chastised. So, like, my blog is probably insignificant, but at least I know it and when you make fun of yourself first then no one else can, really. And I talk about culture pretty often, and it's a popular line from a movie, so it all fits together. Get it?
And did you see the crinkled leaf in the lower left-hand corner and how it symbolizes love and justice and all that's good about paintings? No, but really, you should look at my crinkled leaf. It isn't half-bad, I suggest.
"What?" you shout shortly, sending flocks of nature-filled birds scattering.
"There's this guy just in town today who's looking for paintings!"
"The legendary art critic Tomas Refian?" you ask, since every artist knows his art critics.
"I don't know," your brother says, "but he has a nice blue suit on."
You snatch up your supplies, blow on the paint to make it dry faster, and run to meet fame himself in a blue suit.
I feel kinda like that, except the only woods near UF have signs for the girls that say "Don't go in at night or you'll be raped" in more polite language, and I don't paint masterpieces in them day or night. Rather, I heard about a blogging scholarship today and I'm checking myself out for the man in the blue suit.
"Do you maintain a weblog and attend college?" the website queries. Why, yes, I do. "Would you like $10,000 to help pay for books, tuition, or other living costs?" Hey! Over here! Judge me! The deadline to enter is the end of the month, and I'm scrambling to make my blog presentable to the ten-grand-giving powers that be.
I took the first step and bought a domain name for myself. (A domain name, if the old geezers don't know, is something so complicated we just buy one for ourselves instead of using others'.) That's right, you can now read this blog at www.willgoestocollege.com without a trace of Google in the address. Don't think I'm too hardcore; I paid $2.50 more so Google could give me the convenience and Googly austerity of a Google-bought domain name. I was even logged in to GoDaddy.com with my selection checked, with another tab detailing how to link Google's hosting to a domain name bought through GoDaddy, and I chickened out.
I'm not just making urgent cosmetic changes, I've started the blog death march of explaining everything I've ever said on my blog. Someone who makes a joke and then explains it isn't a comedian; he's a bore. But still: old geezers? That's just a joke, see! I use it as a conscious stereotype. And my parenthetical explanation of a domain name? That was a joke, too! I linked to the Wikipedia page, see, which gives about as good an explanation of a domain name as you can get, but then I also linked to the defining document--which is incomprehendible, and that's a joke, see, because in a way the words were correct, but not in the way old geezers would take it to mean, so for those in the know who clicked on the links, it's a funny way to defend the statement I made about the sil--
And the subtitle of my blog? Facebook readers won't know, of course, but my blog's title is "Will goes to College" followed by "Your mom goes to college." What's that about, right? No, see, that makes sense, too, if you think about it! There's this movie Napoleon Dynamite, 'kay?, and if you haven't heard of it that's okay because I like explaining culture to people and Napoleon Dynamite is definitely culture. In the movie, Deb is going door-to-door selling boondoggle key chains ("a must-have for this season's fasion") to raise money for college. Napoleon says he doesn't want any and from the background Kip, Napoleon's brother, shouts, "Your mom goes to college." And you think to yourself, "That doesn't mean anything and probably isn't true," but Deb is mortified that her already embarrassing endeavor has been mocked. See, because "your mom goes to college" is a retort, only no one is sure why. And that fits perfectly with this blog, because you read the title "Will goes to College" and you're like, "So what?" And then BAM! you see the subtitle and you're chastised. So, like, my blog is probably insignificant, but at least I know it and when you make fun of yourself first then no one else can, really. And I talk about culture pretty often, and it's a popular line from a movie, so it all fits together. Get it?
And did you see the crinkled leaf in the lower left-hand corner and how it symbolizes love and justice and all that's good about paintings? No, but really, you should look at my crinkled leaf. It isn't half-bad, I suggest.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Ambidexterity
Jugglers place a high amount of emphasis on ambidextrous juggling. Asymmetrical patterns, say 3 balls in one hand, are fine, but only if you're able to juggle them on both sides. This is a strange idea in a way: if you have 3 balls, you can only do 3 in one hand from your left hand and your right hand at the same time. In fact, if you saw a guy performing, you wouldn't know if he could juggle an asymmetrical pattern both ways unless he emphasized that he could.
Our focus on ambidexterity (in the limited juggling sense of the word) results in a very balanced mix of valuing what a juggler can do and what he does do. If you can only do a 5-club half-shower to the left, there's no shame in performing it. And yet, if you could do it to the right, even if you don't put it into your routine, it'd be better. Ambidexterity would open up more possibilities for you.
I've carried that mentality into other parts of life, too. It bothers me that I can't comfortably eat a meal with the fork in my left hand. That reminds me of how in China everyone can use chopsticks with both hands, and they sometimes have a different grip depending on the hand. One night my Chinese mom and dad had a whole discussion about what each grip meant and when it was best to use their left hand to eat.
I tried to learn to write with my left hand, but it's hard. Andrew is left-handed, but since we grew up using the computer mouse on the right side, he can do both equally. Academically, too, I shy from specialization because I don't want to develop one skill at the expense of another. I make sure my foot imprints on my flip-flops match. I knew a guy who played tennis seriously, and his right forearm was muscular and his left was normal: disgusting.
Here is my picture of success in life:
That's right. Left hand brushes at night, right hand brushes in the morning. A perfectly symmetrical toothbrush when it's worn.
Our focus on ambidexterity (in the limited juggling sense of the word) results in a very balanced mix of valuing what a juggler can do and what he does do. If you can only do a 5-club half-shower to the left, there's no shame in performing it. And yet, if you could do it to the right, even if you don't put it into your routine, it'd be better. Ambidexterity would open up more possibilities for you.
I've carried that mentality into other parts of life, too. It bothers me that I can't comfortably eat a meal with the fork in my left hand. That reminds me of how in China everyone can use chopsticks with both hands, and they sometimes have a different grip depending on the hand. One night my Chinese mom and dad had a whole discussion about what each grip meant and when it was best to use their left hand to eat.
I tried to learn to write with my left hand, but it's hard. Andrew is left-handed, but since we grew up using the computer mouse on the right side, he can do both equally. Academically, too, I shy from specialization because I don't want to develop one skill at the expense of another. I make sure my foot imprints on my flip-flops match. I knew a guy who played tennis seriously, and his right forearm was muscular and his left was normal: disgusting.
Here is my picture of success in life:
That's right. Left hand brushes at night, right hand brushes in the morning. A perfectly symmetrical toothbrush when it's worn.
Monday, October 20, 2008
The LSAT and Limits of the Law
Senior year of high school, if I remember right (and if I don't then it was junior year), I thought that it would be nice to be Supreme Court Justice when I grew up. And, knowing practically nothing about what that meant, I decided the best way to give myself a shot when the time came was to read Supreme Court decisions, so every day for a month or two I read a Supreme Court case opinion to become Supreme Court-worthy. We'll see if it paid off, I guess, because I signed up to take the LSAT this December.
The LSAT stands for the Law School Admission Test. It's graded from 120 to 180 and is normalized, so a 150 is the 50th percentile. Before I learned that it was a multiple choice logic test, I thought that you had to know legal concepts to do well--hence my reading strategy. I had just read things that talked about studying for the LSAT, and thought to myself that it must involve law, because who can study for a logic test? Either you think logically or you don't. That'll make a delicious story if I become Supreme Court Justice.
Multiple choice is a different story. I downloaded an old LSAT off of the website and took it over the next several nights. I didn't time myself, but that seemed like something you could improve on. Then I scored my practice test and saw that I had gotten a 171. 172 is the 99% percentile. Three quarters of Harvard law students score under a 175. I figure if I get a 180 I'll be safe. I'm willing to accept a 179 and maybe even a 178.
I know, out of the 120,000 people who take the test per year, 8-18 get a perfect 180. But I'm just putting it out there because everyone's expectations for tests are different, and once you know how someone wants to do, then you can encourage him well and be proud of him when he finishes. So be my parents until the end of the year and root me on even if I'm the slow kid who tries his best to win the race.
When I signed up online, I glanced over the fine print for the admission ticket. Right after "I certify that I am the examinee whose name appears on this ticket" there's this curious phrase: "I plan to take the LSAT for the sole purpose of being considered for admission to law school." I'm surprised that the council that tests potential lawyers would write such an ugly clause. Sole purpose? As if we college students knew why we did things. And as if, if we did know, we'd only have one reason. I'm taking the test because I might want to be considered for admission to law school. I'm taking the test because I have $123 to blow. I'm taking the test because I want to see if I'm awesome. I'm taking the test to see if I could have a part-time job teaching a prep-class for Kaplan. I'm taking the test for God, gold, and glory.
I'm taking the test for whatever reason I want to, and their disclaimer encroaches on my motives because they don't know how to specify what they want to prohibit. Restricting my purposes is only to preempt whatever action they don't want me to do. Honestly, I don't know what they're worried about. Taking the test with the intent to memorize questions and sell them to others? That's already covered in another clause. They would really be better off saying, "Don't take the test if you plan on doing something that isn't allowed with it afterward." It's clear and makes sense. The way it's phrased now, though, implies that something about my wanting to score well on a test for test's sake is wrong.
They're just fearful and are trying to protect themselves at my expense. Where's the balance? Ask me after December 5th and I might be qualified to train to give you an answer.
The LSAT stands for the Law School Admission Test. It's graded from 120 to 180 and is normalized, so a 150 is the 50th percentile. Before I learned that it was a multiple choice logic test, I thought that you had to know legal concepts to do well--hence my reading strategy. I had just read things that talked about studying for the LSAT, and thought to myself that it must involve law, because who can study for a logic test? Either you think logically or you don't. That'll make a delicious story if I become Supreme Court Justice.
Multiple choice is a different story. I downloaded an old LSAT off of the website and took it over the next several nights. I didn't time myself, but that seemed like something you could improve on. Then I scored my practice test and saw that I had gotten a 171. 172 is the 99% percentile. Three quarters of Harvard law students score under a 175. I figure if I get a 180 I'll be safe. I'm willing to accept a 179 and maybe even a 178.
I know, out of the 120,000 people who take the test per year, 8-18 get a perfect 180. But I'm just putting it out there because everyone's expectations for tests are different, and once you know how someone wants to do, then you can encourage him well and be proud of him when he finishes. So be my parents until the end of the year and root me on even if I'm the slow kid who tries his best to win the race.
When I signed up online, I glanced over the fine print for the admission ticket. Right after "I certify that I am the examinee whose name appears on this ticket" there's this curious phrase: "I plan to take the LSAT for the sole purpose of being considered for admission to law school." I'm surprised that the council that tests potential lawyers would write such an ugly clause. Sole purpose? As if we college students knew why we did things. And as if, if we did know, we'd only have one reason. I'm taking the test because I might want to be considered for admission to law school. I'm taking the test because I have $123 to blow. I'm taking the test because I want to see if I'm awesome. I'm taking the test to see if I could have a part-time job teaching a prep-class for Kaplan. I'm taking the test for God, gold, and glory.
I'm taking the test for whatever reason I want to, and their disclaimer encroaches on my motives because they don't know how to specify what they want to prohibit. Restricting my purposes is only to preempt whatever action they don't want me to do. Honestly, I don't know what they're worried about. Taking the test with the intent to memorize questions and sell them to others? That's already covered in another clause. They would really be better off saying, "Don't take the test if you plan on doing something that isn't allowed with it afterward." It's clear and makes sense. The way it's phrased now, though, implies that something about my wanting to score well on a test for test's sake is wrong.
They're just fearful and are trying to protect themselves at my expense. Where's the balance? Ask me after December 5th and I might be qualified to train to give you an answer.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Speed Dating
Next time I play "Never have I Ever" I'll have one more weak spot. When I went to RUF's fall conference this weekend, I didn't expect the schedule for the first evening to include speed dating. Listening to a pastor's message, singing Christian songs, waking up groggy because we went to bed too late--those were things I was prepared for. About 10:30pm, though, one or two hundred chairs were set up in long rows facing each other, each with a girl sitting ill-at-ease, waiting. It looked like a human Bernie Bott's Every Flavor Beans (from both sides, I'm sure).
There were strict rules: guys had to ask the first question, and it couldn't be about our schools (we had several Florida schools attending), majors, hometowns, name, or sports. After two minutes, all the guys would shift down a seat and we'd begin afresh.
It was nice that everyone was eligible: Christian, my age, same state. Well, almost everyone was eligible. A few sentences into my conversation with one girl I notice that the guy to my right has edged his seat close to his girl and has his hands on her thighs, talking to her in an indistinct love-mumble. "I don't think we've made it that far in two minutes," I deadpan to the girl I'm speed dating. The guy next to me is quick to clarify that this girl is actually his real girlfriend.
The beginning of each date was the most difficult in some ways. The guy had the responsibility for the conversation, and I felt bad asking the same litany of questions to each girl, so I tried to let something spring up naturally when I introduced myself. Sometimes girls' names were difficult to pronounce, or they had on nice jewelry, or they were right in front of the fan. Then I could blab about "Penman" being easy to pronounce but difficult for people to spell (an extra 'n' looks so much more regal, doesn't it?), or how last Valentine's Day I was in China and didn't even realize people in America were giving each other presents, or how it was hard to hear in the room with everyone else talking.
With most people, though, I had to go for a random question. I tried, "What's your favorite band?" a few times, but since I'm clueless with music I couldn't lead the conversation very far. I got confused when I got to the end of the row and ended up sitting next to Dan, so I asked one girl what his first question had been to her. "'How many kids do you want to have?'" she recalled. I guess that's one way to speed date.
What surprised me was that, with some people, two minutes was too long. As the guy, I tried to lead the conversation, but there would come a point where I had to pause for a second so the girl could reply. That was the critical second. For some conversationally-adept girls, that pause never came, but if conversation didn't flow perfectly there would happen the most important second of our two-minute relationship. And some of my relationships didn't survive... such is life.
I find it interesting that in some cases, you only need two minutes. Obviously it's a sufficient test of compatibility (one girl I thought my speed date went well with ended up not having anything to say when I talked to her later), but it is a helpful test for incompatibility. I used to think that everything would be a lot easier if marriages were just arranged, and to a large extent I think relationships are dependent on willingness, but there's still a significant chunk that comes from personality. I didn't find two-minute true love, but I gave it a shot. I'm working on being desirable.
When it doubt, though, just balance a table on your chin to show your manliness. Where was speed dating, round two?
There were strict rules: guys had to ask the first question, and it couldn't be about our schools (we had several Florida schools attending), majors, hometowns, name, or sports. After two minutes, all the guys would shift down a seat and we'd begin afresh.
It was nice that everyone was eligible: Christian, my age, same state. Well, almost everyone was eligible. A few sentences into my conversation with one girl I notice that the guy to my right has edged his seat close to his girl and has his hands on her thighs, talking to her in an indistinct love-mumble. "I don't think we've made it that far in two minutes," I deadpan to the girl I'm speed dating. The guy next to me is quick to clarify that this girl is actually his real girlfriend.
The beginning of each date was the most difficult in some ways. The guy had the responsibility for the conversation, and I felt bad asking the same litany of questions to each girl, so I tried to let something spring up naturally when I introduced myself. Sometimes girls' names were difficult to pronounce, or they had on nice jewelry, or they were right in front of the fan. Then I could blab about "Penman" being easy to pronounce but difficult for people to spell (an extra 'n' looks so much more regal, doesn't it?), or how last Valentine's Day I was in China and didn't even realize people in America were giving each other presents, or how it was hard to hear in the room with everyone else talking.
With most people, though, I had to go for a random question. I tried, "What's your favorite band?" a few times, but since I'm clueless with music I couldn't lead the conversation very far. I got confused when I got to the end of the row and ended up sitting next to Dan, so I asked one girl what his first question had been to her. "'How many kids do you want to have?'" she recalled. I guess that's one way to speed date.
What surprised me was that, with some people, two minutes was too long. As the guy, I tried to lead the conversation, but there would come a point where I had to pause for a second so the girl could reply. That was the critical second. For some conversationally-adept girls, that pause never came, but if conversation didn't flow perfectly there would happen the most important second of our two-minute relationship. And some of my relationships didn't survive... such is life.
I find it interesting that in some cases, you only need two minutes. Obviously it's a sufficient test of compatibility (one girl I thought my speed date went well with ended up not having anything to say when I talked to her later), but it is a helpful test for incompatibility. I used to think that everything would be a lot easier if marriages were just arranged, and to a large extent I think relationships are dependent on willingness, but there's still a significant chunk that comes from personality. I didn't find two-minute true love, but I gave it a shot. I'm working on being desirable.
When it doubt, though, just balance a table on your chin to show your manliness. Where was speed dating, round two?
Thursday, October 16, 2008
New China Experience
Now that I'm back from seven months in China, and have been ever since school started mid-August, any new China experiences are emotional ones through the rear-view mirror of memory. On Monday, I was walking down the street and saw an Asian couple zooming by me on one of those popular motorized scooters. The guy was in front, the girl was clutching onto him from behind. Something about the way she was latched onto him reminded me of how in China it's popular for the girl to hold a guy's arm above the elbow, so you can feel his bicep. And then I missed China for the first time.
Sure, I've thought of China often since I've been back, but I've been so guarded that every time I think of China I first steel myself for the challenges I faced there. Wow. As I typed that last sentence I noticed that it's really similar to something I wrote in my journal when my family first moved to Florida. My journal is back in Orlando, but it went like this. "Transition is when you accept that there's good and bad where you are and where you were." A few days or weeks after you move, your mind pitches your old home against your new home in a war, and there's a whole period of transition in which your mind ensures that your old home wins. I'm in a weird place because I don't know whether to call America my "new" or "old" home. It's my most recent one, but also my most distant one. My reaction so far to coming back, strangely enough, has been as if I've just moved to China! I'm fiercely protective of how hard China is to live in for a foreigner and how easy and rewarding American life is in comparison. But you're not really moved until you have the ability to miss both.
So I think it's a really important step for me to start missing China. It's not a logical decision: my little experience shows that! I mean, who sees a Korean couple on a motorbike and thinks, oh, that reminds me of the way they hold hands in China. And then who misses that? I mean, one of my friends from Beijing recently reminisced about the restaurant we used to go to almost every day after class. That would be something I would think I would miss: good food, a routine, daily feelings of success in ordering, good friends. But when she mentioned it, I only remembered the time in a shallow way. I remembered that it had been fun, but I didn't experience it again in mind, I didn't re-live it. That's what missing is: the disconnect between living and re-living the good times.
I wonder if the arm-grabbing gesture was something located in my mind really far from all the difficulties of being in China. I can feel someone holding my arm that way, but I can't think of who it was or when. I think once or twice when I went out to eat with my Chinese family, my Chinese mom would hold onto me like that, the same way women would if a guy was holding an umbrella, only I didn't have an umbrella.
I feel wary of letting myself miss China, because from there it seems a hop, skip, and a jump away from wanting to do it again, and I don't want to do it again. I've relied on the tension between my fluency in America and my insufficiency in China to maintain my need to say, "It is finished", but the tension isn't just an abstract one. I'm tense from it. I've been tense all semester; that's why I'm down to twelve credits. I can't handle any more stress because I'm already stressed figuring out where my life is going as it relates to the last seven months of my life.
But now maybe the pressure is starting to drain as I learn to miss China.
Sure, I've thought of China often since I've been back, but I've been so guarded that every time I think of China I first steel myself for the challenges I faced there. Wow. As I typed that last sentence I noticed that it's really similar to something I wrote in my journal when my family first moved to Florida. My journal is back in Orlando, but it went like this. "Transition is when you accept that there's good and bad where you are and where you were." A few days or weeks after you move, your mind pitches your old home against your new home in a war, and there's a whole period of transition in which your mind ensures that your old home wins. I'm in a weird place because I don't know whether to call America my "new" or "old" home. It's my most recent one, but also my most distant one. My reaction so far to coming back, strangely enough, has been as if I've just moved to China! I'm fiercely protective of how hard China is to live in for a foreigner and how easy and rewarding American life is in comparison. But you're not really moved until you have the ability to miss both.
So I think it's a really important step for me to start missing China. It's not a logical decision: my little experience shows that! I mean, who sees a Korean couple on a motorbike and thinks, oh, that reminds me of the way they hold hands in China. And then who misses that? I mean, one of my friends from Beijing recently reminisced about the restaurant we used to go to almost every day after class. That would be something I would think I would miss: good food, a routine, daily feelings of success in ordering, good friends. But when she mentioned it, I only remembered the time in a shallow way. I remembered that it had been fun, but I didn't experience it again in mind, I didn't re-live it. That's what missing is: the disconnect between living and re-living the good times.
I wonder if the arm-grabbing gesture was something located in my mind really far from all the difficulties of being in China. I can feel someone holding my arm that way, but I can't think of who it was or when. I think once or twice when I went out to eat with my Chinese family, my Chinese mom would hold onto me like that, the same way women would if a guy was holding an umbrella, only I didn't have an umbrella.
I feel wary of letting myself miss China, because from there it seems a hop, skip, and a jump away from wanting to do it again, and I don't want to do it again. I've relied on the tension between my fluency in America and my insufficiency in China to maintain my need to say, "It is finished", but the tension isn't just an abstract one. I'm tense from it. I've been tense all semester; that's why I'm down to twelve credits. I can't handle any more stress because I'm already stressed figuring out where my life is going as it relates to the last seven months of my life.
But now maybe the pressure is starting to drain as I learn to miss China.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
What I do with my Life (Fall 08)
It's no good knowing crème brûlée exists if you don't know what it tastes like.
In my class about the works of James Joyce, we learn that Ulysses was banned in America for a long time, but now it's judged the best book of all time. We read and analyze hard passages:
In my class about the works of James Joyce, we learn that Ulysses was banned in America for a long time, but now it's judged the best book of all time. We read and analyze hard passages:
Wombed in sin darkness I was too, made not begotten. By them, the man with my voice and my eyes and a ghostwoman with ashes on her breath. They clasped and sundered, did the coupler's will. From before the ages He willed me and now may not will me away or ever. A lex eterna stays about Him. Is that then the divine substance wherein Father and Son are consubstantial? Where is poor dear Arius to try conclusions? Warring his life long upon the contramagnificandjewbangtatiality. Illstarred heresiarch! In a Greek watercloset he breathed his last: euthanasia. With beaded mitre and with crozier, stalled upon his throne, widower of a widowed see, with upstiffed omophorion, with clotted hindparts. (Ulysses, 32)And easy passages:
He foresaw his pale body reclined in it at full, naked, in a womb of warmth, oiled by scented melting soap, softly laved. He saw his trunk and limbs riprippled over and sustained, buyed lightly upward, lemonyellow: his navel, bud of fless: and saw the dark tangled curls of his bush floating, floating hair of the stream around the limp father of thousands, a languid floating flower. (Ulysses, 71)In my Medieval Literature class we started with important Latin works in translation, did a brief stint in Old English, and are working our way through seminal Middle English texts, modernized and not. Some of them are boring:
The road was stone-paved, the path ledAnd some parts are interesting:
the men together. Their mail coats shone
hard, hand-linked, bright rings of iron
rang out on their gear, when right to the hall
they went trooping in their terrible armor.
Sea-weary, they set their broad shields,
wondrously-hard boards, against the building's wall;
they sat on a bench--their byrnies rang ou,
their soldiers' war-gear; their spears stood,
the gear of the seamen all together,
a gray forest of ash. That iron troop
was worthy of its weapons. (Beowulf, trans. Liuzza 63)
Lo! Here the duchess dere - today was sho taken -In my Elementary Differential Equations, we take math a step further by not solving just for variables, but for equations. Some of our problems are abstract:
Deep dolven and dede, diked in moldes.
He had murthered this mild by mid-day were rungen,
Withouten mercy on molde, I not what it ment;
He has forced her and filed and sho is fey leved;
He slew her unslely and slit her to the navel. (Alliterative Morte Arthure, line 974-9)
Solve the equation:Others have easy applications to the physical world:
dy/dx = e^(x+y)/(y-1)
A 3-kg mass is attached to a spring with stiffness k = 48 N/m. The mass is displaced 1/2 m to the left of the equilibrium point and given a velocity of 2 m/sec to the right. The damping force is negligible. Find the equation of motion of the mass along with the amplitude, period, and frequency. How long after release does the mass pass through the equilitbrium position?In Numbers and Polynomials, we prove a lot of basic truths about numbers. Some problems are crucial:
(Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic) Every natural number greater than 1 has exactly one prime factorization.Some problems aren't as important:
If a divides b and b is not equal to 0, then the absolute value of a is less than or equal to the absolute value of b.That's everything. I've taken up swimming this year, as I've mentioned, and I'm involved with RUF. Academically, though, you've just had a taste of my semester. Diff EQ, Proofs, and Medieval Lit: MWF; Joyce: TR.
Monday, October 13, 2008
The Movie "Fireproof"
I hate central Florida's Christian radio station. It plays old, peppy, effusive songs with little variation and less regard for persistent, deep problems in people's lives. Needless to say, playing worship music as background music is one of my pet peeves. I say that so no one thinks I'm a Christian culture pushover. There are great songs (with great music videos), of course, but they aren't all.
And there are good movies, too. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Fireproof (here's the trailer) wasn't bad. If you haven't seen it yet, you probably won't, but here's the plot spoiler warning anyway: may reference scenes not in the trailer. Plot "spoiler" is actually too hefty for this fairy tale kind of story: a firefighter is good at his job, bad at his marriage. His dad who recently converted asks him to follow a 40 day plan before he goes through with a divorce. It's a difficult plan to follow. The wife cries. And at the end of the story, guess how their marriage is?
One thing I found fascinating, actually, is how the story didn't have to end happily. I would've loved to see them play out the relationship if his heart had warmed toward her and she still pushed him off. Or if he couldn't carry out the plan and they both ended up embittered. Or if he couldn't finish the steps but she still saw the light. See, Christianity isn't a bubble of church-approved stories that will pop a positive witness to the world if a story doesn't end cheerily enough. The story has a happy ending, but not all of them do.
Still, Fireproof did a very good job portraying the reality of a normally bad marriage. The every-day mutual insistence on self-satisfaction that cements separation. She doesn't leave dinner for him; he doesn't tell her his plans. She starts flirting with a doctor; he can't stop looking at porn. It's all one-sided, of course. By that I mean any third-party observer can see that she's always right, and I think in real life it's grayer than that. But he's the bad guy, so let him be the bad guy.
The challenge in evaluating the movie is that there's a difference between saying things that are false and not saying everything that's true. A movie is not a theological treatise, so I give it a lot of leeway in not presenting every trial and urge and doctrine and pitfall of the faith. There was a lot of struggle shown when their marriage was failing. Nevertheless, I wish they would have shown any of the Christians sin.
Once the Caleb, the main character, converts, he is able to, in one unceasing rush of effort, stop his addiction to porn, love his wife, not even beat up the guy she's seeing, give up his dream of owning a boat, and have unflagging patience with her resistance to his attempts. It's a little too heroic. It would have only taken an extra line or two for him to sin, repent to his flawless firefighting buddy, and been told that sin is a struggle for life.
That's my main critique. I have other comments that don't fit in really well. I was impressed that about half our audience was black. I think the racial relations in the movie might have been one of its best features. White Christians and black Christians are afraid of each other, you know. The metaphors Fireproof drew between marriage and God were so powerful that I wondered how people share the message of Christ to unmarried people. I liked the way fire's symbolic meaning had inverted by the end from one of destruction to one of renewal. I hated the few songs they played in the background.
Oh, and one last thing. Dan took the bad acting as fundamental, but I saw the acting as unprofessional. That's not quite the same thing. There was one scene where an older woman who seemed really similar to my mom in like twenty years (but cheesier) confronts the wife on her lunches with the doctor. The woman wasn't trained as an actor, but she meant what she said. You could tell that she was wise--I read that they cast lots of roles after people volunteered from a flier at church--and that gave a level of sincerity which was almost inartistic in its brute mimicry of life.
I'd be really curious to hear if the movie actually inspired couples to change their habits toward each other. With the kind of integrated (profit-garnering) approach they do--the movie, the book, church promotions, etc.--it might give the level of community support to a couple that would be needed to buttress an empty relationship while it undergoes renovation.
And there are good movies, too. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Fireproof (here's the trailer) wasn't bad. If you haven't seen it yet, you probably won't, but here's the plot spoiler warning anyway: may reference scenes not in the trailer. Plot "spoiler" is actually too hefty for this fairy tale kind of story: a firefighter is good at his job, bad at his marriage. His dad who recently converted asks him to follow a 40 day plan before he goes through with a divorce. It's a difficult plan to follow. The wife cries. And at the end of the story, guess how their marriage is?
One thing I found fascinating, actually, is how the story didn't have to end happily. I would've loved to see them play out the relationship if his heart had warmed toward her and she still pushed him off. Or if he couldn't carry out the plan and they both ended up embittered. Or if he couldn't finish the steps but she still saw the light. See, Christianity isn't a bubble of church-approved stories that will pop a positive witness to the world if a story doesn't end cheerily enough. The story has a happy ending, but not all of them do.
Still, Fireproof did a very good job portraying the reality of a normally bad marriage. The every-day mutual insistence on self-satisfaction that cements separation. She doesn't leave dinner for him; he doesn't tell her his plans. She starts flirting with a doctor; he can't stop looking at porn. It's all one-sided, of course. By that I mean any third-party observer can see that she's always right, and I think in real life it's grayer than that. But he's the bad guy, so let him be the bad guy.
The challenge in evaluating the movie is that there's a difference between saying things that are false and not saying everything that's true. A movie is not a theological treatise, so I give it a lot of leeway in not presenting every trial and urge and doctrine and pitfall of the faith. There was a lot of struggle shown when their marriage was failing. Nevertheless, I wish they would have shown any of the Christians sin.
Once the Caleb, the main character, converts, he is able to, in one unceasing rush of effort, stop his addiction to porn, love his wife, not even beat up the guy she's seeing, give up his dream of owning a boat, and have unflagging patience with her resistance to his attempts. It's a little too heroic. It would have only taken an extra line or two for him to sin, repent to his flawless firefighting buddy, and been told that sin is a struggle for life.
That's my main critique. I have other comments that don't fit in really well. I was impressed that about half our audience was black. I think the racial relations in the movie might have been one of its best features. White Christians and black Christians are afraid of each other, you know. The metaphors Fireproof drew between marriage and God were so powerful that I wondered how people share the message of Christ to unmarried people. I liked the way fire's symbolic meaning had inverted by the end from one of destruction to one of renewal. I hated the few songs they played in the background.
Oh, and one last thing. Dan took the bad acting as fundamental, but I saw the acting as unprofessional. That's not quite the same thing. There was one scene where an older woman who seemed really similar to my mom in like twenty years (but cheesier) confronts the wife on her lunches with the doctor. The woman wasn't trained as an actor, but she meant what she said. You could tell that she was wise--I read that they cast lots of roles after people volunteered from a flier at church--and that gave a level of sincerity which was almost inartistic in its brute mimicry of life.
I'd be really curious to hear if the movie actually inspired couples to change their habits toward each other. With the kind of integrated (profit-garnering) approach they do--the movie, the book, church promotions, etc.--it might give the level of community support to a couple that would be needed to buttress an empty relationship while it undergoes renovation.
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Football Dominates
I haven't ever tried to write sports commentary, but it's hard to blog and not comment on sports when that's all you do in a day. I mean, I played racquetball early this morning, but that doesn't count because anything you do on a Saturday before noon is bonus activity. I ended up stopping by Andrew's dorm at 2 and he said he had just woken up.
After my morning extra credit awake time, I picked up my Chinese friend Yang from his apartment to introduce him to the aspect of American college culture called "tailgating." First I had to explain what tailgating was as he carefully documented the experience with his camera.
"Those people in purple and yellow are LSU fans," I said, pointing out some already-toasted Louisiana State supporters. "I hope we beat them."
"Me too," Yang said. "Is it okay if I take picture them?"
"You want to take a picture of them? Sure, go ahead."
He leaned out the window like the foreigner I used to be when I was in China and snapped a shot before we drove away. I introduced him to so many Americans when we got to the RUF tailgate that he gave up on any hope of remembering people's names and loosened up a bit talking about himself. We also worked out a system where I would introduce him to someone. When the person said his/her name, I would repeat it in really clear English so he would hear it better. I started doing that after one guy's name was Chuck, which Yang thought sounded identical to the word "truck." (They don't have the "tr" sound in Chinese.)
Yang and I tailgated for a while, and then when he left I stopped by the Cru tailgate and hung out with more people. Then tonight was the game we had been getting all pepped up for.
I can't decide whether I like the Associated Press summary of it or the concise, straight-up version from ESPN. Regardless, UF played an amazing game. This was an important game, since we've already lost once this season and if we had lost again tonight our season would've been over. On the other hand, LSU was ranked #3 so winning would seriously boost our pitiful 11th place. And then we won, and won by enough that Tim Tebow could sit out our last few offensive plays and let the second-string quarterback try to bring the ball in for a touchdown.
Understanding football strategy is a large part of your football experience. People who know things about football can get outraged at a ref far better than we normal fans. For them, when the ref blows the whistle for a penalty, they already know what the ref is going to call and are shouting about how it can't be true because we saw it and because we're UF and UF doesn't deserve penalties because we're awesome.
Sometimes their rhetoric gets a little shaky, but that's why we have a band who drowns them out with honor and distracts everyone until the next play with our cheers.
It's taken me several years of coming to UF games to let my mood be influenced by a football game. Now, though, if we lose I feel like I've lost, and when we won tonight I felt like I deserved to go to sleep because we had just done a great job.
Great job, Will. Now let's get some sleep.
After my morning extra credit awake time, I picked up my Chinese friend Yang from his apartment to introduce him to the aspect of American college culture called "tailgating." First I had to explain what tailgating was as he carefully documented the experience with his camera.
"Those people in purple and yellow are LSU fans," I said, pointing out some already-toasted Louisiana State supporters. "I hope we beat them."
"Me too," Yang said. "Is it okay if I take picture them?"
"You want to take a picture of them? Sure, go ahead."
He leaned out the window like the foreigner I used to be when I was in China and snapped a shot before we drove away. I introduced him to so many Americans when we got to the RUF tailgate that he gave up on any hope of remembering people's names and loosened up a bit talking about himself. We also worked out a system where I would introduce him to someone. When the person said his/her name, I would repeat it in really clear English so he would hear it better. I started doing that after one guy's name was Chuck, which Yang thought sounded identical to the word "truck." (They don't have the "tr" sound in Chinese.)
Yang and I tailgated for a while, and then when he left I stopped by the Cru tailgate and hung out with more people. Then tonight was the game we had been getting all pepped up for.
I can't decide whether I like the Associated Press summary of it or the concise, straight-up version from ESPN. Regardless, UF played an amazing game. This was an important game, since we've already lost once this season and if we had lost again tonight our season would've been over. On the other hand, LSU was ranked #3 so winning would seriously boost our pitiful 11th place. And then we won, and won by enough that Tim Tebow could sit out our last few offensive plays and let the second-string quarterback try to bring the ball in for a touchdown.
Understanding football strategy is a large part of your football experience. People who know things about football can get outraged at a ref far better than we normal fans. For them, when the ref blows the whistle for a penalty, they already know what the ref is going to call and are shouting about how it can't be true because we saw it and because we're UF and UF doesn't deserve penalties because we're awesome.
Sometimes their rhetoric gets a little shaky, but that's why we have a band who drowns them out with honor and distracts everyone until the next play with our cheers.
It's taken me several years of coming to UF games to let my mood be influenced by a football game. Now, though, if we lose I feel like I've lost, and when we won tonight I felt like I deserved to go to sleep because we had just done a great job.
Great job, Will. Now let's get some sleep.
Thursday, October 9, 2008
The Gay Guy and the Fat Girl
Today's theme is contentious, so I start with an anecdote.
I had dinner with April tonight and she asked how I was doing. "Pretty good," I said. "I late-added a Chinese class, then dropped that and another class to be able to adjust back to America better."
"I know," she said. "I read your blog."
It's tricky, this blogging thing, trying to be interesting but not so much that I'm boring in real life. I have to think deeper for people who read my blog. Just wait till you get a fake name from me, April.
Take, for example, my friend I'll call Ron. I imagine he'd be shy about hearing his real name because he this is a story about rejection, and he isn't used to it. I, on the other hand, am rejection's right hand man. Fresh off rejection, it always helps to go back to the basics, so Ron and I have been theorizing about how relationships develop. Or don't develop.
It sucks to realize that the girl you're interested in doesn't even have you on her radar. Ron and I have decided to call this being the gay guy: a different kind of male to girls. One who can be confided in, one who is nonthreatening, unarousing, removed. It's like a girl clapping for Pinocchio's performance and then laughingly skipping away with a brawny man while Pinocchio is left protesting with wooden lips, "But I'm a real boy!"
Don't take me to mean that I expect girls to flirt with every straight guy they know. I just mean that it's nice to be on a list even if you don't want to be selected. For example, consider this dialogue:
"I'm so mad at Francine."
"What for?"
"She didn't invite me to her party."
"Sharon, you're out of town that weekend."
"Yeah, but she still should have invited me."
Ron and I phrased it differently, but with the same message: each country must have some kind of a list of how much any other country is a threat. Would a country want to be a threat? Of course not, but you at least want to be considered. And even if you've had a summit at which you decide that you're not a huge threat, and are just going to be friends, at least you earned a meeting. Guys don't want to be human Switzerlands.
Then Ron and I realized that guys do it, too, stereotypically to the fat girl: you just expect her to know that she's out of the running and treat her like a bystander in the great race for a spouse. She's less than a girl.
I remember in junior high there was a girl I liked who was way too cool for me. She liked one of my friends, and I would ask her to tell me about it because I'd rather hear her talk about liking someone and pretend it was me than not hear about it and puff myself up to thinking I was under consideration.
I'm not sure if I chose the best path. Currently dispassionate me would say neither approach was good and I should've just gotten over her. But if you could just get over someone, you wouldn't need to invent explanations like Ron and I have for why it hurts.
I had dinner with April tonight and she asked how I was doing. "Pretty good," I said. "I late-added a Chinese class, then dropped that and another class to be able to adjust back to America better."
"I know," she said. "I read your blog."
It's tricky, this blogging thing, trying to be interesting but not so much that I'm boring in real life. I have to think deeper for people who read my blog. Just wait till you get a fake name from me, April.
Take, for example, my friend I'll call Ron. I imagine he'd be shy about hearing his real name because he this is a story about rejection, and he isn't used to it. I, on the other hand, am rejection's right hand man. Fresh off rejection, it always helps to go back to the basics, so Ron and I have been theorizing about how relationships develop. Or don't develop.
It sucks to realize that the girl you're interested in doesn't even have you on her radar. Ron and I have decided to call this being the gay guy: a different kind of male to girls. One who can be confided in, one who is nonthreatening, unarousing, removed. It's like a girl clapping for Pinocchio's performance and then laughingly skipping away with a brawny man while Pinocchio is left protesting with wooden lips, "But I'm a real boy!"
Don't take me to mean that I expect girls to flirt with every straight guy they know. I just mean that it's nice to be on a list even if you don't want to be selected. For example, consider this dialogue:
"I'm so mad at Francine."
"What for?"
"She didn't invite me to her party."
"Sharon, you're out of town that weekend."
"Yeah, but she still should have invited me."
Ron and I phrased it differently, but with the same message: each country must have some kind of a list of how much any other country is a threat. Would a country want to be a threat? Of course not, but you at least want to be considered. And even if you've had a summit at which you decide that you're not a huge threat, and are just going to be friends, at least you earned a meeting. Guys don't want to be human Switzerlands.
Then Ron and I realized that guys do it, too, stereotypically to the fat girl: you just expect her to know that she's out of the running and treat her like a bystander in the great race for a spouse. She's less than a girl.
I remember in junior high there was a girl I liked who was way too cool for me. She liked one of my friends, and I would ask her to tell me about it because I'd rather hear her talk about liking someone and pretend it was me than not hear about it and puff myself up to thinking I was under consideration.
I'm not sure if I chose the best path. Currently dispassionate me would say neither approach was good and I should've just gotten over her. But if you could just get over someone, you wouldn't need to invent explanations like Ron and I have for why it hurts.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Orthography: Its Killer
How do you read the title to this post? And by "you," I don't mean the vague, "people" you that we use a lot, nor do I mean you the hypothetical reader; I uncomfortably address the person currently absorbing these words, because this post is powerless for an audience that isn't composed of individuals. Okay, now hold that thought while I lay out an introduction.
Each major has its own realm of assurance. Physicists insist that we follow physical laws, economists insist there are rules of incentive, historians disagree with people regularly enough that it's like a rule, and so on. English majors have an obligation to assure the world that spelling conventions are important. It's a loaded statement, I know. "Important!" you exclaim indignantly. "Well, it shouldn't be." But here's the thing: symbols aren't bad. Obviously, letters aren't bad, but I mean symbols generally. The ability to write a sentence according to society's standards of spelling and grammar is currently a symbol of a good education. I could argue that it's an end to itself, but I don't think that's necessary. All that's necessary is to say it's a symbol of it.
And symbols not being bad, seeing spelling as a symbol for a good education isn't bad either. Now, you can argue that there are more accurate, equitable symbols, but that really just hints at most people's problem with valuing spelling: people don't believe that good education exists. Because if good education exists, and it's marked by good grammar and spelling, and you don't have good grammar and spelling (or "don't care"), then you must not be getting a good education. People's first reaction to that thought is to get defensive and think it's an attack on their worth. Just to be clear, I personally value you as much as a person whether you can write flawlessly or, as someone writing to me recently brought into play, whether you honestly confuse "to" and "two."
If you can admit that good education exists (and if it helps you, Teach for America's starting proposition is that there is an education gap) then there must be a symbol for it. Diplomas exist because employers haven't lived college with us: they need the symbol, even if it is distorted.
And when you consider it, spelling and grammar as a symbol for good breeding is a pretty fair deal. You don't need to be rich, or wear the right clothes, or have a proper accent. Grammar and spelling are pretty robust, as statisticians would say. Jessica got me a shirt for my birthday one year that says, "Good grammar costs nothing." I always apologize for wearing it when people ask me. "A friend got it for me and I like the color," I demur. But the message is true: wealth (and lack of it) is not an excuse.
So that's all the theory I can make up for one day. Let's talk application: it's and its. The paragraph was coming, you knew from the beginning of this post. I'll just tell it to you straight:
1) It's a great day today.
2) Tomorrow is its own problem.
There's no excuse for the first one, really. Contractions use apostrophes.
"I'm not very good at orthography." [I am]
"I don't even know what that means." [do not]
"It's spelling." [it is]
"Really? I never would've guessed." [would have]
Please hear me: just because you use an apostrophe doesn't mean something is a contraction, but when you have a contraction, you use an apostrophe. For example, just because I'm a person doesn't make me a student at UF, but if I am a student at UF, I'm also a person.
So you look at your sentence and you ask yourself, "Is there an extra word I'm not saying?" If the answer is yes, it's a contraction and you need an apostrophe. Just to be obnoxious, I'm going to highlight all the contractions in the rest of this post so you know what I'm talking about.
Let's move on to the possessive case. I have some degree of sympathy for you if you get this one confused. For most things, indicating possession requires an apostrophe. "The cat's bowl is dirty." "Will's tone is not condescending." And so on. But pronouns are different. Just look: "His cat is in the freezer." "Our house burned down yesterday." No apostrophes!
It's the same thing with "its." You have to hunt to find a good neuter subject (like groups), but then it's a piece of cake. "Apple remade its laptops." "The History Club is on its own for funding."
Now for the pop quiz. I didn't make it easy, but there's only one question and it's an open-book test. Partial credit probably not given.
In the title of this post, do I mean "Orthography: it is really tough" or "Orthography: how it is dying"? Pass your papers forward with your name in the top right hand corner...
Each major has its own realm of assurance. Physicists insist that we follow physical laws, economists insist there are rules of incentive, historians disagree with people regularly enough that it's like a rule, and so on. English majors have an obligation to assure the world that spelling conventions are important. It's a loaded statement, I know. "Important!" you exclaim indignantly. "Well, it shouldn't be." But here's the thing: symbols aren't bad. Obviously, letters aren't bad, but I mean symbols generally. The ability to write a sentence according to society's standards of spelling and grammar is currently a symbol of a good education. I could argue that it's an end to itself, but I don't think that's necessary. All that's necessary is to say it's a symbol of it.
And symbols not being bad, seeing spelling as a symbol for a good education isn't bad either. Now, you can argue that there are more accurate, equitable symbols, but that really just hints at most people's problem with valuing spelling: people don't believe that good education exists. Because if good education exists, and it's marked by good grammar and spelling, and you don't have good grammar and spelling (or "don't care"), then you must not be getting a good education. People's first reaction to that thought is to get defensive and think it's an attack on their worth. Just to be clear, I personally value you as much as a person whether you can write flawlessly or, as someone writing to me recently brought into play, whether you honestly confuse "to" and "two."
If you can admit that good education exists (and if it helps you, Teach for America's starting proposition is that there is an education gap) then there must be a symbol for it. Diplomas exist because employers haven't lived college with us: they need the symbol, even if it is distorted.
And when you consider it, spelling and grammar as a symbol for good breeding is a pretty fair deal. You don't need to be rich, or wear the right clothes, or have a proper accent. Grammar and spelling are pretty robust, as statisticians would say. Jessica got me a shirt for my birthday one year that says, "Good grammar costs nothing." I always apologize for wearing it when people ask me. "A friend got it for me and I like the color," I demur. But the message is true: wealth (and lack of it) is not an excuse.
So that's all the theory I can make up for one day. Let's talk application: it's and its. The paragraph was coming, you knew from the beginning of this post. I'll just tell it to you straight:
1) It's a great day today.
2) Tomorrow is its own problem.
There's no excuse for the first one, really. Contractions use apostrophes.
"I'm not very good at orthography." [I am]
"I don't even know what that means." [do not]
"It's spelling." [it is]
"Really? I never would've guessed." [would have]
Please hear me: just because you use an apostrophe doesn't mean something is a contraction, but when you have a contraction, you use an apostrophe. For example, just because I'm a person doesn't make me a student at UF, but if I am a student at UF, I'm also a person.
So you look at your sentence and you ask yourself, "Is there an extra word I'm not saying?" If the answer is yes, it's a contraction and you need an apostrophe. Just to be obnoxious, I'm going to highlight all the contractions in the rest of this post so you know what I'm talking about.
Let's move on to the possessive case. I have some degree of sympathy for you if you get this one confused. For most things, indicating possession requires an apostrophe. "The cat's bowl is dirty." "Will's tone is not condescending." And so on. But pronouns are different. Just look: "His cat is in the freezer." "Our house burned down yesterday." No apostrophes!
It's the same thing with "its." You have to hunt to find a good neuter subject (like groups), but then it's a piece of cake. "Apple remade its laptops." "The History Club is on its own for funding."
Now for the pop quiz. I didn't make it easy, but there's only one question and it's an open-book test. Partial credit probably not given.
In the title of this post, do I mean "Orthography: it is really tough" or "Orthography: how it is dying"? Pass your papers forward with your name in the top right hand corner...
Monday, October 6, 2008
Omnipotence and Milkshakes
I didn't do a very good job explaining in my last post what Stephen (from A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man) meant in the quote about not taking communion. That's all English majors do, really: explain why you should like books. So I'll try again for a sentence or two. Stephen knows that he--the part of him that is him--is incompatible with taking communion when he doesn't believe it, because he can't dissociate the symbol from the act. If he did, he fears the "chemical action which would be set up in my soul." I was hoping to pun off of Joyce's convenient "chemical action," but that part isn't as important.
Well, Stephen might think that's a big deal, but today I bought a chocolate milkshake. I used to think I had a choice when I bought a milkshake, but then after about a year of only ever buying vanilla, I realized that my choice wasn't of the quality I thought it was. I'm almost incapable of buying a different flavor. I come to the decision fresh every time, and every time I have in mind that occasionally I buy chocolate, and occasionally strawberry, and occasionally vanilla. But then I always come away with vanilla.
Then today came. I went to the Chick-fil-A on Archer because they sell milkshakes there, and without thinking about it, I ordered chocolate. I'm pretty sure I'm not even the same person I was several weeks ago.
I was at a barbecue Saturday with a bunch of people and tried to explain the change that's come over me recently, only I was too eager to tell and didn't think it was important that I had only known the girl I was talking to for about twenty minutes.
"I don't love people," I summed up earnestly. "I only love myself. Is that a problem?"
She balked.
It's difficult to tell which changes are me returning from a seven-month stay in China and which are permanent modifications to my temperament. And I just bought a chocolate milkshake.
It reminds me of God's omnipotence, actually. People out for a riddle often wonder why, if God can do anything, can he not sin? Ever since I was little I looked a little skeptically at the "temptation" of Christ since God can't sin... right?
"Can" here is the fuzzy word. When we say God "can" do things, we mean there's no force external to him that would limit him. When we say we humans "can" do things, we mean it in a more nebulous sense, especially in English. (In Chinese they divide "can" into 能 (unrestricted ability) and 会 (learned ability). So I think if you're talking about driving a car, if you 能 drive a car, you have the keys and gas in your tank; if you 会 drive your parents have taught you and you know how to make it down the street without crashing.)
We as humans are changeable, and so on one day I might be in the mood to wear green and on another day in the mood to wear red. I can choose green or red. Or both if it's Christmas.
Some things about us change less. One season I might decide to watch Survivor, the next year I might prefer America's Next Top Model. It all depends on whether I have a girlfriend or not. Or whatever. I can choose to watch whatever show I want.
Some things barely change at all. I don't really like beans. If I'm pressed, I'll eat them out of politeness. I can eat beans--I guess.
And still other aspects of ourselves we regard as fundamental. One day I might snap and kill someone in cold blood. An extreme example, you say, but only because you're so secure in yourself: hat makes you different from a murderer? I can commit murder.
Here you would stop me. "I could not commit murder," you say indignantly. "Never have, never will." The idea here is that no circumstance imaginable would induce you to stab someone to death. But two factors make this uncertain: you don't know yourself perfectly; and you are mutable.
In contrast, God is self-aware and immutable. His can is not one limited by circumstance (there is nothing outside his control) but by character. God doesn't sin because that's not who God is. I'm tagging all the people I know with theological training on the Facebook version of this blog so if I'm totally off-base they can let me know. But here's my summary: God always chooses vanilla milkshakes. Thus proving by algebra that I am not God.
Well, Stephen might think that's a big deal, but today I bought a chocolate milkshake. I used to think I had a choice when I bought a milkshake, but then after about a year of only ever buying vanilla, I realized that my choice wasn't of the quality I thought it was. I'm almost incapable of buying a different flavor. I come to the decision fresh every time, and every time I have in mind that occasionally I buy chocolate, and occasionally strawberry, and occasionally vanilla. But then I always come away with vanilla.
Then today came. I went to the Chick-fil-A on Archer because they sell milkshakes there, and without thinking about it, I ordered chocolate. I'm pretty sure I'm not even the same person I was several weeks ago.
I was at a barbecue Saturday with a bunch of people and tried to explain the change that's come over me recently, only I was too eager to tell and didn't think it was important that I had only known the girl I was talking to for about twenty minutes.
"I don't love people," I summed up earnestly. "I only love myself. Is that a problem?"
She balked.
It's difficult to tell which changes are me returning from a seven-month stay in China and which are permanent modifications to my temperament. And I just bought a chocolate milkshake.
It reminds me of God's omnipotence, actually. People out for a riddle often wonder why, if God can do anything, can he not sin? Ever since I was little I looked a little skeptically at the "temptation" of Christ since God can't sin... right?
"Can" here is the fuzzy word. When we say God "can" do things, we mean there's no force external to him that would limit him. When we say we humans "can" do things, we mean it in a more nebulous sense, especially in English. (In Chinese they divide "can" into 能 (unrestricted ability) and 会 (learned ability). So I think if you're talking about driving a car, if you 能 drive a car, you have the keys and gas in your tank; if you 会 drive your parents have taught you and you know how to make it down the street without crashing.)
We as humans are changeable, and so on one day I might be in the mood to wear green and on another day in the mood to wear red. I can choose green or red. Or both if it's Christmas.
Some things about us change less. One season I might decide to watch Survivor, the next year I might prefer America's Next Top Model. It all depends on whether I have a girlfriend or not. Or whatever. I can choose to watch whatever show I want.
Some things barely change at all. I don't really like beans. If I'm pressed, I'll eat them out of politeness. I can eat beans--I guess.
And still other aspects of ourselves we regard as fundamental. One day I might snap and kill someone in cold blood. An extreme example, you say, but only because you're so secure in yourself: hat makes you different from a murderer? I can commit murder.
Here you would stop me. "I could not commit murder," you say indignantly. "Never have, never will." The idea here is that no circumstance imaginable would induce you to stab someone to death. But two factors make this uncertain: you don't know yourself perfectly; and you are mutable.
In contrast, God is self-aware and immutable. His can is not one limited by circumstance (there is nothing outside his control) but by character. God doesn't sin because that's not who God is. I'm tagging all the people I know with theological training on the Facebook version of this blog so if I'm totally off-base they can let me know. But here's my summary: God always chooses vanilla milkshakes. Thus proving by algebra that I am not God.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Underwear and the Eucharist
I'll phrase this hypothetically since the real party I was invited to I was later uninvited to.
Consider the concept of an underwear party. It could be a race with a skimpy cause thrown in for legitimacy, or a birthday party at which people are only allowed to wear underwear. The idea fascinates me because underwear is a socially constructed taboo. There's nothing inherently sexual about that fabric in that shape. In fact, now that I've taken up swimming, I see (very tan, attractive) people every day wearing less clothes to swim than they would as underwear. I myself am only hardcore enough for "Jammers," which are like Speedos with three inches appended for your legs.
So logically, going to an underwear party is just another fun theme-based party, like a "wear your prom clothes" party or a "50s-wear" party. And yet. I don't think I'd be able to go to an underwear party lust-free, and I admit that for most people that's the whole point. But I should be able to look at things from an objective perspective. If I could do that, it would give me the freedom to go to an underwear party or not.
That would be fun. Flirtatious, obviously, but in a pseudo-serious way, as if the whole house was in on the Emperor's new clothes. Pretending like nothing's unusual but snickering after every sentence from the titillating atmosphere.
It reminds me of a passage from Joyce. Stephen Dedalus has grown up in the Catholic church but recently decided that he doesn't actually believe it. His mom pleads with him to go to the Easter mass and take communion, but as he talks over the matter with his friend, he comes to the conclusion that he's too attached to the Catholic idea of communion as a sacred act to partake when he doesn't believe. The symbolism behind underwear and the Eucharist is too great to become immune to.
Consider the concept of an underwear party. It could be a race with a skimpy cause thrown in for legitimacy, or a birthday party at which people are only allowed to wear underwear. The idea fascinates me because underwear is a socially constructed taboo. There's nothing inherently sexual about that fabric in that shape. In fact, now that I've taken up swimming, I see (very tan, attractive) people every day wearing less clothes to swim than they would as underwear. I myself am only hardcore enough for "Jammers," which are like Speedos with three inches appended for your legs.
So logically, going to an underwear party is just another fun theme-based party, like a "wear your prom clothes" party or a "50s-wear" party. And yet. I don't think I'd be able to go to an underwear party lust-free, and I admit that for most people that's the whole point. But I should be able to look at things from an objective perspective. If I could do that, it would give me the freedom to go to an underwear party or not.
That would be fun. Flirtatious, obviously, but in a pseudo-serious way, as if the whole house was in on the Emperor's new clothes. Pretending like nothing's unusual but snickering after every sentence from the titillating atmosphere.
It reminds me of a passage from Joyce. Stephen Dedalus has grown up in the Catholic church but recently decided that he doesn't actually believe it. His mom pleads with him to go to the Easter mass and take communion, but as he talks over the matter with his friend, he comes to the conclusion that he's too attached to the Catholic idea of communion as a sacred act to partake when he doesn't believe. The symbolism behind underwear and the Eucharist is too great to become immune to.
--Do you fear then, Cranly asked, that the God of the Roman catholics would strike you dead and damn you if you made a sacrilegious communion?
--The God of the Roman catholics could do that now, Stephen said. I fear more than that the chemical action which would be set upin my soul by a false homage to a symbol behind which are massed twenty centuries of authority and veneration.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Doing the Deed
I turned in the drop form yesterday. My schedule is now short CHI3410 and CHT3500. With both of my Chinese classes gone, I'm down to 12 credits and a theoretically much easier semester. But I still feel tense, and it's tiring me out.
On one hand, I feel really accomplished. I aced my Medieval Lit test, finished my math proofs in time to turn them in, wrote a pretty good essay for Joyce. I even sent something in the mail yesterday, and that takes stamps and time and everything.
And yet, I've shied away from several things. For example, I wanted to clean the everlasting stack of dirty dishes. In the last week or two I've shrunk into a habit of using one cup, one small plate for my breakfast bagel, and one large plate for lunch. I have one knife with butter remnants and one with peanut butter traces, and one for cheese, too. So no matter what I'm hungry for I have the tableware needed to make myself food without cleaning anything. But I don't really like that habit and think when I have the time and energy it'd be nice to tidy up a bit.
The light in my room has grown finicky. I didn't know lights could be finicky, but recently when I turn on the switch, my light will take up to ten seconds to turn on, or not at all. Right now it's unwilling. I tried to be scientific about the problem, but it's difficult when you don't know anything. The problem can't be with the lightbulb, because the light will turn on sometimes. I tested it out with the fan on and off, but that didn't do anything. So maybe there's a wiring problem that magically popped up.
There are other deeds lurking, too. I half-intended to go to a coached swimming lesson with the triathletes someone invited me to, but by the end of today I felt scared somehow. Too much assessment, maybe.
I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but coming back from China has been difficult because in America it's not an accomplishment to be average. In China, me just living got respect. Now I'm back at college with thousands of other people who are also going to college and I'm drowning in normalcy. And drowning was supposed to be my comparison for my courseload before and after dropping Chinese, so it's worrying that I'm still using it.
It's difficult to read Joyce's perfect sentences, exquisitely crafted in endless variety, and with every one see my failure as a writer. Usually it takes a whole book before I admit that I can't do that. Joyce proves his superiority every paragraph afresh.
I guess I'm in a pretty disheartened mood. I used to call these 2am moods, because in high school 2am was late and lamenting my girl troubles then felt like I was baring my soul to the world. Now I do that less often.
But tomorrow I'm going to help build a wheelchair ramp, so that might be fun.
On one hand, I feel really accomplished. I aced my Medieval Lit test, finished my math proofs in time to turn them in, wrote a pretty good essay for Joyce. I even sent something in the mail yesterday, and that takes stamps and time and everything.
And yet, I've shied away from several things. For example, I wanted to clean the everlasting stack of dirty dishes. In the last week or two I've shrunk into a habit of using one cup, one small plate for my breakfast bagel, and one large plate for lunch. I have one knife with butter remnants and one with peanut butter traces, and one for cheese, too. So no matter what I'm hungry for I have the tableware needed to make myself food without cleaning anything. But I don't really like that habit and think when I have the time and energy it'd be nice to tidy up a bit.
The light in my room has grown finicky. I didn't know lights could be finicky, but recently when I turn on the switch, my light will take up to ten seconds to turn on, or not at all. Right now it's unwilling. I tried to be scientific about the problem, but it's difficult when you don't know anything. The problem can't be with the lightbulb, because the light will turn on sometimes. I tested it out with the fan on and off, but that didn't do anything. So maybe there's a wiring problem that magically popped up.
There are other deeds lurking, too. I half-intended to go to a coached swimming lesson with the triathletes someone invited me to, but by the end of today I felt scared somehow. Too much assessment, maybe.
I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but coming back from China has been difficult because in America it's not an accomplishment to be average. In China, me just living got respect. Now I'm back at college with thousands of other people who are also going to college and I'm drowning in normalcy. And drowning was supposed to be my comparison for my courseload before and after dropping Chinese, so it's worrying that I'm still using it.
It's difficult to read Joyce's perfect sentences, exquisitely crafted in endless variety, and with every one see my failure as a writer. Usually it takes a whole book before I admit that I can't do that. Joyce proves his superiority every paragraph afresh.
I guess I'm in a pretty disheartened mood. I used to call these 2am moods, because in high school 2am was late and lamenting my girl troubles then felt like I was baring my soul to the world. Now I do that less often.
But tomorrow I'm going to help build a wheelchair ramp, so that might be fun.
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Witnessing a Paper
I decided to write my 8-10 page midterm for my Joyce class on one paragraph of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, a famous book about a boy growing up and figuring out who he is. It's really difficult to write an essay for a class you don't like. This paper has come smoothly but I think that's because I don't think it's a brilliant essay. It's actually a pretty boring paper:
If you want to read the rest of the paper, you can:
I think if you click on the picture, you can see a full-size version where you can read all my notes. This is how I write essays. There's no spatial organization, but I do find that I write bigger when there isn't anything on the page, so my final comments before I started a draft are scribbled in between other, less relevant things. You might be able to tell I started this essay in Library West. Where else would I encounter freshmen girls who were desperately cramming for a pre-calc exam? I can do absolute value problems!
Math is a surprising portion of my schedule. Mallory and I take a math class together every semester, but I have to catch up since I was in China in the spring, so I'm in diff-eq and my proofs class. We took our first test in the proofs class, and I was marked down for not being thorough enough proving that anything times zero is zero. I love that class.
But back to my paper. You might be able to tell I'm having trouble focusing. I've channeled some of my non-focus into Facebook messenger, which sucks as a messenger unless you really, really want to procrastinate and don't care if you're talking to your best friend from second grade's cousin because you both happen to be online. But it's okay, because the girl I was talking to is in my class working on her paper, too. So it's practically like I'm writing my essay.
Since my essay is boring and hers is about Spanish, we talked about religion. I got to share with her about what I believe ("witnessing," to use the Christian parlance). I thought it'd be weird if we had a deep conversation online over Joyce. Last night at RUF the preacher was talking about how we shouldn't be afraid to get in conversations with people about God. Then I was pulled over coming out of the parking lot because my headlights weren't on, and the cop asked where I was coming from. "RUF," I began, thinking of the sermon. "It's a Christian ministry..." But the cop left without converting and I left without a ticket.
But for tonight, all people will be witnessing is someone doing a fantastic job finishing up his Joyce paper.
At least, that's my first paragraph while I only have five pages finish. By the time I reach my conclusion, I might have changed my mind and think Joyce is actually supporting Irish despondency.At the end of book one of James Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, young Stephen Dedalus reflects on his encounter with the rector. "He was alone. He was happy and free." Then, "he wished that he could do something kind for [Father Dolan] to show him that he was not proud" (64). Underlying this thought is Stephen's idea that conflict resolution is possible: he succeeded in complaining to the rector; he can succeed in convincing Father Dolan that he isn't really a bad boy. In book two, though, we quickly learn that the respect Stephen thought he received from the rector was only patronizing indulgence. When Stephen participates in a school play, he has a new mentality that happiness, which is still conceived of as being "alone" (85), proceeds from withdrawal. This other extreme is no more satisfying or lasting than the first, but a close reading of Stephen's explanation for isolation reveals a stubbornness for insignificance that, a contrario, is an encouraging statement of empowerment for downtrodden Irishmen.
If you want to read the rest of the paper, you can:
I think if you click on the picture, you can see a full-size version where you can read all my notes. This is how I write essays. There's no spatial organization, but I do find that I write bigger when there isn't anything on the page, so my final comments before I started a draft are scribbled in between other, less relevant things. You might be able to tell I started this essay in Library West. Where else would I encounter freshmen girls who were desperately cramming for a pre-calc exam? I can do absolute value problems!
Math is a surprising portion of my schedule. Mallory and I take a math class together every semester, but I have to catch up since I was in China in the spring, so I'm in diff-eq and my proofs class. We took our first test in the proofs class, and I was marked down for not being thorough enough proving that anything times zero is zero. I love that class.
But back to my paper. You might be able to tell I'm having trouble focusing. I've channeled some of my non-focus into Facebook messenger, which sucks as a messenger unless you really, really want to procrastinate and don't care if you're talking to your best friend from second grade's cousin because you both happen to be online. But it's okay, because the girl I was talking to is in my class working on her paper, too. So it's practically like I'm writing my essay.
Since my essay is boring and hers is about Spanish, we talked about religion. I got to share with her about what I believe ("witnessing," to use the Christian parlance). I thought it'd be weird if we had a deep conversation online over Joyce. Last night at RUF the preacher was talking about how we shouldn't be afraid to get in conversations with people about God. Then I was pulled over coming out of the parking lot because my headlights weren't on, and the cop asked where I was coming from. "RUF," I began, thinking of the sermon. "It's a Christian ministry..." But the cop left without converting and I left without a ticket.
But for tonight, all people will be witnessing is someone doing a fantastic job finishing up his Joyce paper.
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