The Nutty Ones

It's been a good while since I've put anything on this blog. So here's something. I wrote it a couple of years ago, but it's a start--perhaps sharing a little will inspire something to flow out of my pen that I might "publish" here.

The Nutty Ones

Forrest Gump’s mama was dead wrong. Life ain’t like a box a chocolates, it is a box of chocolates. The days can be god-knows-what type of truffles—overwhelming and sickening—you wonder what sick bastard would place that in your path. Or when the caramel stretches for miles and miles and you question: is this ever going to end? You are glued to the never-ending day that started pleasurably but is now growing denser between your teeth, tighter around your tongue, closer to a gag than a gulp. And then, amidst the terrifying truffles, there are the turtles. The nutty ones. As if you weren’t nutty enough. As if you weren’t pokey enough. The chocolate can never simply be left plain, as God (seeing as you are God) intended. Yet, from the antsy race through the ick, to this pokey, this crunchy, this condoned before the start, yes, this silly turtle, allowing for the noting of the deep, dark chocolate, this is the one that has most surprised you. 

Priorities

I wrote this piece last year on Easter for my senior project. For the first time in over three years I attended a church(y) service today--Mount Hermon's Sunrise service. Churchy because the message is a telling of the Easter story mostly. (Which I appreciate. I'd rather not a full sermon.) However, this piece still rings quite true for me on the Easter Sunday.

31 March 2013

Holy week. The naming of the days preceding Easter is much more reasonable in the Romance languages. Viernes Santo. Not “Good,” but rather Holy Friday. The days are considered holy. Good, especially in modern English, is quite out of place, so far as I’m concerned.

Church. “Cr-easter Christians.” That term is insulting. As is “Nominal Catholics.” To each her own. Allow that she labels herself according to that with which she most identifies, whether or not her habits are up to the “standards” of said community.

Lapsed Christian that I am, there is a remnant of tradition that pulls me toward the Church on Holy days, paired with a dose of self-inflicted guilt. Yet I do not go. Besides, Jesus didn’t go to Church on what we call Easter. My sin, if I can use such language, my sin is that I am not with others, among friends. That’s what Jesus did. When Jesus rose from the dead, he went and hung out with his friends, after enjoying some gardening. 

Of this World

There has been a (welcome) decrease over the last ten years of the 90s' hit Jesus-fish phenomenon in the religious pockets of Santa Cruz County. However, replacing the dwindling fish population, a new form of bumper-sticker evangelicalism has emerged:

The HE>i decals and the “not of this world” decals.

I thought the HE>i decal represented some faux-hipster charity or clothing brand. (How would one even say that? “Hay-kai?”) But apparently, one should connect the “HE” to God and the i to I and then to the driver.

Jesus/God is bigger, and presumably more important, than the I. Which is why “I” is expressed with a grammatically incorrect, lowercase vowel. Even though the sticker does draw attention to the driver. But then again, most all evangelism struggles with to whom it points when the day is over. So I’ll forgive the ungrammatical HE>i. Even though it is huge and confusing. Maybe since the driver knows what it stands for, it is meant to be a reminder to her, not an announcement to the world?

As for the “now” stickers. Does it mean “Jesus, come now?” I figured. But then I saw it paired with “not of this world.” Ah. So the cross is also a “t.” Hm. There is something rotten in Denmark. Arrogance, perhaps? Pride? I know the sticker bearers mean no harm.

If this Jesus was FULLY God and also FULLY human, I think (perhaps wrongly) that he became and was and is part of this world. Don’t forget John 3:17, my Biblical friends: He came not to condemn the world . . .

He ate fish and drank wine and pooped and peed and bled and sweat and stunk and touched dirty feet. 

Yes. Of this world. We are all of this world. And it is good. 

Someone in Genesis said, “it is good.” 

The Evolution of the Tree Fort

Not a Through Street

Our tree fort--on the neighbor’s property--was and is a castle: real shingles, a climbable rope swing, a trap-door, a real cabinet, a pulley connected to the house, and a zip-line. We used to climb over the railing and down the rope, or vice-versa. Eric broke his arm on that zip-line; Rachel told him to let go at the end and he’d fly. (She failed to mention that Dad caught her.)

During the fall and winter seasons, we would slide down the hill on the pine needles—not always intentionally—and straight into the stunted, bush-like oaks and other unidentifiable, shrubs. And the occasional poison oak.

Inside of the cabinet we stored pinecones and other projectiles. By means of the pulley, we received our nourishment: apples, oranges, muffins. (Thanks, Mom.)

We prepared for battles, conquered our foes, and celebrated the victories from that tree fort; indeed, it fostered imagination, conflict, reconciliation, and many, many memories.

The fort leans a little funny now. A supporting board is cracked. The zip-line is gone. The pulley is gone. The bar to which the zip was attached leans precariously across the trail that is no longer well-trodden. Soon it will no longer stare forlornly into my window, dancing with the ghosts of the grown children of its youth. We’ll have to say goodbye.

Perhaps I’ll keep a piece of wood. Or that sign: not a through street. It’ll be a good reminder.

Cliché of the Day: Twenty-somethings and Technology

Technology: the ever present, ever whined about convenience and nuisance that I use now to communicate with a wee audience. But, it is sooo annoying, says the Original English Major.

Even Upworthy has become tiresome. It is time sucked away that could be used otherwise, that is lost forever. We don’t get this moment back. Ever. 

Upworthy, so long as we’re on the topic, is indeed worthy. One can learn about happenings of which s/he is otherwise ignorant: stop and frisk, on-line sexual slavery, etc. These things are outraging. The movements in response are the fruit of well-managed anger.

But do we do anything? Enough to keep Upworthy running. Is it a feel-good thing? The disconnect between humans that has come with technology has harmed our ability to feel, to relate, to communicate, to engage in legitimate understanding. Are media outlets such as Upworthy and Change.org successful for some generated feeling of connection, of participation? They are the news’ sources. Instead of reading the NY Times or SF Chronicle, we watch Upworthy or vote on Change and feel informed and involved; we feel something.

The generation tired of apathy, tired of the postmodern blahs, finds in these media a pseudo-connection. It is, though, the same generation that is heading the initiatives. Is it not? At least it is an effort to make connection, to interact.

I, too, subscribe to Upworthy, receive e-mails from Change and Avaaz and sometimes even 350.org and CREDO Action. How I wound up on all these mailing lists, I don’t know; why I haven’t unsubscribed, well, as it is I feel guilty for skipping over petitions or ignoring videos. Especially if I skip petitions solely for my lack of knowledge regarding the cause, the event, the likely relevant issue at hand. Instead of researching, I guilt trip myself while, oops, deleting the e-mail.

Yet it is too easy to simply click yes, this I support, to click “add my name to the proposal,” to “sign the petition.” We become lazy. Instead of researching for ourselves, we rely on others; we don’t dirty our hands.

“I’ll write a check. I support art; I just don’t have to see it,” says Ouiser.

That is how I’ve begun to feel about Change.org, Upworthy, et. al. Even World Vision. Even the Mentoring Project, to which I’ve sent many a hard-earned dollar meant for tuition.

I write a check. I click “yes.” I support change. I just don’t have to do it. I’ll give you my two to ten minutes of passion—for however long your filmed or written vignette may be— leave the rest to you. Good luck. 

Cliché of the Day: A cliché topic, the "-ists"

You’ve probably heard it: “My best friend is black.” “My best friend is gay.” Ad nauseam. If you haven’t, well, you’re blessed. (Yep, I could’ve helped that cliché.)

Now, I haven’t heard “My best friend is Mexican” or latino or Asian or Middle Eastern or African;  I don’t doubt that people say such things. But, it probably stays there, rather than using more specific language: Guatemalan, Peruvian, Uruguayan, Honduran, Columbian; Cambodian, Vietnamese, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Hmong; Indian, Pakistani, Israeli, Iraqi, Palestinian; Malagasy, Nigerian, Sudanese, Rwandan, Ghanan, Ethiopian, Mauritanian, etc. You probably mean your best friend is American, or s/he isn’t “one of your best friends,” as the person’s actual ethnicity is beyond memory.

My closer and older friends are white. White, straight, females. I have a close friend who is first generation American; her father is Dutch. I have a wonderful friend who is Peruvian, who studied and is currently working in the U.S. There are people dear to me who are Spaniards. And family that is Mexican. One friend who is gay. (And, guess what? He is a white American.) End of story. Nope. Not too diversified, my life. To boot, most of them are Christians.

 

There’s one not heard: “My best friend is a Christian.” (Add to that “and not an asshole,” and then it might be a reasonable thing to say. Probably not.) 

I’ll say it again: my closer and older friends are white, straight, Christian women. Does that make me racist? No. Am I racist? Probably.

The majority of people are racist and/or prejudice in some way against some people group. White people need to stop defending themselves. We are not a post-racial or post sexist, or post homophobic society, and having, or claiming to have, a (best) friend from these fields does not change that.

So stop it. It sounds racist. It is defensive. And what are we defending? The fear of being labeled with an ist, no doubt. Perhaps that fear has grounds, perhaps it doesn’t. White Americans are obsessed with race, and it is disturbing. The obsession tends towards abstract conversations of color, of race, of ethnicity, and of self-protection, instead of conversations about people and the roots of their plight. It is no different when speaking of LGBT+ rights or women’s rights or immigration. Let us listen to people. Then let us speak of and with people, not concepts. Not money. Not numbers. Just people. With love.