Rude Works

The Wonder of It All: A Tribute to A Man of God

2012-02-14T11:03:00.000-08:00

I've read so many thoughtful posts and status updates by people who loved Dr. Kenyon today. He was truly a man after God's own heart. My own experiences with him were brief, but lifechanging. Dr. Kenyon taught me about how to view the world, and it was his thoughts on Wonder Vs. Doubt that have shaped much of how I see the world today.

Wonder is a Hope-Filled thing, and faith is the substance of things hoped for. Hope..wonder...is so integral to faith, and he really taught me that.

Kenyon also taught me how to laugh. You don't just chuckle, you don't just giggle, you don't just guffaw, you laugh from the edges of your heart, the very depths of your soul, your laugh comes booming out like a gunshot, loud and joyful for all the world to hear. That is the way to laugh.

I met with him once to discuss my bad grades in Perspectives, and I used my usual excuses, the ones that involved my father's death, and the pain that came with. But Dr. Kenyon was one of those that really sat down with me. I related my past, and he related his hope for my future. It was one of the first steps I really took towards letting dad, and how he died, go. In a way you have to forgive life itself, it's struggles and it's pains. If you can't it's very hard to ever move forward.

I wish I had told Kenyon too that the novel I'm writing was largely inspired by him. By his perspectives class and his discussions on reality, particularly once again, wonder and doubt. Or as I like to say now, wonder and lack of hope.

I didn't know him as well as others, and I wish I had. He had an air about him that I think I found intimidating sometimes. This was a man who's heart and mind were so full of truth that there was little room for much else. He was absentminded but in an endearing way. A kinder soul few will meet. And yet for those of us, still trying to embrace the love God has for us, people so sure in their walk, so well placed in the puzzle of life, can be intimidating. But he was a good man. And I think now I could have talked to him more. I truly look forward to the day when I enter heaven and hear that booming laugh echoing through the golden streets. I'll know I'm home then, cause really, there's nowhere else Dr. Kenyon could have ended up.

Review: Tree of Life (originally published on lifeisstory.com)

2012-01-30T16:22:00.001-08:00

When I first endeavored to write a review of Tree of Life I was spurred on by the words of the author and movie critic Jeffrey Overstreet who praised this movie, as well as Terrence Malick, rather fervently. Having realized Overstreet as a thoughtful and wise critic of our times I was rightly interested in reviewing this strangely beautiful film. My first introduction to Malick was The Thin Red Line, and later The New World. I was used to his use of inner dialogue which far outweighed his character to character conversations throughout his films. One of his most famous quotes from Thin Red Line—“Have you passed through this night?”—became the name of my blog where I write stories and reviews. It is a question of existential consequence, that seemingly simple question we seem, in all our souls, to be asking those we meet. Have you passed through this night? Have you seen the same things I have? Experienced the same experiences? Passed through the same dark night of the soul as I?

Malick adeptly weaves this question somehow through all his movies, through his contemplations on violence, on war, on history. In The Tree of Life, he seems to be taking the question in a far more personal direction, into the deeper and perhaps more hard questions of faith. His answers seem vague, poetic imagery is used throughout the movie as an answer rather than simple direct words. When the mother asks God where was he when her son dies, he seems to simply answer with a picture of the beginning of the world. Job is quoted at the beginning of the movie with God asking Job where he was during the beginning of the foundation of the world, when all God’s creation cried out in joy. God seems to be asking the mother the same question as his answer to her question.

There is a dichotomy made early on in the film as well between the way of grace, and the way of nature. This is strongly seen in the story of Jack O’Brien and the life-shaping choices of his parents, but it is also seen in the imagery of the creation of the world as well, shown by images of The Big Bang, and evolutionary processes. In all the science, in all the nature, is a natural grace, even in the way the herbivore dinosaur is spared by its meat eating neighbor. In all the grace though, too, is a very naturalistic answer to all the deeper questions: the questions we, and those in the film, ask God. Is it really him answering? We only have one another to believe that. Jack echoes this in his many inner dialogues on his parents, in the way of nature that his father follows, the way of the survivalist and the one who makes his own destiny and the way of grace of his mother, who sees beauty and wonder in the world, and believes that to love everything and to forgive is the deepest meaning of a human being. We never really know who exactly is answering; we only know that the boy believes in God because of his mother, and faces temptation and rebellion because of his father, until many years later he realizes that he misses that wonder of childhood, returning to his former self, his belief in God, the way of grace.

To say it’s a Christian movie would be a bit of a misnomer, though I feel like as far as religious movies, it’s perhaps one of the most beautiful and poetic and probably deep I’ve ever seen. God is not painted with a very sure stroke, and one could as easily believe that faith is just a simple hope rather than a sure thing. But then again, faith is the evidence of things hoped for. I think it’s more of a Kierkegaardian faith, a leap rather than a sermon from Malick on grief and trust in God. All we have to believe in God is the shapes and curves, the bright flashes of light, the beauty of creation around us, the forgiveness of our brother, the kindness and wonder of our mother. And perhaps for some that is more than enough.

The family at the center of story bears some contemplation, particularly Jack, the actor who plays him gives an excellent performance that I feel outweighs even Pitt’s or Chastain’s. We can see the lines on his face change with age, and knowledge of good and evil. When he is stealing we see the slight guilt and pleasure play in his eyes so vividly, and the coldness that comes when he hurts his brother, and yet we completely believe it when he asks for forgiveness later. These are not whimsical choices, these are truly weighed decisions based on deeply felt feelings of grief, of anger, of hope. The father seems to love the brother more, and Jack feels the pain of this. In the way Eden is echoed in the first shots of the son being born, walking with his father and mother in the garden of life, so too is Cain and Abel echoed in these two brothers. Brad Pitt, playing the father, holds out his jaw in the determination and swagger of a man making his own way in the world, but it loosens somewhat as he grows older, as he becomes wiser, as he faces loss and pain, and ultimately redemption.

The role of a father in the life of a son is explored through Jack’s learning to cope with a father who doesn’t love him in the way he needs, teaching him instead that people aren’t good and kind despite his mother’s insistence to the opposite. Her own crisis of faith comes when the middle brother, a kind and quiet spirit if there ever was one, dies at the early age of nineteen, and her faith in God is rattled to the core. She wanders a forest as if lost in her own existential maze. In the end, she gives her boy to God in a beautiful beachside sequence that one can only surmise is reminiscent of Malick’s vision of heaven.

In an earlier sequence Jack learns about death when a boy drowns at the local pool. He concludes that if God allows a boy to die, God is not good, and if God is not good, why should he be? Without a fatherly influence to correct him, he starts down a path of rebellion and sin. His brother’s forgiveness opens his eyes; he later echoes Romans, effectively saying, “I do what I don’t want to do, and what I want to do I don’t do”. It is his brother’s forgiveness that changes his heart, even allowing him to forgive his father. Finally the father gives the love Jack wants, and things change, for a time. We see him grown up, now a businessman much like his father had once been, still facing his old demons, and walking through a house with many rooms, uncommunicative with his wife, and working in a building of many windows, almost templelike in its angles and curves. But even in the city beauty and wonder are to be found and he realizes this as he chooses to remember and re-embrace the wonder and grace of his childhood and what his mother taught him.

It is essentially a redemptive film of hope. The darkness which resides in the hearts of the family is temporary and answered to with grace. The imagery is poetic, and leaves it to the viewer to decide exactly how God is answering these questions or if he is answering at all. I believe it’s all in how you see the world. The performances are top notch, mainly Jack, the father, and mother played by Jessica Chastain, who continues to surprise and awe me in her many performances this year. Thematically the movie is well-paced, if a little hard to follow at times, and probably intentionally so.

This reviewer would strongly encourage to view on your own time and come to your own answers. In the end this is truly a movie worth seeing and contemplating. Whether it wins Oscars or accolades is really not the point; whether it causes one to ask others if they have passed through this night, to talk to God, to seek answers of faith and wonder, to begin to walk the way of grace is the point. And in that, this movie passes with flying colors.

The Death and Resurrection of Christmas

2011-12-24T21:52:00.000-08:00

I'm sharing this even though it's part of a contest now because I don't think I'll be able to know if I won the contest by tomorrow, so without further adieu, a Christmas Story.

The Death and Resurrection of Christmas

A silent night, almost holy in its cessation of sound. The boy walked along the street, his little sister holding his hand tight. His mother strode ahead of them. They were filing out of the ballet recital, and Henry Cole knew that he was in trouble by the way his mother clenched her hands. It was because of the way he kicked the chair, he knew, that and the embarrassing loudness of the old lady who'd turned to scold him. Even though it was Christmas Eve, he was sure that his only present would be a spanking. In the night the wind howled like a beast, and snow came down all wet and icy, the wet forming flurries in the sky that looked like dryad children made of snow. He could see his breath clouding on the air, and he pretended he was smoking. That didn't change his mother's mood any more as they got into their car. She started the engine, rumbling low and loud, their path heading home. Something moved in the dark, and it looked white and elklike, he wondered if it was a reindeer.

Santa had cancelled Christmas, much to the elves chagrin. The tall robust elf known as Santa Claus to many wore his faded red outfit, chosen for its portrayal in a cartoon by Thomas Nast, and puffed his cheeks red in the cold day. It was always cold in the North Pole. Black Pete, his assistant came up to him, and said in Dutch that the Krampus was free, roar echoing down the streets of America even as they spoke. Santa, also known as Sinterklaas, Saint Nick, and many other names nodded in approval, his face gruff and set.

"Are you sure about this?" Black Pete asked one last time.

Santa didn't reply, he'd had it with naughty children only getting coal. He was going to reinstitute real punishment. If it took The Krampus eating a few, that's what it took.

Black Pete sighed, he didn't like this one bit.

The elklike thing roared in a very non elklike way, and Henry quaked in his seasonally logical boots. His sister beside him screamed and out of the dark and white came a creature that looked something like Pan in Pan's Labyrinth, or a goat who learned to walk on two feet and grew teeth like a shark. It roared again in some strange language and Henry wondered if this was his punishment for being naughty.

It spoke in Dutch, and moved like a demon, spreading its clawed hands to rake dissonantly against the car. Henry's mother was shouting at it, "get out of here!", still thinking it was some kind of animal, and it chuckled to itself.

"Henryyyyy…naughty…." it said in a whisper, and then began to peel the door open.

Henry's sister was the first to hear those words, and she remembered in her little eight year old way what Henry had done in the recital. It had made her so mad that he would ruin her Nutcracker like that. She'd wanted to kick him right back, but her mom wouldn't let her, and now here was his consequence, some demon out of the mist, borne of his selfish brokenness. She thought maybe he didn't deserve it this bad though and piped up in her tiny voice

"No! Leave my brother alone!"

Santa watched from his sleigh on high, Rudolph's red light spraying the scene in an eerie blood like projection. He thought of the old days, and how he'd once whipped the children, flogging the naughty ones, and before that The Krampus. This boy deserved to die for his sins, and yet somehow he couldn't understand why the sister was forgiving him. It was her he'd sinned against most of all.

The Krampus started to pull Henry out of the car, claws ripping into his jeans and his sister and mother grabbed his hands holding on tight.

"Let him go!" His sister said. "I forgive him, he didn't mean to hurt us!"

The Krampus didn't stop though, it was a singleminded creature, that being much of the reason that Santa had gotten rid of him in the first place.

Santa remembered the night he and Black Pete had thrown those coins into the little girl's window, keeping her and her sisters from having to take up prostitution in order to save their ailing father. He knew there were times when people did things for reasons more complicated than just naughty or nice. In his ball he looked, to see a man in a uniform hugging young Henry as he got onto a ship headed to Iraq. He realized then the boy simply missed his father.

And that made it different somehow. Perhaps the rest were like the boy.

A whip flew down from the sky, bathed in red light and the Krampus cowered in pain, it looped around his feet and drew him back up in a flurry of white and Dutch expletives. The night was silent again, and perhaps more holy, as the boy hugged his sister and mother and promised he would never be naughty again.

The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise (My Wedding Gift to My New Wife)

2011-07-29T11:12:00.000-07:00

This was written as my gift to my wife on our wedding day.

The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise

Space. Quiet as a black and star filled night, and the same in every respect. As the ship hovered in orbit above earth, William woke to the beeping of his console.
He was home, sort of. Earth was where he had been born, but like many young men of his generation he had joined the Starfighter Corps and left Earth behind to reach out to the stars. 5 skirmishes and one war since he’d finally returned to the little blue dot of a planet. Looking down on it now, he noticed less blue and more brown, more grey where the beautiful oceans had once been. He skimmed over his console, tapping in the commands for approach to the last existing starport on the continent of Asia, in the country of India. Hyderabad had once been a bustling city of millions of people running left and right, weaving through cars and taxi’s. Now it was a ghost town, as many of the cities of Earth had become as more and more people left for the stars, for the planets and space roads above. As he slowly approached, a bored voice came over his speakers.
“Identity and Reason for Landing?”
“This is Lt. Colonel William Ambrose, returning for shore leave.”
“Copy, Hangar 18 is available for landing, have a good vacation Lt. Colonel Ambrose”
From what he could see all the hangars were available for landing, but he took 18 anyways.
After putting his ship on lockdown, and exiting the cockpit, he crawled down the makeshift ladder onto the hot ground of Hyderabad. An Indian man was waiting for him, his head bobbing back and forth.
“Welcome to Hyderabad my friend, I have been sent by the American Consulate to make sure you make it to the coast and your ship for home.”
Ever since the Migration, there were no more airplanes, only old cars and boats.
William nodded, and followed the man into the dirty streets. India had always looked like a post apocalyptic landscape, but now it seemed as if it was beyond even that, it was gutted, forgotten and alone. Huts stood beside skyscrapers, and side roads were at every block. Dirt covered the streets and ratty looking dogs hovered at the edges of his vision. He stepped into the little yellow taxi another Indian man was driving, and chuckled to himself as the little man weaved back and forth across the road as if it was bustling traffic, though he was the only automobile on the road. Here and there were children, orphans left behind by families that could have been there to take care of them. It seemed the earth had been left to the children, no one to show them how to take care of it. One little boy ran beside the taxi, hollering in his own language, lifting little yellowed fingernails into the window. As the taxi sped up, he was left behind.
The consul man, named Abraham, smiled a toothy smile.
“Even now they ask for coins, it’s the only thing they know to do. Travelers are rare though, even though we are the only starport.”
A dog barked at them, and the city sped by, the smells that had once been floating like a thick cloud over the city now replaced with the smell of dirt and dust.

……

The coast was all plastic bags and soda cans, a dead fish or two floating on the grey water. It couldn’t be called ocean anymore, more like sludge, trash made up 90% of it. This was the world left behind, left to the last dregs of humanity, those too old or too stubborn to leave. Robots weaved among the trash, little hands picking it up, and shoving it in old compartments, there to be taken to another dump, which would later be cleaned by it’s own robots. The hovership stood waiting for them, the bottom covered with much of the same trash and a ladder lowered to them. Abraham smiled his toothy smile at William and nodded his head.
“I hope your trip was not too boring, perhaps we will see each other again on your return.”
The unspoken “if you return” hung between them like a line of laundry. William stepped onto the first rung, and began the climb. He reached the deck in about two minutes. Several white men were standing around, smoking cigarettes, one of them glanced at him and snickered.
“You must be the passenger, alright let’s get this ship to movin’,” The other men stared at his uniform for a minute then grunted and went down into the bowels of the ship to get the hover motors working. The man who had spoken revealed his name as Captain Petyr Blankenship, Petyr with a y he said. A cold smile covered his face as he spoke, it was well known that most of the people left behind who had had no choice in the matter were convicts, prisoners and men of low repute. These were left to the transportation of those few who had chosen to stay behind. They were surly men, but each had a ring around their legs that would shock them if they went too far from their designated areas. There were no guards, no people to police their behavior, and some had found ways around the electric rings.
“If ya need anything let me know,” Petyr said, and went below decks himself. William stood at the railing for a time, staring off into the grey ugly horizon. He began to wonder why he had come home, why of all places he could have vacationed he chose to return to Moses Lake WA. There were no seagull calls over the grey seas as he floated over the horizon, in time he went below as well. Through a dimly lit corridor he found his bunk, a dingy, rust stained room, the walls old and flaking. On the bed was an old ipod, the note on top read
“Only means of entertainment ‘round here, welcome to Hell”.
He chuckled to himself and put on the too large headphones, flipping through the songs. There was a little bit of everything, but he found one song he remembered from his childhood.
“Wouldn’t it be nice if we were older?” The harmonized singers sang, and he felt nostalgia creep up over him.

It was 1992, and the world was still alive with light and soul. William, then called Will, was sitting by a tree in the snow, watching his father. His father was standing as still as the tree beside him, gun in hand and raised to shoot, sighting down the barrel at a buck grazing in the clearing. Breath became cloud of smoke as Will waited for the inevitable thunder and lightning. It never came though, and his father came back to sit beside him as they watched the buck continue to graze.
“Majestic creature,” His father said.
Young Will just nodded.
“’Spose you’re wonderin why I didn’t shoot? Well, it’s as easy as knowin we got enough food fer survival, that there buck’s just tryin to do the same.”
Will didn’t question the logic.
“Sun’s gonna go down soon,” His father said, pushing curly black hair out of his wide face. He was a big man, a lumberjack who spent most of his twelve months away from the family off at camp in the high tree lines. This was a man who loved nature, and saw wonder in the smallest and largest of it’s creatures. He pointed at a butterfly roaming near them, alighting itself on a branch not far above their heads. The sun shone on it in patterns of light and triangle. Will smiled. His father patted his head.
“Time to git you home before Momma whoops us both.”
He took his father’s hand and they walked down the trail, the buck watching them, then bounding into the woods.

“Wake up,” Petyr poked at William’s shoulder, and William groggily came to. He’d fallen asleep with Pink Floyd singing about crazy diamonds, and his father’s voice in his head, telling him goodnight for the last time.
“We’re nearing Oregon, that’s where we leave you.”
He nodded, pulling himself out of the bed.
“You think I could keep this ipod?” He asked.
“Hell, keep it, not like any man ‘round here really appreciates it.”
They neared Portland about thirty minutes later, and he stepped off into the cold morning, fog on the horizon.
From here he would have to walk, or buy a car.
He shivered, and pulled his jacket closer, then began to walk.

1995, and the sun was shining bright over the playground where Will, almost 12, was sitting in a swing. Kaely Anne was standing with her friends, the pretty red-haired girl his reason for sitting in the swing. Her skin was pale, her laugh echoing across the field.
Brian poked him in his side.
His best friend grinned.
“You ever gonna ask her out?”
“She’s too good to date, she’s the kinda girl you marry.”
Brian made a farting sound with his mouth and poked Will again.
“Sheesh, hey c’mon, let’s go play with your Genesis.”

Night edged over the sky like Van Gogh paint strokes as William walked for hours. He could hear music playing in the dark, but nowhere could he see the source of it. It was quiet, folksy and jazzy even, a man’s voice singing “The Times They Are A Changin.” by Dylan. As he neared closer he came upon a strange scene. Sitting around a campfire were several dirty faced children smiling and listening to a black man playing on an old acoustic guitar. The man was clad in a Buba and Sokoto and had a gray beard that stuck out from his head like a finger pointing to the ground. He saw William in the firelight and smiled, his face was kind as only an old black man’s face can be, lines echoing the patterns of earth in between his eyes and forehead. His voice was that of a lonely wolf who had found a home. The children each and every one listened enraptured at the old Dylan song, and all around the landscape echoed it’s truth in stark reality. He was transfixed himself and waited for a while. It was such a different thing than he had expected on this forgotten world. The old man finished playing and laughed and joked with the children as they ran off in different directions. He nodded at William as he walked up, eyes both kind and wary.
“I was looking for a way north to Washington, and wondering if you have a car to sell, or a horse or something?”
The smiling man grinned, “Horse? Nuttin to feed it with. A car needs gas, and gas is a luxury these days, rarer than gold. I’d suggest finding a bike or something, can always find one left by it’s family in some abandoned house or something.”
“Times sure have changed.”
“Sure have, sure have, noticed you listenin to the music, you a Dylan fan?”
“As much as the next guy I guess, I enjoy most of his work.”
“Indeed, well, reason I ask is cause I been needin a companion travel north with, going to Seattle myself, what part o Washington you headin?”
“Moses Lake, eastern side, the desert side.”
“Oh yeah, yeah, I been that way once or twice, beautiful sunrises out that way.”
They had started walking while talking, sort of an easy pace, the black man was older and slower than William.
“What’s your name by the way,” William asked. “Mine is William, William Ambrose.”
“Eh, friends call me Richie, it ain’t my true name, but I admit I forgot that a long time ago. Gettin’ old is bad for the memory.”
The houses they passed were decrepit and broken down, hearts without a home, William found himself wanting to explore them, study their history and past. On Filandis 5, a planet light years from Earth, he had been part of a reconnaissance team, surveying a possible new building place for hostiles, among the rubble of old what seemed like adobe huts he had found an engraving. It wasn’t understandable, what seemed like faces, but could have easily been legs or animals, or something else altogether, but he liked to believe it was a picture, forgotten in flight, of a happy family.

He never talked to her, he’d always wanted to, but she was popular, and he wasn’t. It’s not that he was ugly, or even all that nerdy, he was just not all that interested in socializing with anyone but his few friends. And he liked to read, all the time, probably to a fault. While his friends were out seeing the latest flick, he was in his room, reading White Fang, or Huckleberry Finn, or even something by Stephen King. For him childhood was late nights in the neighborhood, a stick thrown to his dog Yeller, escapades out to the woods behind his house, or what passed for woods in Moses Lake.
To call it a desert was a bit of a misnomer, there was water, and trees, but the land was all flat, and mostly farmland. The smell of cow dung filled the air more often than not, and while he’d become used to it, any newcomers were wont to complain about the air as much as anything else they said. He hadn’t always been there, back when he was eight they lived in a cottage up near the Cascades, while his father worked in the lumber yards. But when his father passed after a freak accident involving chains and a chainsaw and a large cache of lumber, his mother had returned to her hometown of Moses Lake. It took some getting used to, but he had made friends, Brian one of them, and like every boy he bounced back from death and sorrow with flying colors. His mother remarried, a kindly older man who worked with computers at a potato plant, and was rarely seen on account of his working the night hours. She seemed happy, and that’s all that mattered to Will. They had a house out in the country, off Road 1 and his new father planted a copse of trees by the house where his mother could go and plant flowers. Brian and he would go off into the trees some nights and camp out, pretending they were in the great forests like the Tillamook, and there were animals all around. There was a horse who sometimes got out of it’s pen over at his neighbors, sneaking over to munch at his mother’s flowers. The horse was brown and white, splotched all over with a white face and brown mane. Will thought he was beautiful, and though he was not a riding horse, Will liked to pretend that it was his horse and he was a knight defending his kingdom. Their neighbors also had sheep, and a big beautiful collie that sometimes would play with Will.
His mom bought him a bike and he used to go riding as far as he could, sometimes towards 17, sometimes toward I-90. The roads were always bustling in those times. It was on one of these rides that he first met Kaely Anne, right when they’d first moved in with the new dad, and he had started going to a new school. She was in a little farmhouse about five miles from his house, far down R road which became S Road. She was outside watering some flowers when he rode past, noticing her and almost crashing into the ditch by the road.
She laughed as he stood up sheepishly.
“Uh…hi,” He said, grinning.
“Hi, what’s your name?” She asked. Beside her a beagle was watching him with narrowed eyes, and began barking with a bellow.
“Don’t mind Becky, she don’t like strangers much.” She smiled and hushed the dog.
“Kaely Anne! You get in here right now!” A woman’s voice was calling from the house.
“Sorry, I gotta go…” She smiled again and turned towards the house, Becky already was halfway there, not looking back.
“My name is Will,” He said quickly as she walked away, she stopped for a second and grinned back at him, then was gone.
That was the day he fell in love.

Richie was shaking him awake, their campfire down to embers in the morning dew.
“Best be getting on before the day gets away from us.”
The old man was watching the road warily.
“Something wrong?”
“Dunno, there’s been sounds I heard for a while now. Seems to be someone’s got some kinda machine and they’re using it, but I can’t tell what it is.”
William listened and as the loud buzzing sound came again he realized what it was.
“A chainsaw, someone’s cutting trees.”
Richie nodded.
They began to walk towards the sound, despite Richie’s misgivings, and as they walked William reflected on the last time he’d heard that sound.

It was 1990, the turn of the century, and two years before he and his father took their last hunting trip. He was six years old, and sitting in the car as his mom coughing stepped from it to greet their dad who was walking up from the trail back into the trees. She was still coughing as he came to her, and he asked her if she was okay. She said yes, just a bit of bronchitis and he frowned. He drove back and let her sleep in the passenger side.
He smiled back at William who was looking out the window at the blur of green and yellow sun. He grinned back, a small exchange, but deep with meaning.
“Don’t worry, your mom will be fine,” His dad said. “I gotcha a book, you wanna read it?”
Will nodded.
His dad tossed a book back that was old and weathered.
“Belonged to a friend of mine, but he sold it to me for a quarter, was one of my favorites when I was a boy.”
The cover showed a wolf standing at attention, staring off to outside the book’s cover, wild eyes wandering paths unseen. He was beautiful. The book was called White Fang, and Will thought it the best name ever for a book about a wolf.
He began to read, and didn’t even notice when they made it home a couple hours later.

The man with the chainsaw had his back turned to them, but William could tell even from the back that the man was very old. He stood stooped over, and leaning against a tree nearby was an old banjo. The man was wiry, with a shock of gray hair and as he turned to them his face looked chiseled from rock. He smiled.
“Well, what do we have hur?” He asked cheerily.
“Heard the noise, thought we’d investigate.”
“Heh, that is what people tend to do when they hear noise I guess.”
He looked to be about 60 or 65 with glasses hanging on his beak of a nose. He looked like something out of a southern gothic novel, the ghost of Roscoe Holcomb.
“Spose yer wonderin what a man like me is doin in a place like this with a chainsaw?” He laughed and showed them, the tree he was cutting was wider than William was, and covered in vines. From the vines came a cheeping sound and a beaked animal peeked out from a hollow in the tree before flitting back in.
“Heard em as I was walking through the trees, seems like their pappy or momma done left em”
His voice was southern too. High and lonesome it sounded.
“Thought I’d save em, but they don’t seem to want to come out. Thought maybe I’d cut the tree down then they’d fly off.”
Richie laughed.
“Where are you from?” William asked.
“Me, I’m from Arkansas boy, out towards Little Rock way.”
“You’re surely far from home.”
“Indeed, sure am, out East ain’t so safe no more for old men like me, it got lawless out that way fast. Heard of a town out this way where the water flows freely and the people are kind, so I took my banjo and began playing my way out West.”
William believed it, he’d heard what happened to New York City, the homeless had risen up, and in their bitterness had turned the city into a walled castle, no one allowed in or out. He wondered what it was like in Little Rock, but he didn’t ask.”
“You know how to play that ole’ gitar?” The man asked Richie.
“Sure enuff, been playing it since I was ten.”
“Sure enuff?”
“So what do they call you?”
“Oh, they call me Dock, I was named after some old bluegrass man.”
A woman appeared then, quiet and unassuming, she was older than William, but younger than Richie or Dock.
“Well, seems my party is all here, spose I should leave these owl chicks to the fates and git back on the road.”
He led them to an old wagon, where two large oxen munched at the grass by the side of the road.
“You men need a ride? I don’t have much, but I can tell you’re good men, and me and the lady could use some friendship and song on the road.”
Richie agreed quickly, and William too.
They rode in the back, legs hanging from the edge and the road flowing beneath them, a swift river of asphalt. They went quickly for a wagon, passing forest and field alike. The Tillamook loomed on the horizon and soon they were swallowed by it.
That night as they sat by a fire, the woman sang them a song as Dock strummed on his banjo. Richie joined in as he recognized the song, an old one, older than both old men.
“Ain’t got no sugar baby now…” She sang, sadly, and with feeling.
Dock told their story, of how they’d started out a whole family, him, his sister Daisy, the woman with him now, who was his younger sister Nellie, and Nellie’s husband. Nellie’s husband had died trying to cross a swift river in Colorado, his older sister of fever when they got caught in a snowstorm.
As she sang William felt the song rise like a prayer into the night sky, and tears came to his eyes. The next morning as they set out once again he left the ipod sitting by the side of the road for some other wanderer to find. One always needed good music as they traveled.

In 1993 His father suggested they go see a movie, he’d heard of this new movie about dinosaurs directed by Spielberg called Jurassic Park. Though Will was only ten his father felt like he could handle it, and so they got in his old pickup and drove thirty miles down to the nearest town. The dinosaur movie was the only one playing at the cinema, and it was almost sold out.
“You’re the last two tickets we have for it,” The ticket lady said.
She handed the tickets over, and for almost two hours Will and his dad were whisked off to another world, where dinosaurs could roam and terrorize people freely, and a little boy a lot like Will helps save the day. The scientist played by Sam Neill, with his cool hat and his easy smile, he became one of Will’s heroes that day. Outside as they got into the car, Will watched his dad looking out the rearview mirror, making sure they didn’t pull into oncoming traffic. It wasn’t a tyrannosaurus rex coming after them in the mirror, but it was danger all the same, and he realized that every day his father watched over him and saved his life.

The Tillamook forest was wide and deep, moss covered trees like something out of a Tolkien novel. William almost expected the trees to sprout legs and a face and begin talking in a deep and earthy voice. At night their fires warmed them, and by day they followed the old paths made by men before them, some of the paths had not been tread in hundreds of years. One night William swore he saw a wolf, come down from the northern mountains, out of Montana or British Columbia, it’s gray and white fur a blur in the moonlight, but then it was gone. Nature was truly the mother of this place, and it’s roots were deeper than time itself. As he followed the two older men and woman, having had to abandon the ox and wagon when the paths grew too narrow, he felt a stranger in their midst. They talked of old things, the 1960’s, Vietnam, and Korea further back. Dock’s father had been in World War 2, and his great grandfather in the Civil War. As old as they were, it was as if no time had passed at all, as if America was still as young as a newborn child. Day by day passed and the woods sheltered them and fed them with it‘s bounty, til they finally came to the end of it. They had reached Washington, and the flat farmlands of it’s east. They came to a river some days later, living on the supplies they had stored from the trek through the forest, and as they came down the road to the river they saw the long and narrow suspension bridge they would have to cross. Winds rushed strong across it, and William remembered it being hard even for cars to cross back in the day.
“Well, this won’t be easy, Will, but I hope you do well.” Richie was smiling his gentle smile, the kind of smile that laughs.
“Me? You’re the one heading on up to Seattle alone, you still have the Cascade Mountains to go through,” William said.
“Oh I’ll be fine, I’ll be fine, I got this here guitar to play, and God above to watch over me.”
William smiled, they shook hands and he knew he would miss the old guy as he walked on up the road.
“If you make it to Seattle, go leave a flower at Jimi Hendrix’s grave for me!” He yelled.
The old man waved, then he was out of earshot.

After that first encounter, Will pretty much kept away from Kaely Anne, despite being in love with her. He felt she was too pretty for him, too perfect, too pretty and perfect for anyone really. He also felt like the only right way to be with her was if he married her. So he waited, and hoped, and the time came that he graduated from High School, and began looking for a place to go to college. He wanted to be a writer, to write novels like Jack London and Neil Gaiman, to visit places he’d never been and do things he’d never done. His mother, having lived in Moses Lake all her life, didn’t really know where to send him, so it ended up that his English teacher was the one who told him about a little college in Jackson Mississippi called Belhaven.
“But it’s so far away,” His mother said. She’d never had any other children and his step dad was often off on business now that he’d become a big shot at a fruit plant that had it’s home base over in Europe.
“It really looks like the best place Mom, and it’s Christian too, I’ll learn a lot, but I’ll learn it from people like us.”
She finally assented, and Will applied and got in. He excelled at it, his teachers said he had a genius’ touch at writing, and his friends loved him. He got involved in a little church, and learned a lot more about God than he had in many other places. But what he loved most about it was the surprise he found standing before him the first day he walked into the Student Center.
“Will? Will Ambrose?!”
Kaely Anne was standing there, clad in what looked like tights under her shorts and a tshirt.
“Wait, you go here?” He asked in astonishment.
“Yeah, I mean, I’m in the Ballet Department, oh my gosh what are the odds!”
He hadn’t even known she was applying, he hadn’t even known she was into ballet.
They were close after that, seeing each other every day. He’d find himself at her dorm every Open House, and she came to see him and his roommate, a quirky Biology major named Derrick, every time his dorm’s doors opened up for the girls.
“Can I tell you a secret?” She said one night as they took a walk by the lake.
“Sure,” He replied, and something about the night made his skin crawl, but in a good way. His hands were sweating, he had to tell her how he felt.
“I had a crush on you in high school, I know it sounds weird, we never really talked or anything, but I would see you in class and remember that time you fell off your bike when you first met me, and Becky barking at you, and it made me giggle.”
He smiled.
“I had a crush on you too, no…not a crush, I was in love.” Am in love, he thought.
“Really?! Wow, I never knew…” She trailed off and she looked strange, nervous.
“Can I tell you a secret now?” He asked.
“Okay…” She said very quietly.
“I still am in love with you.”
Her cheeks reddened and she looked up at him, into his eyes.
He leaned forward to kiss her, and she put her hand up to his face.
“No…”
“Oh wow, I’m sorry, I totally misread you,” He felt like a jerk.
“No, you didn’t, I just…I made a promise that I wouldn’t kiss til my wedding day,” She looked worried, “Is that okay?” She asked.
He laughed, “Of course it’s okay silly, I guess I’ll just have to marry you then.”
She didn’t object, and they decided holding hands was a nice compromise.
“So I guess we’re together now?” She said.
“If you wanna be….” He looked at her, apprehensive.
“Oh, I do, I think I’ve always wanted to be.”

The bridge wailed and wailed like a crying baby, and the three companions stood waiting, for what they didn’t know. For the wind to die down, or for a giant hand of God to sweep them up and deposit them on the other side.
“I think we should just go for it.” Nellie said.
“That’s my little sister, the brave one.” Dock laughed.
They finally decided going was better than waiting, and began to trek across. Though the wind was strong and the going slow, it turned out not as hard as it would seem.

It reminded him of another day, the day he’d walked down the aisle, toward a minister, and the milling group of people crossing paths with him as the wedding was about to start.
Brian had come back from Afghanistan, buzz haircut and all, to be his best man, his mother looked beautiful in her blue dress, and his step dad gave him a wink.
It was the longest walk he ever took, when he finally got to the minister the man smiled.
“So, we ready to do this?” He asked cheerily.
For a second Will couldn’t speak, his mouth felt like cotton and his whole body was cold in sweat.
“Yeah,” He finally got out.
“Don’t worry,” The minister said as Brian and his groomsmen came up to stand beside him, and Kaely Anne’s bridesmaids and maid of honor stood on the other side. “The first step’s the hardest, and now you made it.”
It was nice, not completely true, but it did help him get through the wedding.
He turned to watch her walk down the aisle, the whole place turned to watch her, her face was glowing, like candlelit flame, her hair curled and framing her face perfectly. Her dress was simple, yet elegant, a dress that spoke volumes of the kind of person she was. Her father, still alive, walked her down the aisle. He was grinning when he handed her over.
The rest of the wedding was a blur, even the reception was only a small buzz in the back of his head. She was the only thing he saw. He barely even remembered getting in the car and them driving out to the little place he’d bought for them both. He couldn’t have told how he made it home, or if he went the long way or the short, he couldn’t even have told what kind of night it was. He was bursting at the seam with love. He was crying on the inside a torrent of happy tears. He was falling apart and coming back together again. He was the Big Bang, he was the Great Flood of Noah’s day, he was supernovas and the birth of stars, he was the whole universe, and just himself. He was a man in love with a woman he knew loved him back, and now he was going to spend the rest of his life with her.

The roads began to be familiar, the houses to remind him of old times. They finally made it to Moses Lake. The night was bright with stars and he didn’t know where he was going. His own house, the house he’d bought for him and Kaely Anne, was on the lake itself, and he was sure that she’d left it when he did. Still he found himself making his way to it, marveling at how the town had changed.
The buildings were still the same, but people lived in them now, instead of held business. Tents and pavilions lined the streets. The place was crowded from end to end. There were fires, and people singing in the night. It was truly what Dock had said it was, a town where beauty and hope still reigned. As he neared his house he heard singing coming from an old church, a church he remembered going to as a child, and despite himself he walked into it.
The preacher was a plump man, tall, with glasses that seemed to not want to stay on his face. His face was smiling and beaming as he shared the joy of the lord. He spoke of how he’d once been a writer, but after The Great Migration, people had needed someone to give hope, and so he had taken it on himself to help the town thrive during the hard times. After the service as William was leaving the man walked up to him.
“Welcome, soldier, we are honored for your service.”
William had almost forgot he was still wearing his uniform. It was the only pair of clothes he had.
“Th..Thanks,” He said.
“So what brings you here?” The pastor, who introduced himself as Justin, asked.
“I came home, I used to live here, shore leave..” He mumbled out.
“Naomi! Come meet my new soldier friend.” Naomi was his wife, a pretty woman with a smile that could light up a room. Beside her walked a little boy and a girl.
“Kaely, Liam, say hi to the nice man.”
The boy said hi shyly, but the little girl walked right up to him and shook his hand. She had a smile that reminded him of the other one who had the same name.
“Will?” Someone asked.
The voice was so familiar, it drove a knife through his heart.
“Will, it’s me, it’s Kaely Anne.”
The woman who had been talking to Naomi was standing there too. She looked older now, but still just as beautiful. Six years had barely changed her at all.
“Wait, this is Will?” Naomi asked.
“Kaely, I…” He wanted to say he didn’t know she’d be there, and that he was sorry for intruding, but his mouth was just as cotton as the day he married her.
He walked away before she could yell at him, or blame him, kill him with the words he’d been killing himself with for years.
“Will, wait…” Kaely Anne said, but he was gone.

Their marriage was a happy marriage, the best kind of marriage. He’d given her a home, and he had a good job with the newspaper. She took up ballet teaching and eventually opened up her own studio. They even bought another beagle, this one named Becky Too. It was perfect. It was not to say they never fought, because they did, over finances, over other things, but they always made up, and he let her have her way more often than not. But in the end it was the news that wounded them the deepest. A scientist had developed a way to propel a ship through space at faster than the speed of light. Terraforming was being revolutionized and a colony had already been built on Mars. The traveler in William longed to see it, and Kaely Anne was content where she was, in their small home. He found himself resenting her, despite his deep and abiding love, he found himself becoming angry at her small dreams.
“They’re the stars!” He would say, as if that made all the difference.
Brian, who had been in the air force, came home finally with a wife from Japan. She was petite, and extremely beautiful, with a round apple face and gentle smile. She was also in the airforce, just like him, and whenever Brian came over to watch the space race, as they called it, she was right there by his side.
He was different from William, he hadn’t grown up religious, and he was just as prone to party and alchohol as most guys. Kaely Anne thought he was a bad influence, but William said that it was a good way to witness, opening up their house to Brian and Kiko his wife. Kiko and Kaely Anne rarely talked, and it hurt her that Kiko wanted to be with the guys more than her. She felt alone often as they sat in the other room, the tv on, talking about space and how Star Trek had had it right all along.
One night though it was just Kiko that came to their door, and she had been crying. Brian had died in a car wreck, he was drunk. Instead of going to Kaely Anne for comfort she went to William.
Now it was just two people in the other room, and Kaely Anne felt more alone than ever before.
“I think I’m gonna apply to the Starfighter Corps.” William announced one day.
Kaely Anne watched him over her soup, uncertain whether he was joking or not.
“Kiko says…”
“Kiko, it’s always about Kiko…why don’t you just go sleep with her already and get it over with.” She knew the outburst was melodramatic, but her heart was hurting. She was ready to have children, and he was off with another woman. She knew him, she knew it was harmless, and yet, he came home too tired to even try most nights, and now he wanted to go off into space?
He looked hurt. “Honey, seriously, do you hear yourself? I mean look out there, it’s beautiful, think what it would be like from a spaceship? And you could live in one of the new colonies, so many families have left already…”
She shook her head and left him sitting at the table.
A couple days passed, and instead of making up, the silence extended into indefiniteness. One day when Kaely Anne came home she noticed her flowers were drooping and dead.
“You forgot to water them again?! I asked you just this morning!”
“Why do I have to water them? Why can’t you?”
“I work all morning and afternoon, I don’t have time, you know that.”
It wasn’t even about flowers, they both knew that, but with an angry yell he walked out the door, slamming it behind him. She watched him go, tears falling down her face.
“I didn’t want you to leave…” She said.

William found himself sitting in an old Japanese Garden, thinking of their argument, and what he had done that night. The garden was overgrown now, and yet the chaos of plant and water was far more peaceful to him than it’s ordered beauty that had once been. He remembered coming there many times with Kaely Anne, before it all fell apart.
“I’m so sorry…” He said to no one in particular, and to everyone.
A cricket sang among the bushes and he pulled his hands in close, shivering in the night, he fell asleep on the bench, dreaming of a girl with golden red hair, and a smile like the sunrise.

Two weeks after the fight William left her, he barely even said goodbye, just left her a note on the kitchen table. He wasn’t divorcing her, just leaving, he would be back when he felt like it, if he ever did, but for now he wanted to live among the stars and save the universe.
Training was rigorous, and hard, and he hated every minute of it. He’d never been the most athletic of men, and had gained weight after marriage. But in time he found the rhythm, and the will, and before long he was one of the best starfighter pilots in the corps. Kiko had joined the Corps too, in the Medical Division. She ended up joining a medical team on Zirak, and helping in the Zirak/Abor war, while he went off with the main contingent of the corps deep into space, as part of a reconnaissance team, their mission to explore the new planets found, and make sure they were safe. On one of the planets he found the engraving that reminded him of a happy family, and old feelings washed over him that had long been dormant. Perhaps it was the reality that the stars while beautiful, were not home, or that she wasn’t there with him, but he found himself longing to see her again. Longing to see Kaely Anne. Six years passed, and whenever shore leave came, he opted out of it. He would go to the most dangerous corners of the galaxy, trying to find ways to die. He couldn’t go back, but he couldn’t go forward. He couldn’t do anything, and so he found himself in a med ward with a non-fatal wound that he hoped would kill him regardless, and he waited for the end.
It was Kiko he saw walk into the room, smiling at him lying in the bed.
“Well, if it isn’t William Ambrose…” They talked for a while, she had gotten remarried, to a colonel, and they had had two boys, crazy little buggers that lived on Mars with their nanny.
“I really don’t get to see them enough,” She said.
“Why don’t you retire?” He asked.
“What and leave all this?” The wrongness of her response really struck William, but he didn’t say anything.
“What about you? You and your wife still together?”
“No.” He said honestly.
She looked at him strangely, reproachfully almost.
“You know, Brian spoke highly of you before we met, he always said, ’That Will, he’s a real loyal guy, he’d never leave or hurt a brother or friend.’ and after I met you, and found out that you and Bri’ disagreed on a lot of things, yet how you always opened your home, I knew it was true. I could also see how much you loved her, your wife, it was like she was the only woman in the world. It made me jealous to be honest, Bri’ always had the wandering eye.”
“Did in high school too, I never knew the guy without a girlfriend.”
“Yep, that was Brian,” She laughed. “When he died I’ll be honest, I felt relieved, but you were different, I never thought you’d leave her, that’s not the guy that Brian loved like a brother.”
The words stung worse than a thousand bee stings.

He shivered in the dark, and woke with a cry, the night was cold, and he had no blanket, no home, not even any other clothes than a uniform he hated more than anything else because it reminded him of how horrible a person he was.
A dog barked in the gloom, and it sounded like a beagle, the bellowing bark hard to not recognize.
“William…” A voice called.
He was so tired, he didn’t want to answer.
A man’s voice called then, and he recognized it as Pastor Justin’s, then another man’s, then a dog’s cold nose was sniffing at his face, licking it with a warm wet tongue.
“We found him, he’s over here!”
Justin and some other men showed up then, Kaely Anne and Naomi with them.

He didn’t want to go back, but he knew he had to, not to see her, but to just get some peace and quiet. He’d heard about the town even that far away, out in a totally different world, about how a pastor there had turned the place into a beautiful commune where the refugees of the Migration could come and find warmth and friendship. Most of his friends snickered and laughed, but he understood why, the Earth was their home, it always would be their home, and someday if they ever returned, they would find it strange and inhospitable, unforgiving of their abandonment, if not for men like that pastor.
So he went back, not even thinking he would see her.

“Thanks guys,” Kaely Anne said to them, then walked over to the beagle and man shivering on the bench.
She put a blanket around him and sat down on the ground, looking up at him.
“Oh William…” She said.
He didn’t speak for a long time, but found himself scratching the beagle’s head, and the dog liked it.
“I figured Becky Too would have died by now,” He finally said.
“She did, that’s not Becky Too, that’s Benny.” Kaely Anne smiled.
“Benny…” He found himself smiling a little too. “It’s a good name.”
He looked over at her then, and was surprised to find no anger in her eyes. What he did find there made him look away though, and made his heart hurt.
She took his hand, and he didn’t pull it away, though a part of him screamed at him to do so. He looked at the ground and his face felt like stone, his mouth like it was sewn up and he couldn’t speak.
She didn’t speak either, for a time..
The quiet was peaceful, and even healing, and her hand in his felt right, he guessed that’s what it was that gave him the courage to finally say
“I’m sorry…”
“Oh Will, I forgave you a long time ago, I just wanted you to come home, why’d you leave me here alone?”
He looked down at her, at her beautiful eyes, and the way she was smiling, he realized she was made of stuff tougher than stars and more bright too, she would never explode in a burst of light and fire, and she would stand steadfast, always, shining in his heart like the sun. And even the sun would die someday, but she never would, even into Heaven she would shine so much brighter than the night sky that had tempted him away.
“I was guilty, and afraid, and lonely.” He admitted. She squeezed his hand.
“I can’t believe you waited, that you…forgave me.” He said.
“I love you William Ambrose, I love you even when I don’t love you.”
He realized it was true, and that it was true for him too, otherwise why had he felt so guilty?
“I’m such a fool…” He said, sitting up and letting her sit on the bench beside him.
“But you’re my fool, and you’re finally home.”
“Can you take me back, can you be my wife again?”
“I never stopped Will, I never stopped.”
The night was ending, the stars fading into mist, and memory, in their place came the sun, glorious in orange and pink, yellow and red, filling the sky with a song as beautiful as any he’d ever heard. He told her then of his journey, and of his time in the Corps, of the engraving he’d found on another world, and of the strange people he’d traveled with. Angels, she said, probably, watching over him. He agreed.
“But in all of it, the three moons of Celtis 5, the Maholian Nebula all purple and white, the most beautiful things you’ve ever seen, and I could write for days of it all, even the Tillamook as we passed through, it was all empty, homeless, not as beautiful as it could have been, because I missed you, I realize that now, I missed you.”
She smiled and the sun was rising in her smile, and he knew that it was that smile, the special one she had only for him, that he had been needing all along

Loving The Church

2011-07-12T14:42:00.000-07:00

Been a few weeks since I posted a blog, so consider this my monthly entry.

I don't know really how to start this one, cause it seems like a bit of a hot button topic, but I wanted to share my honest, heartfelt opinion. And remember, it's just that, an opinion.

I started out a church brat, born in a sanctuary so to speak, the son of a music minister. I spent my whole life at church functions, in christian schools, at youth group, with christian friends, at christian concerts and music festivals. For the longest time the only music I listened to was Christian Contemporary, and later Christian Rock. I interacted with non christian people later in my life, but my interactions were often laced with witnessing tactics, and a general sense of maybe looking down my nose at them.

But really, this is about The Church, and what it means to me.

The Bible says, where two or three are gathered in His Name, there is He also (Matthew 18:20) and I always liked that verse.

When Jesus spoke to Peter and asked him who he was, Peter replied that he was Christ, The Son of the Living God, and Jesus spoke, metaphorically, that on this Truth He would build his church. He wasn't speaking of a physical building necessarily, but of an ideal, a theology, a reaction to God and Truth. He was using the word Church to refer to His Followers, Christians, which means simply Christ Follower.

The idea of a church building did not necessarily come from The Bible only, though there was a Temple in the Bible, where people could take their sacrifices, give them to the priest, and the priest would walk into the Holy of Holies. This concept was essentially a cultural thing though, as all gods had their own temples and priests. The Greeks liked to build their temples without walls because they thought it better to worship their gods in the open, rather than behind walls. I actually believe Christ thought this to be a more biblical way of worship than the walled buildings we use now. Because when He died the veil was torn, and the Holy of Holies, the place where you could worship God and stand before Him in full humanity was open to all, and not just the priests anymore.

The idea of an inward facing Church, who spends it's most important time of worship inside walls, away from the World it is called to love seems to me a gross misunderstanding of scripture.

This is not to say that we should not gather together, as I believe we most certainly should, but where is our priority? Sunday? or the other days?

There is a reality that we need fellowship, and without devaluing that I want to widen the perspective a bit. Christ's Bride is His people, not a church building, HOW we gather together is not more important than what we DO as His Bride. For those who find more comfort in simple house get togethers where they worship and read the Word, I find no fault. For those who find comfort in a service at a traditional church building with a pastor and deacons and a tithe, and such, I also find no fault.

That is to say I find no fault if they have their priorities straight. See, because the real mission of the church, the MOST IMPORTANT mission, is to Go into all the world, and preach the gospel, make disciples, and love others as Christ loves us. How can we do that if our emphasis is on simply going to church on Sunday morning, becoming a member, and serving there, but never getting OUTSIDE the walls?

There is a real problem I see in American Christianity. We see the building as the place of outreach, the place where nonchristians need to come before we can serve them, we spend thousands upon thousands of dollars making the building more "friendly", with nice classrooms and such, but that is not what Christ did. He visited the temples, yes, but if you really read of His Journies, 95% of his greatest acts of service and love as The Groom of His Growing Bride/Church, was done OUTSIDE of the temples, in the streets of the cities and towns. This is true for Paul as well, who wrote to several different churches, but was he writing to a certain building? Or the people in that city who worshipped Christ there?

Then on Sunday mornings we have the pastor saying "If you do not go to church, you are not truly a Christian." We have several points saying how loving the Church means you need to become a member of a local congregation and tithe and such, even if it's not specifically that one. And let's be honest, there's nothing wrong with being a member, tithing, being a part of a local congregation, and in all truth it is very helpful to our spiritual walk. But that's because of the believers, not the building. That's because we are following the biblical mandate to not forsake the gathering together and fellowship of fellow believers. But there is absolutely no criterion on how that should look, except that it should be two or more, except that it should not be alone.

But where is the real heart of the church? Is it in the Temple, or in The World? Where is the real worship happening? Behind closed doors, or outside among those God desperately desires as His own? What is the true meaning of Church? I think once we answer these questions our whole lives will change in how we approach God. Suddenly Church, and being part of it, is every single day, every single hour and second, suddenly being a member of the Body is about what you do on Tuesday more than what you do on Sunday, suddenly serving in your church is just as much about (if not more) how you conduct yourself at work as it is about cleaning the bathrooms of your local church building or helping take the tithe on Sunday.

I think we have two extremes, we have the individualistic Americans who forsake the fellowship and try to follow God on their own, without any interaction and worship with other believers, and this is just as wrong and horrible as the other extreme which is an overemphasis on Sunday morning worship at your local congregation. To make that what being a Christian is all about is to miss the mark entirely.

The Church, the true Church, is out there, among the People, the true worship is washing the feet of sinners, and taking care of orphans, and widows (James 1:27) I would go so far as to say that if we say we love God, and ONLY spend time at Church on Sunday, only serve as a member at that building, only worship God there, and only partake in outreach programs there, and only give our money to that specific place, then just maybe, we are not really loving God, but the building, and our idolatry of the church building is keeping us from the abundant and wide life of Christ as His Bride.

I hope and pray for us. I pray we get plugged in to a local community of believers, but that we don't lose sight of the universal one, and that we will not serve God and His Bride behind walls and closed doors, but in the sight of all, for they will know we are Christians by our love, of them, and each other (John 13:35). They will know what it means to follow Christ by our example.

How we do it, how we gather together, and fellowship, be it two or three, or hundreds in one building, is not what matters, what we do is what matters. Where our priorities are is what matters.

Thoughts on Literature

2011-06-08T12:18:00.000-07:00

The other day I wrote a little about my feelings while reading William Gay, and what it made me realize about another novel I had read before it. I wanted to clear up a few things, as well as speak on some things about literature. First off, I am not saying that I am not a fan of literature such as Gay's or Cormac McCarthy, both write in a deeply southern gothic type style that is often filled with dark characters, and few heroes, even the flawed kind. In a way they come off as parables, moreso with McCarthy. This type of approach has been done long before they came along. It could be said that it started with such writers as William Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor, you could even call them the king and queen of southern gothic. Flannery O'Connor in particular had reasons, which I find valid, for writing in the worlds she did. And such is the importance of such literature. To wake one up to the brokenness of the world. In fact it is those puffed up with pride that such literature is best meant for. We are all flawed, broken, needing to be healed people, and sometimes it takes a story with no heroes to show that.

Many authors are seeking to say something about the world, and few are really trying to say something about God in the world. But I think most of the approaches I've found, even the absurdist approach of Vonnegut and Beckett have purpose in the overall scheme. But it is no wonder that my three most favorite novels happen to be White Fang by Jack London, East of Eden by John Steinbeck, and American Gods by Neil Gaiman respectively. In each story there is a redemptive theme, though one could argue that in American Gods it's turned on it's head a little into a darker theme. But in White Fang in particular the redemptive theme is so beautiful and creative as to, in my opinion, be the best case for Christ and our need for Him that any novel makes in the whole history of literature. East of Eden as well spins a story about family, and love and forgiveness in the face of terribly hurting sin that speaks volumes beyond the pages of script. Such stories are what my heart returns to in the end, and perhaps it's because I know the Christ they echo.

But all life is a path, and in that path is stages, and in those stages are points in time, and in those points in time are growth, and in that growth is a strong need for authenticity and trueness. In a way literature, good literature, reflects one of those stages, be it the conviction stage, the learning to laugh at oneself stage, or the growing in understanding redemption stage. I guess I make a case that a story doesn't always have to be redemptive to have meaning. But there needs to be a meaning. Many authors can weave a beautiful story, with poetic prose, that says nothing at all. But as my opening line to this blog says, better the rudest most rudimentary work that simply records a fact or tells a story, than the richest most beautiful prose without meaning.

Meaning is everything when it comes to what we read and what we write. Flannery O'Connor got that when she wrote A Good Man is Hard to Find. I believe Hemingway got that when he wrote The Old Man and the Sea. And many others get that as well.

So it may be true that my favorite stories of all usually include redemptive storylines, but it doesn't mean the rest doesn't have purpose, or even beauty.

Review: Auralia's Colors by Jeffrey Overstreet

2011-06-07T16:20:00.000-07:00

It hit me while I was reading a collection of short stories by William Gay entitled "I Hate To See That Evening Sun Go Down." why I loved Jeffrey Overstreet's Auralia's Colors, my first foray into the world of The Expanse, so much. It's not because the story is all that different from many other stories I've read, it's not because the prose stands out to me all that much, though it is in fact lovely. It is because of the fascination with all things artful, beautiful and true. Look up Mr. Overstreet and you will come across a phrase from Dostoevsky's The Idiot "Beauty will save the world." at first this may seem abstract and perhaps even dangerous, but in reflection beauty is truth is as true a statement as the aforementioned, and in this light stands the power of Auralia, and of us all. We are the beauty-makers of this world, the meaning bringers, the children of Truth, of Christ. And oftentimes we can take out the beauty in what we try to bring. One reviewer said it best when she compared Overstreet's work to a Van Gogh painting. Van Gogh painted reality, his impression of it, and it was that individual touch on beauty that made art. What Overstreet does is show the importance not only of creativity, but of understanding how to take color and light and beauty, and make meaning and purpose out of it. The Expanse is a world much like our own, where art is somehow turned on it's head and what is beautiful is not, and what is forgotten or put to the wayside is the most beautiful of all. We can't write reality beautifully without inviting some magic, some light, some impressionism into the mix. And that's what got me last night while reading William Gay. He writes beautifully too, you could say the same of Nabokov, or Hemingway, but something is missing, something which shares the ache, and the brokenness, but no hope. Overstreet shares hope. And beauty as well. In truth if you were to read his novels you might not come to the conclusion that God is God and Christ is Lord, or even what that Hope is. But you will know color, and you will know wonder and I know, having been down that path, where it ultimately leads. I also know Gay's path, and while it is pretty, it is hopeless...and for all of it, it deeply misses someone like Auralia.

Review: Boy's Life by Robert R. McCammon

2011-05-29T15:48:00.000-07:00

We ran like young wild furies,
where angels feared to tread.
The woods were dark and deep.
Before us demons fled.
We checked Coke bottle bottoms
to see how far was far.
Our worlds of magic wonder
were never reached by car.
We loved our dogs like brothers,
our bikes like rocket ships.
We were going to the stars,
to Mars we'd make round trips.
We swung on vines like Tarzan,
and flashed Zorro's keen blade.
We were James Bond in his Aston,
we were Hercules unchained.
We looked upon the future
and we saw a distant land,
where our folks were always ageless,
and time was shifting sand.
We filled up life with living,
with grins, scabbed knees, and noise.
In glass I see an older man,
but this book's for the boys.

Such begins the novel Boy's Life by Robert R McCammon, a novel that is at once classical and contemporary, enlightening and entertaining, horrific in some parts and wondrous in others (many times the same part), it is a book about a young boy's growing up in the small town of Zephyr, Alabama. In this town are many magical and wondrous things, from an escaped triceratops from the fair, to an elderly black lady who might or might not be able to do magic. This small town is filled to the brim with exciting and bizarre characters, people who are in a way, larger than life. But at the same time, as a child, everything is larger than life. And that is what this novel is about, the wonder and magic of childhood, be it truth or imagination, and holding on to that as we grow, and learn of the darker truths of this life. This boy learns of these darker truths as a murder happens in town, and his father becomes inextricably intertwined into the mystery. Subplots abound though that have everything to do with growing up, from the death of a friend and crisis of faith, to the inevitable encounter with school bullies. It reminds one of Tom Sawyer, or Scout from To Kill a Mockingbird. The story is set in 1963 and '64, a time when civil rights is a huge issue, and it continues to be an ongoing subplot throughout the book as well as the mystery of the murder.

One thing I loved about this story is the father, a strong male character in a world where increasingly the father is relegated to a bumbling idiot, it reminded me of Koontz's characters in that regard, and family is indeed a powerful catalyst throughout the story, and a shoulder to lean on as the boy grows and learns. It feels as if much of the story was taken from older stories, there's elements of Old Yeller, Stephen King novels, To Kill a Mockingbird, and even Something Wicked This Way Comes as the story goes on, but all of this it is at root it's own animal. I believe as one of my favorite author's once said, that there are no new stories under the sun, only old ones told in our individual ways, and if you can do this, then you have told a good story. McCammon does this with flying colors. At almost 500 something pages it is hard for one to say that he wants to read more, but I was left with that indelible effect as I finished the novel, having read it for the most part of a night and sitting there half asleep at 6 o clock in the morning, I could have read a hundred more chapters about Cory Mackenson, his friends Ben, Davy Ray, and Johnny, the dog Rebel, The Lady, The Moon Man and the large cast of supporting characters, each so lovingly individual that you know this author knew people like them in real life.

I think the mark of a good story is how long it stays with you after you read it, and whether you feel at once changed and perhaps healed after reading it. I can say for a fact that Boy's Life has this effect, and I look forward to repeat readings in the future, entering into Zephyr, and into the magic and wonder of that pool of innocence and grace of childhood, back when the world was far bigger and every person we met was a mystery and a magician, when our fathers were giants, and our dogs were our brothers, and the woods beside our house was a magic kingdom where anything could happen.

Arrowhead Reviews: Ale Boy's Feast Giveaway

2011-05-25T12:30:00.000-07:00

The blog entitled Arrowhead Reviews is giving away a copy of Ale Boy's Feast by Jeffrey Overstreet.

Jeffrey Overstreet is the author of the wonderful Auralia's Colors, a novel about a young girl who changes the face of a city forever through her use of colors in a world where color has been outlawed. A little bit The Giver, a little bit Tolkien, but definitely a book all it's own. This is the first in the series of which Ale Boy's Feast is the last. Definitely worth looking into.

http://arrowheadreviews.blogspot.com/2011/05/ale-boys-feast-giveaway.html#idc-container

Review: I (Heart) Huckabee's

2011-05-20T16:48:00.000-07:00

Let me start off by saying that Jason Schwartzman is a real hit and miss with me. I find him to be a bit grating in most of his roles, but he charmed me in this one. Going from zero to enlightened "hero" is an interesting journey for him. That it all begins by coincidence that means absolutely nothing is what I love most about this movie.

Filled with nods to several philosophical camps, both blatantly (Existentialism and Nihilism) and subtly (the very Matisse like blackboard maze in Bernard's office) it is a movie about finding the meaning of life in realizing there is no meaning, but that we're all connected anyways, especially in pain. I found the moments of epiphany to be very believable, and the dynamic of the marriage of two seemingly different philosophies to be interesting. But ultimately unsatisfying.

Don't get me wrong, the movie for what it is is brilliant, and touching. And yet the idea that we have to put our own face on the enemy before we can love him is something that really bothers me, because at it's deepest level seems truly a selfish almost self worshipful thing. Sure we're all the blanket, connected scientifically and spiritually to the point of no cracks, sure pain draws us together, etc. but is there not a beauty in the idea of an 'other'? Of something/someone that is not us?

I think perhaps all these people are still on the journey to realizing that.

I loved the film despite all that, and glad to add it to my library. Repeat viewings will have to be sparse though for one very uncomfortable scene I plan on never seeing again, and the only true flaw in the movie. I won't even describe it it's just that uncomfortable..

Well, that's all for this review, more to come.

8.5/10

2011-04-29T13:15:00.000-07:00

For those of you who read my blog, most of you know that I am writing(ish) a novel called Willow The Wisp. It's sort of a modern day fairy tale in the same vein as Neil Gaiman's Coraline.

When I sat in Christian Perspectives at Belhaven we spent a lot of time talking about belief in things we can't see or experience. There was a lot of discussion on Plato, and his view of reality. One of the things that really stuck with me is that the professor talked about seeing the world with wonder, and not doubt. That if we come to the table of reality to examine it with a preconceived notion of doubt then we will not see reality truly. God, faith, all of it takes a sense of wonder to really see. Such is why I think God/Jesus really emphasized the faith of a child.

As a child I loved fantasy stories, ones about elves, and dwarves, men proficient with sword, and dragons. My heart leap't at the use of magic, and powerful wizards. I think there's a certain sinfulness to it in a strange way, it's not just about the beauty of watching a wizard create a field of flowers with a few words, it the power too. In a sense Willow The Wisp explores both aspects, the dark and the wonder.

There's an escapism too, a world not our own, a place where we can hide from the things of man, getting away from the pain, or the doldrum, but what we leave behind is beautiful too, wondrous even, magical. To explore the magical aspect of everyday life is another reason I write the story. To emphasize family, forgiveness, and faith. Hope.

But there is one other aspect I really wanted to explore, and it goes back to the very beginning of my Willow The Wisp idea, and that is a father's love. In the poem The Elf King by Goethe a father is carrying his fevered son through a dark, and medieval forest, haunted by the spirit of an elf king (in those times the idea of elves were more like demonic spirits) who wishes to own the boy. In some translations it's actually the elf king's daughter who haunts them. But the father carries the boy in haste, unknowing of the haunting spirit, though the boy can feel him, in a way it's like a fever dream, and there is that unsurety of whether the boy is just mad, or there really is an Elf King trying to steal him away. As they finally reach safety the boy is dead.

So of course there's some aspects of that in the story, a staple of magic realism is a tendency to blur the lines a bit, is it real or is it not? Well, it depends on how you see the world, with wonder or doubt.

The last aspect I really wanted to explore is Weiden herself, the true main character, though it is written from the boy's perspective. She is a reluctant heroine, who comes into her own as time goes on. There's a lot of complications I can't really go into, but really the idea of courage is explored, and Weiden has to face her fears, including herself, to help Jack the boy. I was really inspired by Miyazaki's Spirited Away for this.

All this to say there's two other stories within the main story that get hinted at, the story of Jack's uncle, who faces a similar path in his life as Jack is now, and the story of the Elf King himself and his darkly evil beautiful daughter. To write a prologue is a bit tricky, because I end up giving away a lot of the secrets of Willow The Wisp, other than Weiden herself, who always remains a bit of a mystery. But of the past of the forest, it is somewhat fully revealed, and the darkness of the hearts of Jack's family, and why his father fears the forest, that is revealed as well. But perhaps it will bring perspective to the main story in a way that will emphasize the key aspects i am exploring. And I hope that it will also provide an inroad in a way for an audience.

No name yet, but maybe that will come to me as I am writing it.

Midnight In the Gardens of my mind, the good and the evil

2011-04-07T00:04:00.000-07:00

There's an edge of the world, where a boy dips his foot into water, silky black and starry clothed. Cold flows back and forth into pores and out, a curtain closing and opening between life and death. For a moment he can dip his head beneath that veil and see the murky world beneath with alien things and creatures all scales and fin. There is an edge of the world where a man can dig his feet into the grain, the particles of rock as numerous as the stars and remember the things his father taught him, of how God's love is more than the sand on a beach, or the stars in the sky. Both worlds underwater or deep space could bring death, but when seen behind the curtain of life can bring hopeful messages of a grace filled Creator.

The radio plays sometimes these same stories, turned to the right channel a kind woman and man deejay a show filled with songs of praise and worship, Crowder Band, Newsboys, Matt Maher, JJ Heller.

I love you I love you I love you God says.

It's written in the songs you seek, in the stars you don't have to seek, and in the water you dip yourself into.

It's written in far more abstract, ancient and mystical letters behind her eyes, seen in the flickers of a smile, in the deepness of a gaze.

Long drives take one away from all of this, across barren landscapes that smell of shit. An angry voice, a insulting tone, all of it rips the worlds away, life and death simply become doldrum and sacrifice. Where's the love now.

The silence answers as deep as the ocean itself, the ocean speaks louder than the silence, waves crash and stars glimmer, a lively late night conversation in a hot-tub, soothing heat stripping both physical and emotional pains away. And in the laughter God says don't lose hope.

Arkansas, Beloved Arkansas

2011-02-25T15:42:00.000-08:00

I never really saw Arkansas til my 20's. I was born here, among the maple and old oak trees. I walked barefoot on gravel roads around lakes filled with catfish that sometimes my father and I would fish for, but we always threw them back. Only in the South could you find a ranch that was half bible college half summer camp. But that's where I was grown. Around fires and college kids that took me on as their official mascot. On weekends my father would play Peter in the local passion play entitled The Witness. It was there among the smells of coke and donkey, smoke and bathroom that I stubbed my toe the first time, running up the concrete stadium in sandals. It was the moment a boy realizes pain exists. I fell out of an old cabin once too, right on my butt. I made my first best friends. I had my first crush, my first and only dog, who I named after the dog of the year from one of the years in the 80's, Scruffy. I got my first broken heart when Ashley in first grade didn't like me, but liked my best friend Gabe. At least that's how I remember it in my head. But through all this, it was like a boy just living, he didn't really know what he was living in. He didn't really understand culture and worldview.

When I was in my later 20's I saw a movie called Chrystal. It stars Billy Bob Thornton and was written and produced by Arkansan Ray Mckinnon. In a way it's a lovesong to the hillbilly culture of the Ozarks. I visited Petit Jean, walked the old mountains, but never did I really see these places til I watched that movie. Suddenly old dirt backroads held ancient stories, and the music of my heritage, that of bluegrass, folk, blues even, became the music of my heart. I wanted to go back to bible college, sitting there at Vesper's Point where many years before my birth mother and father had exchanged vows. I would watch the stars and talk to God. Looking off at the same hills I once pretended that I was gonna run away to. Oh what adventures a little boy would have, like Old Yeller, or Where The Red Fern Grows. I was that kinda boy. But those days I seemed fascinated with stars, and God behind them. While now I am more fascinated with culture and people and stories and poetry and, still, God, I wish I'd go back to that time and look out at those old hills like that boy did.

People have a lot to say about roots, and I've found that mine tend to run deeper than I like to think, the Arkansas mountainboy always crooning in my soul for a time long lost. And yet I look at where I will be going and I know it has it's culture too, it's stories, and the same stars in the sky. Perhaps like that little boy I can see this as the running away adventure, and like Shasta in A Horse and His Boy, find out what's beyond those hills and mountains.

I'll sure miss her though, Arkansas...she raised me. She gave me refuge. She built me out of logs and fireflies, warm summer nights feet touching grass. I'll never forget that. I'll never forget ya Arkansas.

Reminisces 2010

2010-12-31T21:07:00.000-08:00

A good year, the time has passed like a flicker. Time is like a fire, both always in motion and constant. You are 5 years old and 500 all in the same moment. Each person a tendril of flame waving in the wind, held constant to the logs of existence. And in time, the flame dies, but embers glow, always holding the promise of rebirth and flickering life again.

This has been a year for growth, for change, for renewed desires and for hopeful goals. By this time next year I will be married. By this time next year I will be that much closer to a published author. Perhaps already be one.

Memory is such a fickle thing, how often do we remember what we don't desire to with overwhelming clarity, but when we seek to renew the knowledge of something it runs ahead of us like hunter and prey. I don't remember a lot. I remember moments, feelings, some are smoky in the mirror. I remember this time, I was young, driving towards home, happy...I think it was my birthday. The road is leading to the trailer. That is all I remember. I don't remember what was said, or who was with me, or which birthday it was. Years come and go as gently as fireflies or as spectacular and ephemeral as shooting stars.

Everyone's making a resolution, I heard this song once, I think it was by Carolyn Arends, the words went "This will be my resolution, every day is new years day". I've tried to live by that, but I can see the easy laziness of such a thing. If every day is special, lifechanging, wonderful, then no day is special, lifechanging or wonderful. I can see the importance and wonder in holidays, and I can see the beauty in having a day to mark the beginning of the next year, a clean slate, a time to change, forgive, and renew goals. There's nothing so wrong with this as there is in the lackadaisicalness one might enter in to if one were to cynically call it just another day, and do nothing about the resolutions or changing of oneself the day almost seems to beg for. To be true new years resolutions only hold about as much power as a speck of dust without resolve, choice and love. But this makes them no less good of a thing.

I resolve to be a good fiancee, a good husband, a good best friend to Naomi.
I resolve to grow closer in my walk with God, and in my growth of wellbeing.
I resolve to be healthier.
I resolve to be more sociable, to love people better, to write more, to laugh more, to sing often, and sometimes, when no one is looking, to dance.
I resolve to visit Weiden, Jack, and all the gang more often, to learn to see the world through her eyes, with wonder and not doubt.
I resolve to hope.
I resolve to care more about the things that matter, and care less about the things that only matter to me.
I resolve to be a better communicator.
Lastly, I resolve to continue in the things I am doing right, forgive myself and sin no more in the things I am not, and always always to be in the face of God always, as a friend once wrote.

May this next year be one of good memories, so that the flickers I remember 10 years down the road bring warm feelings of joy and contentment. Even if I don't remember all the specifics.

To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

2010-12-27T22:07:00.000-08:00

Strains of soft sad music play in the background, not a soundtrack, but a elevator string of silent whisperings of the heart. Can love make you sad? Or just morose. Such a powerful downer drug, but the kind that leaves you feeling more incredibly alive than you would even understand. These bipolar rumblings come now and then, here and gone again like fairies in the smoke of morning mist. Little flickering lights and will o the wisps taking one in with enchantment, and leading one on adventures that one cannot walk away from.

There was a girl once named Weiden...or was it Zoe.

She liked to dance among the fireflies, and laugh with the hopeless dreamers. She had a cat who walked in Life and Death, and a bruised doppleganger.

Stories take form from the stuff of our lives, little pieces of our earth growing through the soil of imagination, into flowers. Rain falls from the sky in divine interruptus, washing away the Grey to reveal the Gold. In turn as we turn our eyes from the page we see the Gold in that person who somehow got in our story. Somehow wormed her way into our heart and mind so deeply that it would take simple death itself to get her out, and maybe not even that.

There was a boy named Jack, or was it Justin. He had a quiet, literary father, a bully at the school and a best friend obsessed with science and science fiction, in the days he falls for this girl, he sees both hope and despair, love and death, and terror all in one. Love is like a dream, a nightmare, a dream, there and back again, this boy's tale. This man's tale.

here in the south, on the cobblestones that lined the walk of a college where i was taught to love art, faith in art, and dance...itself almost a two worlds walker between faith and art, like fairies in the smoke of morning mist, in this place where Eudora Welty wrote her novels, and Faulkner wrote not far away, where civil rights was fought for, and southern roots run deep, in this place of enchantment, i found my Samwise Gamgee. I found my Weiden Nebelstreif, my heart of my own heart.

The stuff legends are made of, sometimes you just gotta fill in the blanks with a little overt magic, to make the magical moments easy to see for those with ears to hear and eyes to see.

There needs not be any dichotomy between the sword of love and the sword of self respect, for this is not just a love story, but a story of self growth too. They say in order to be ready, one needs a life, but I say one needs to know the stones upon which a life is built, and include the love part. Cause it matters.

I could not see that forest if not for her. I could not know what makes Weiden and Jack so beautiful a story if not for her. I couldn't even write if not for her. Sure other muses would might exist, but would this story ever exist without her, and the circumstances around her, the environment her feet have walked upon, the people she has known that i have known, without the world around her. I think not. I never would have read Goethe's poem, or The Stolen Child by Yeats, and the book which Donohue wrote inspired by it. I never would have then read Donohue's other novel Angels of Destruction, in which I found the seeds of a Weiden character. I did watch Miyazaki movies before her, but I think even though many of his female characters have a seed in Weiden, the beauty of her story is purely one of literature, of Scouts and Elizabeth Bennett's, Alice's and Wendy's etc. The world goes ever on and on. And I still love her.

There's the beginning of every story, and there's an end. No story goes on forever, but life goes on beyond the pages. I left my hobbit hole to follow Gandalf into the night when I first met her, she of the fireshining hair, a living Galadriel. Like the dust of stars fallen from the sky. I opened the gate, I took her hand, and we walked into the unknown world, made up of things already created, and things we would create.

There is meaning in love. There is Godliness in this fairy tale. Just as all roads must go somewhere, and be they yellow brick, or cobblestone, be they gravel, or paved, they must go somewhere. When I look into her eyes I know God exists. And I know God is at the end of that road. Like a little flickering will o' the wisp she leads me into that adventure, through wardrobes and doorways, gateways and pillars of light, to the end and beginning of time itself.

I laugh and the laugh shatters, and fairies fly all around.

I smile and she smiles, and the whole earth, and expanse of universe smiles. For a moment i am so existential it hurts. I wonder how could there be love greater than this and power so much stronger, and i am reminded that God is bigger than even my finite mind can comprehend and for a moment i know what it's like to sit at the feet and know what it is to say Holy Holy Holy

In the end, it's real, it's a fairy tale, and it's better than anything could be imagined. In the end any story I write, though it be some metaphysical mirror image of life I live, and girl and God I love it pales in comparison to reality. It can only capture some of the flickering moments, and far too many of the dripping gray ones. But like taking a picture, it holds a moment in stasis, and each time you look at it, you know something different about that story.

And there's the beauty.

The music stops, the album's over and the thoughts give way to dreams, sleep overtakes quietly and tomorrow lies in wait, all the new adventures and seeds of stories to be had. Dreams themselves are alot like stories, twisted, distorted visions of reality, both incredibly breathtaking and terrifying in what they reveal. Lately mine have revealed that behind the smile, behind the shattering laughter, and the joys of adventure lies a girl who will always be in my heart, a woman who will always have my heart, and a hope that when I look back, arthritic hands too pained to type, eyes too dim to see, and memories fading fast, each one will be haunted by her, the ghost of her always in my eyes, shimmering through the trees in a rainbow that looks like angel wings. And that when my last breath is taken by Death, I will go happily into that good night, knowing that the God on the other side, his adventures and loving and knowing Him are what her and I were like a dream of.

maybe it's only supposed to make sense when you're half asleep, and about to dream...maybe that's when the you inside begins writing the feelings and things that can't be uttered logically. I'll always only know God and love through the medium of stories, her a part of them. It's just how I tick. And always behind the music will be playing. Not a soundtrack, but a silent whispering of the heart til I am dust, and then something more than dust on the other side.

The Gift Worth Asking For (A Christmas Story)

2010-12-09T19:03:00.000-08:00

The hard floor of the mall sparkled with shades of green and red, mingled with the normal porcelain brown of it's tiles. All around bright faces stared in wonder at wreathed doorways and the beautiful script reading "Happy Holidays"

A man in santa costume sat near the middle of the store, red and white suit framing a large figure with a fake white beard as long as Gandalf's. His face bore that grandfatherly kindness, but in his eyes was other things. He was thinking about what he was going to get his estranged wife, divorced now for four years she lived in Los Angeles, with a screenwriter. He still thought of her after all that time, still found himself waking up at night expecting to find her still form rising out of his dreams beside him. Children began lining up, and his eyes changed, the humanity fading from them, to appear more like the god of Christmas he forced a smile, and laughed the deep belly laugh of the one who he represented.

"And what would you like little boy?" He asked his firstcomer, as the teenagers dressed as elves held back the throng behind him.
"A buzz lightyear doll, or a skateboard!"
"Ho Ho Ho, but you have to pick one...have you been a good boy?"
"I've tried, but mommy says I've sometimes been naughty, maybe is that okay?"

The santa didn't know how to reply, so he just laughed again. You couldn't tell a kid they were getting coal, you couldn't tell a kid one act of naughtiness knocked them from the nice list.

"I'm sure you'll get that gift, now run along."

A little girl came next, dressed in a pink coat and little jeans that had fleur de lis' on the buttocks. She sat down quickly and her eyes searched his.
Her mom watched from the crowd, a strangely anxious look on her face.
"And what do you want little girl?"
"I want my daddy to go to jail for hitting mommy."
The Santa looked up at the mother in startlement, then back down at the girl who had begun to cry.
"Please Santa, please save mommy, I don't want no gift, I want her to be happy."
One of the elves was moving forward
"Time to go kid, Santa's busy."
The mother grabbed her daughter's hand and pulled her from Santa's lap.
He stood up, mumbling something about needing a break and dashed towards the long hallway which led to the bathrooms.
In the bathroom he stood in front of the mirror, his eyes red with something like tears, but mostly shame.
It had happened a few times before they married. He had always promised her that he would never do it again. He would go and drink, and in an inebriated state became something very unlike the person staring back at him now. His last attack had been the most vicious, and it was because of this that his wife had left him, though in a singular act of love and forgiveness she had pressed no charges.

Outside one of the elves knocked on the door.
"You okay in there man?"
"Just a minute, just a minute."
He washed his face, and left the bathroom.
Walking back he began to wonder what was the point. All these gifts, all this hope, what was it for? There was no Santa Claus, just an old abusive drunk in a suit. Where were the true answers and gifts of life that Christmas' mass hysteria seemed to scream the desire for?

He sat back down again, perfecting his laugh and smile. The kids seemed impatient.
The boy that walked up next was a quiet one in glasses, his father standing at the fore watched with a smile, texting on his Blackberry.
"And what would you like"
The little boy was looking past him, over at a bookstore. He pointed at something and said "I wanna know why that says that?"
The man in the Santa suit turned his head, looking back at the bookstore. The sign read "LifeWay Christian Bookstore" and underneath was a banner which read "The Reason For the Season." And underneath that was a large nativity scene.
The man found himself smiling despite himself. He'd never been to church, never read much of the Bible, and if he was quite honest, didn't even believe there was a God, but for some reason that question in the boy's eyes, mirrored with the questions of those other two children's, one seeking forgiveness and the other salvation and hope...they all mirrored the feeling he had in himself at that moment.
"You know, that's a gift worth asking for."
He stood up then, and the elves sighed thinking he was taking another bathroom break.
He knew he'd be fired for this but he didn't care. He told the kids and parents to follow him, said he was answering the boy's question. They walked across the mall, a strange procession to the shoppers, who watched in confusion as they trekked into the bookstore and stood beside the nativity scene. An employee approached them with a curious look on his face.
"Can I help you?"
The man in the santa costume looked at the children's expectant faces, at the parent's annoyed eyes, at the elves who looked terrified to say the least and finally at the young employee.
"They ask me for gifts I can't give. I'm only a man." He tore off his beard then, and unbuttoned his santa suit.
"My name is Bob, and though I am not Santa, no God of gifts or forgiveness and hope, I think I can show you who is, I wish I'd asked for him as a child too, like this little boy."
The employee looked over at his manager, who smiled, and nodded his head.
"Uhhh, would you like me to tell the Nativity Story?"
The little boy blurted out "Yes!"
"Yes." Said Bob.
So the employee did.

Just a Scene from Somewhere

2010-12-06T21:38:00.000-08:00

"Have you sat down to watch the flowers grow?" Henry asked
Amy smiled, "Never, but I don't have much time these days, what with the diner, my pa, and brother."
Henry watched her talk, the way her mouth moved and the slight hint of cinnamon and chocolate in her breath. Her face was lined, but not in an ugly way, in the way all faces become lined with wisdom, and only the fools tried to botox it out. He didn't care that she was almost 5 years older than him.
"Why do you look at me like that?"
"Cause I like to watch the flowers grow."

Scarlet watched them from the trees, her tiny bump wiggling with the baby inside. She felt it kick, it's little legs seeking for space, for time, for a place in the world, kicking to carve out a piece in the puzzle, kicking to let the world know it existed. She was his world.
The wind picked up and snatches of conversation came from the meadow, something about flowers and diners, hopes and dreams. If only Bill was more like his sister Amy.
If only were the two most dangerous words her father would say.
She had to admit he was right, Tim was her 'if only', the greener grass on the other side, the one who saw in her everything she wanted to be seen. God knew she shoulda gone to him instead of Bill. Times were different then.

"I'm no flower," Amy looked down at the ground. This boy come back from college, a man now, the little mudpied face that used to grin through her window and terrorize her with worms was this same smiling face, those same beautiful blue eyes.
"A rose is a rose, no matter what you call it," Henry was watching the forest, and he looked to have spotted something.
"What is it?"
"My sister," He said, resignation on his face.

"Done spotted me," She turned to walk and there was Bill. His large face red as a tomato.
"Where you been woman? I been lookin up and down these hills for ya, I gots things ta do, and you out here playin like you some wild animal."
"I'm sorry baby, I am."
He took her hand roughly and pulled her towards the truck.
"What you starin at anyways?"
"Something I'll never have."
He grunted.
She'd decided then and there that she had to break it off with Tim. Bill was her husband, and her father was right, saying if only would just get Tim killed. Bill was a loaded gun even on the best of days.

Henry watched them go, a strange feeling in his stomach. He hadn't seen longing on Scarlet's face, more like regret, more like loss.
"I gotta go Amy."
The trees parted as he left the meadow, walking towards the trailer park and home, he felt a cold wind, and knew Fall was on the horizon, he hoped those dying leaves weren't any kind of symbol of what was to come, but he had a sinking feeling they were.

Character Histories: Caden Lore

2010-12-03T21:14:00.000-08:00

Caden Lore came to being during the RP narrative Edendown, and was a character written in honor of my friend Brandon's new son at the time, also named Caden.

The son of Alden Lore and Diane Ulstaf, Caden's story cannot be understood without highlighting some of what his parents were like too. First of all Alden Lore was a Gryphoni, a mercenary soldier from a different continent, the Gryphoni served Ileya the Chaos Goddess, and had tattoos of Gryphons on their backs. Alden was short, and had little hair, just like his son later would. The true picture of a soldier. He had no magical powers, and came to Diane's continent in search of employment.

Diane on the other hand was the daughter of the chief Wizard of Rhune, and while at first she had no good impression of Alden, she needed his help when her father locked her up for using magic in an illegal way. Alden saved her and they escaped together into the night, running across a woman seeking a powerful magical diamond, The Oracle, on the run through Mirror's gateway from the machinations of Elsteth and Talis, crossing much time itself, and seeking the Gem of Kaey, known to bear incredible power. A ruse really, by Talis, in order to get The Oracle to appear in the forest outside Rhune at the same time as Alden and Diane. In pursuit are hellhounds, and Alden kills them, in turn the Oracle gives a prophecy, that in a few months Alden will die, and Diane will return to her people, where their son will be raised.

They don't believe her.

But it comes true, and Diane indeeds returns to Rhune, where she raises their young son, magicless like his father, and unable to master the ability since it's in the blood. or through the use of talismans.

Caden is both hated, and looked down upon for knowing no magic, and yet he bears an incredible ability to master weapons, a gift from his father. And one day when the new Chief Wizard's son challenges him to a fight, Caden accidentally kills him, and is banished from the city. Caden is only too happy to leave, a young 20 year old man, interested to see the world. He joins a troop from the capitol City of Salis, and becomes a soldier, where he earns the reputation of a great warrior. But the gods watch him, and one of them in particular is interested in him, for he has the bearings of a legend about him. She makes a pact with Ileya (who feels she owns him because of who his father was) to take Caden as her plaything. The goddess is The Morrigu, Goddess of Death, and Mother of The Reaper, that one that holds power over men and all else, to cut the chords of their lives and drive them to the underworld. The game is that The Reaper will hunt Caden, kill him, then he is reborn as a 20 year old man. The first hunt is over quickly and when Caden awakes he is sitting in a field of flowers, naked, and two children watching and laughing. He doesn't know what happened.

This goes on for several "lives" he sometimes lives to 50, but never further, and always The Reaper comes and hunts him down, Caden powerless to kill him. In one of his lives he meets his former patron goddess, Ileya and she gives him a task, tricking him into believing she will break the curse if he does, but she abandons him at the end, and he is left with two soul stealing swords, The Swords of Night and Day, which themselves become a sort of curse to him, but give him extra ability on his already incredible prowess in fighting. He is still unable to defeat The Reaper, but always when he wakes into a new life, the swords are there too.

He fights in a far off Empire, both as the Emperor's general, and later as a rebel. Goes mad in the country of the Khat's, falls into dark depression and suicidalness on the coast of Maijin, and it is around this time, suicidal and broken that Caden meets Elda, after waking near the elven kingdom, and learning of a marauding troop of former soldiers of the dead High King of the continent terrorizing the countryside, and he goes in search of the elve's help. They are in congregation, discussing two boys who it has been prophesied will recover the Runestaff, and kill Elsteth the Evil. Caden finds himself vowing to guard them, along with a young elven girl named Elda who he finds interesting, the elven princess, a Wizard of Rhune who has a strange connection to Dragons, a young lord from Maijin, a Khat, and other adventurers. During their travels somehow Caden and Elda end up in the world of Elsteth, and there The Phoenix binds itself to Elda, and she becomes it's avatar in her world, and it slowly consumes her til it is all that is left...but this happens over time and Caden slowly loses her. He also comes to love the elven princess Sianna, and she uses her powers to help break his curse with The Morrigu, giving him the ability to die (part of the curse was Caden could not die by any hand but The Reapers) and he and the others go on to help the twin boys find the Runestaff and defeat Elsteth. All along a strange man with a harp haunts Caden, and tells him things about other worlds, etc. This man is Talis, who has by machination and manipulation used all of Mirror's history to bring it to this point, where Caden and the others slay Elsteth. This is his revenge.

Many die, but they are hailed as heroes, and Caden, in his wrath with Talis and the gods of his world becomes known as The Godslayer, killing the guardians of the world, and taking on their powers. (I should note here that I thought up Caden and all this long before I ever knew about Kratos and the God of War games, but they are incredibly similar characters)

Elda is consumed by the Phoenix, and yet able to retain some of her memories, which is why she protects Caden when, because of his actions magic consumes the world and it's people, destroying half the world, and leaving the landscape pretty much impassable. In her fire Caden is able to withstand the onslaught of magic, and falls into a deep sleep, that he is woken from 500 years later by Zoe, a Walker, and elven woman able to withstand the magical onslaught for a couple hours. Others like her exist, but are feared by the towns. She wakens him because of the legend of the runestaff, but does not know of his part in the way her world has become. He is an old man, nearly 50, and he helps her restore order to the world, appointing a new group of guardians, and coming to know of The Creator. Caden himself becomes Guardian of Water, and lives out his life on the coast of the place which used to be Maijin, with Zoe. The new guardians are not all like him, and some take on the name of gods, but he is undesirous to meddle in the affairs of the higher worlds anymore. And this goes on for centuries, til he is called by The Creator for one last war, to join the Champions against The Dissonance, a creation of using the Harp of Creation for evil as Talis has. He meets Taliesin Dalmanes, Pandishar, and many others. And he dies in that last battle, finally able to come to Haven, where The Creator has established a Forever Kingdom.

and other ideas

2010-12-02T18:31:00.000-08:00

I could use Buzz for my "conversation starters"

but i don't wanna just write fantasy, and i think that my skills need to be honed in many different directions, so i will continue writing short stories, or whatever you want to call them too.

but i think half the point of this is to begin the work, whatever form it takes, and do it, not to prove i'm a writer, or reach a point where i deserve responses, or whatever...the cloying insecurity all writers deal with is an awful demon, and comparing myself to others or getting jealous is stupid.

period.

The End. And The Beginning.

Codename: Avalon

2010-11-29T19:59:00.000-08:00

When the biographers and documentarians someday scour the writings of one Justin Hanvey they will find a very detailed, possibly maniacal, worldbuilding exercise codenamed Avalon.

So what is this you might ask?

A way to hone my skills really

There are 7 worlds. Each is connected by magical gateways that lead to a garden, which has arches to the other worlds on it. The Garden is named Avalon. It does not exist on this plane so much, and is more a concept in the mind of Creator. The being that sang the worlds into existence, as well as created the Garden, a place where 7 guardians watch over the gateways. These 7 guardians are beings of incredible, demigod like power, they are called the Gatekeepers, and an ongoing story goes on with them that in turn effects the worlds they guard.

So far I have a few worlds outlined

Aether - the world of angels, beings created as a sort of army of the Creator. They're something like High Elves with wings, and several of them in some distant past find their way to other worlds, where they mate with men and have children who are actually the elves. One of the main characters who interacts is an angel named Mikael Silver Goldeneyes, who loses his memory, and later becomes a Champion in the last war.

Lyrica - It is on this world that the Harp of Creation resides, and a lone Bard (read Wizard, but uses song magic) named Taliesin is forced into a war which will have ramifications on the whole universe, mainly when he gives the harp to a mysterious being named Talis, who then uses it for both great good and evil

Haven - A small world, a peaceful planet that has little to do with the story til later in the sci fi parts, birthplace of Zel who will become the last Champion, and a Prince of the Galaxy as brother of King Barak. It's also fair to note here that while the seven worlds are the main ways to the overall plot, what Haven represents is the worlds outside the realm of the gateways, a full galaxy of planets. the other six worlds lie in different parts of this galaxy and not close together. they are truly only reachable by the gateways, but around them are other worlds and these worlds play a part in the sci fi story...which is admittedly largely inspired by Star Wars

De'lon - thought by many to be the first world created by the Creator after making Avalon. De'lon is the homeworld of Corland, the Sword King, the first Champion, and later birthplace of Taliesin Dalmanes, a central character who is revealed to be a reincarnation of Talis, given a second chance to atone for his sins by the Creator.

Mirror - Several Champions end up on this world, including Liliana the Forest Elemental, Caden Lore, Vorin Night the Dark Assassin, Pandishar the Black Paladin, Valadan Rayvensvere, and others. Many stories happen on Mirror, and it's the central world in the overall plotline.

Khad - a world of demons and dark wizards, call it Hell, call it Hades, it is the Underworld of the seven worlds

Earth - though only seen in one small time in it's history, Earth is the homeworld of one champion, the one known as Wolf Kahn. It is written of after magic is reborn and everything changes.

The seven gatekeepers have children and these children are titans, in turn the titans have children and these are "gods", and often worshipped by the humans in place of the true God, the Creator. He mainly uses his Creation as his hands and feet, but he will speak openly with those who seek him truly. one such is Caden, known as the Godslayer, who finds a God worth following in the Creator.

of the seven gatekeepers Talis is one, the guardian of Mirror's gateway. Elsteth, the guardian of Khad's gateway. The Oracle, who begs no name given, who guards De'lons gateway. Iam Song, Lyrica's gateway, Heth of Earth, Iya of Haven, and Miyal Iya's twin of Aether.

of the titans few really play a big part except for Ulgronth the son of Talis and Rhiannon, a human, who is Gardener of Avalon. She plays the part of Eve, falling to the temptations of Elsteth...who uses her to gain control of his world. Talis, who loves her, uses a far more manipulative, and time crossing way to control his. It is actually strictly forbidden of gatekeepers to interfere in their worlds, and both are seen as having committed a great sin. One is for lust for power, the other for revenge.

Time itself plays a major part, especially in it's fluidness, inasmuch as a reincarnation of a character actually faces off against his old self. There is no set timeline, though there is a beginning and an end, the rest is everchanging.

And always in the background a great evil known as The Dissonance grows, and will come to be the Champion's last greatest fight in the salvation of the 7 worlds and Avalon itself.

Either way, the idea is an ongoing project Robert Jordanian in scope, a worldbuilding exercise that I will never finish, using characters, plots, and ideas from many of my old narrative rp'ing days and old book ideas long since scrapped (for now). It is never to be published, and only to be read by those close, and those who ever come across this blog, though not advertised.

but for now that's what this blog is, a place to write this crazily large story, and a place to hone skills of writing...there will be edits, repeats, do-overs, changes, and many other things that will probably make reading the story for enjoyment very annoying. but as a study of the art of writing, perhaps informative, and fun.

that is all for tonight.

Q&A with Justin Hanvey (by Justin Hanvey)

2010-11-25T16:12:00.000-08:00

Justin: Hey thanks Justin for stopping by and being gracious enough to answer some questions.

Justin: No problem.

Justin: So, well, let's start out with the big one, I heard recently on your blog that you were going to shut down the place, but then I see some new blogs and a seeming lack of desire to shut down, what changed your mind?

Justin: Wow...good question, well I had a lot of reasons for deciding to keep the place, mainly cause there's so much going on in my brain, and putting it here it's like a glorified storage closet. I used to walk around and this line would enter my head. For years that line would haunt me til I put it in a poem or story, and it would finally leave me alone. It's funny cause it wouldn't really mind if the story or poem was good, or worth reading, as long as it was written. I also decided to stay on because of some personal issues, these issues are starting to be hammered out. I wanted to write for good and bad reasons. I would sometimes become focused on the good ones, and feel at peace, and other times focus on the bad ones and not feel at peace. But I think now I'm at a bit of peace for my reason for keeping this place.

Justin: That's good! It's nice to be at peace. You mind sharing your reason?

Justin: Of course, it started with a discussion with a friend, and ended with a movie. I'll be unconventional and share the end first. Imagine a tree, a high tall tree that grows far into the sky, and now imagine a little girl who loves climbing that tree. She comes to the top and from it she can see her whole world. She goes there in the afternoons and mornings to watch the sun rise, and the sun set. That tree to her is a gateway into a world of beauty and wonder within her own world. It's a lot like a book really. My first vision of writing was defined by that tree. Sorta. I mean I only recently saw that movie, but that tree, and what it meant to the girl is exactly what writing means to me.

Justin: Wow

Justin: Yeah, and so in the story the tree gets cut down so that someone can build a home. The girl is devastated! Imagine if...well let's use A Horse and His Boy...imagine if this incredible beautiful story was burned, and no other trace of it existed. Imagine if Shasta never crossed the mountains, never met Aravis, never learned of his destiny, never becomes a talking horse's boy. Travesty! But that story, like all stories will someday fade into the mist. These ephemeral things are as transient as we are, flickers of light in the darkness. Anyways, a boy comes along and over the years falls in love with this girl, he hurts her though and has to make amends before she can return his feelings. So what does he do for her? He plants her a tree. And they began patting down the soil, and this tiny sapling, just like their relationship, like all beauty, will grow into something great. And that's how the movie ends. It doesn't show what happens next. At first I was looking at my tv disappointed, but then I got it. And it had a lot to do with a recent conversation about how writing is like all craft, it takes time and effort and honing. That little sap of a tree will become that tall beautiful sycamore, and that girl and boy will sit as adults in it's high branches and see beauty in the world, and maybe their kids will too, and yet it takes time to create true beauty. It takes time for that tree to grow, and some branches might have to be pruned...

Justin: Wow that's a lot to take in, but I think I get what you're saying.

Justin: You asked why I want to keep this place. Well, it's not about me anymore. Or you. It's about God, but it's also about the stories, about the trees. It's about honing the craft, and taking the time to make the beauty. If some people wanna peek in and watch, that's fine. But for me, for now...it's about that tree. And that little girl in the tree.

Justin: Amazing, well, thanks for taking the time to answer that question, I know I was truly wondering what was going on in that head of yours.

Justin: Hey no problem. Thanks for asking

The Circles of Life

2010-11-22T20:16:00.000-08:00

All life is a circle

When I was a child we moved around alot, from a trailer to a in law's house, from there to a university's apartment, and finally to a condo. But in all those small circles we often ended up at one stable place, my Grandma Hanvey's house. It is the one home that has always been there from the start. When my mother and sister died in a car wreck, that was where dad left me, so that he could go rebuild what happiness he had, it's the same home he returned to a year later with the acknowledgement that he hadn't lost his whole family, and I still mattered.

We lived in a trailer on a bible college campus in the heart of the ozarks of Arkansas. But a trailer is a home on wheels, and it signified deeply Dad's restlessness at Applied Life, a place I am sure he never truly felt he really belonged.

And always we would go down the road a bit to see Grandma Hanvey, still in that house on the road named after a tree, with her big back yard, and at that time a garden, and a swingset that I loved to play on.

We lived in my mother's parent's place for a year, always tense, waiting for the future to unfold, waiting for that moment when Dad would come home and say..."this is what we're going to do."

And always, the circle might lead to new places, but it would return to Grandma Hanvey's.

And then we jumped a bit further in our curve, crossing 800 miles to a large town called Virginia Beach. But I had another circle you see, one constant that made the move do-able. I had my father. I'd known him from the moment I was born, his blood flowed inside me, and he was a constant in a world of strangely shaped celtic knots.

Those were good years, the years to break walls, and explore, the years to know what songs to sing and books to read, the years that I learned how to be a friend, and how not to be.

Those were also the years new circles were borne, circles of insecurity and blame, circles of broken behaviors and bad habits...things that recently, ironically, I've fallen back into pretty deeply, cause all life is a circle you see.

For a moment the circle broke. Two moments actually...

My father died. A constant was lost. But that's when I returned to older roots, a house on a street named after a tree, and the only mother I've truly really had...Grandma Hanvey. Mothers don't have to be the people that birthed you, that one died, or the one who raised you, that one left me and has barely talked to me since, though I'm learning to forgive her.

Mothers are that constant in the circle, just like Fathers.

Strangely Oedipal complex there.

Sort of.

Those were good years too, branches were made, and a tree began to sprout, a man began to be shaped, by the Sculptor's hands out of stone, coming to life almost as if the sculpture was it's own being. Identity is a strange thing.

But who and what we are, it's made of the mess of our lives, from the good to the bad, to the very ugly. And my life, as all lives, is, was, and will be a mess. I ran home way too many times, I broke promises, I created idols, and I gave up on Church. In the mess of old circles new, yet strangely familiar, circles were born.

But it was all about to change for a second time.

I made a choice. A bit more of an existential leap than the hand of fate breaking a cycle like my father dying. And it seems strangely organic that I was more of a happy fatalist back then, content like a child to let a God I slightly feared drive me where he would. Until he drove me to a place of deep and horrible pain. And unlike my father with his wife and daughter, I think I reacted quite a bit stronger to it...then again...what do I know...it took my father years to heal, and he never truly did.

As I might never truly. My wound's a part of me now, the skin of me.

Or maybe it's just such a big knot I can't untie it on my own. All those circles within circles.

I made a choice to cross even further than my parents did, to a town in Eastern Washington, for a girl who taught me how to fly. I later made a choice to run away from her, because I guess those circles, they held me round the neck, or were in my neck.

"He's in my neck joe, that baby's in my neck, you gotta cut him outta me!"

From the movie Chrystal...I won't go into that, just wanted to make sense of what I referencing...though perhaps there's meaning to this all in that movie.

But that's one of my circles, finding life, and meaning in the stories told, rather than life itself. Because life itself is boring, mundane and kinda endless. You wake up, you work, you go back to sleep again.

All life is a circle.

You're born out of God's Imagination, you live for God, or you don't (but still do in a way), and you go back to God when you die.

And life tries to imitate art, cause we want life to mean more than that.

It doesn't. Sometimes in small ways we glimpse the larger world, the deeper Narnia, and we know life gets better on the other side, and we secretly long to die, while paradoxically fearing death completely, cause how can you really know if the glimpses are real, or if this, this mundane boring life, is all you have.

The circles take meaning cause they give us something to run to. I run to a house in Arkansas. Where do you run?

And how does the cycle, sometimes a circle borne of centuries, get broken.

Big things happen, people die, choices are made.

You get married.

That's the third, and hopefully last cut in the circle.

In a way, I really am dying. I saw my Dorian Gray today, and I realized he's the devil himself. He's the mess of all these circles, so knotted together like so many rubber bands they've become a sphere, they've become a tiny little world on which I live, love, walk, and try to make sense of this life.

The sad thing is, so far I can't see past him. Maybe there's a better world on the other side, a place that can exist even in this life, but I can't see it right now. Maybe cause I've kicked against the goads for so many years, and only come right back to that house, that Grandma, that constant. Maybe cause as hard as I want to break the knots, they're unbreakable.

And don't say give it to God. I've given it to God.

Or maybe I haven't...maybe I don't know what that means.

I think it'd just be easier to have a voice in my head that tells me where to go, how to laugh, what to say, what to write, what part to play in the on Shakespearian universal stage we're all on, and when to die.

My brain's too much of a damaged thing. It's got too many circles.

And that's where I am tonight, no easy solution, no hopeful ending, no bluster to make it all seem better. I don't have much left to say, and few people who would listen...

maybe it's better that way.

Art, it's the last three letters in heart, and art truly is our heart on our sleeve...i've put mine out, oh, I can't count the times.

maybe I'm here in this house, at this time, part of the old circle, for reasons I could have controlled. Changed. Broken. And maybe no one is to blame but me for why my writing still hasn't taken off, or why the guy I've seemed to replace my dad with seems to be completely oblivious to that fact...and why so many holes sit here from all the times he didn't notice, or noticed someone else's heart.

the old me, part of the good parts of the old me, reminds me that it's stupid to blame other people for wounds they didn't mean to incur.

sometimes villains in our stories, they're perfectly innocent.

and maybe we're all just mirrors staring at each other, trying to discern some part of ourselves in the light and image on the other piece of glass. Maybe that's our problem. Maybe that's mine. I'm only seeing dopplegangers.

But I don't know what to do, and too tired to try to fix it like usual. Maybe that's where I'm supposed to be, God came to heal the sick not the whole after all.

And I'm one sick son of a Garry.

May You See Drops Like Stars

2010-11-18T16:15:00.000-08:00

In his book Drops Like Stars Rob Bell quotes one of Susan Howatch's novels, Absolute Truths, from a scene where a priest approaches a sculptor to describe her thoughts on suffering, and art.

her words

"But no matter how much the mess and distortion make you want to despair, you can't abandon the work cause you're chained to the bloody thing, it's absolutely woven into your soul and you know you can never rest until you've brought truth out of all the distortion and beauty out of all the mess - but it's agony, agony, agony - while simultaneously being the most wonderful and rewarding experience in the world - and that's the creative process so few people understand. It involves an indestructible sort of infidelity, an insane sort of hope, an indescribable sort of...well, it's love isn't it? There's no other word for it...and don't throw Mozart at me...I know he claimed his creative process was no more than a form of automatic writing, but the truth was he sweated and slaved and died young giving birth to all that music. He poured himself out and suffered. That's the way it is. That's creation. You can't create without waste and mess and sheer undiluted slog. You can't create without pain. It's all part of the process, it's in the nature of things. So in the end every major disaster, every tiny error, every wrong turning, every fragment of discarded clay, all the blood, sweat, and tears - everything has meaning. I give it meaning. I reuse, reshape, recast all that goes wrong so that in the end nothing is wasted and nothing is without signifigance and nothing ceases to be precious to me."

Bell describes a time when he met with his sister and nephew, who was three, and how they were watching it raining out a window. The little boy looked at the raindrops and kept on saying "stars, stars, stars.." when Bell asked his sister why the boy kept saying stars she said that the boy thinks the raindrops look like stars when they hit the ground.

Wonder, it's a thing born out of pain, and out of childlike naivete', two very distinctly different things. It seems as though the world is made to engage a sense of wonder in us, no matter what it takes. Both of these answers, from the elderly sculptors to the three year old nephew's have the same answer. Hope.

One of my friends recently asked me where I get my sense of wonder from and I couldn't really tell him, but now I think that little three year boy, and character in a novel answered for me. I get it from pain, I get it from beauty...I get it from life itself, and God.

My hope and prayer is that we all would get it.

6,878,656,906* Humans in Search of a God

2010-11-15T16:30:00.000-08:00

November Fools?

I can't shut the brain down...doesn't seem to work that way.

*based upon current World Population counts, as of this month.

Today my fiancee mentioned the play by Luigi Pirandello titled Six Characters in Search of an author, the play itself is from the aptly named genre "theatre of the absurd" a play within a play. A Manager is conducting a rehearsal for a play, named Six Characters in Search of an Author, and six actors are rehearsing, on this mostly unfinished stage, when the actual six characters themselves arrive, some realizing they are not human, and others thinking they are. But all are in search of an "author" to tell their story, in a sense to give meaning to their existence.

This play is about the creative process, about how when an author writes, or paints, what he's creating often comes out of nowhere, a story or a character just blossoms from the nothingness of imagination and comes forward, telling its story, wishing that it be retold.

In a sense I wonder if that's like it is with God. Standing outside of time, a being comes forward, and he decides on it's existence, and story, if it is worth a part of the Whole Story, the Big Picture if you will. What choices did it make, why, and what part did it play in the overall scheme of things.

The tragedy of the play, and of Pirandello's imagination is that he ultimately refused to tell these character's story, and in the play, the story is the refusal to tell their story and how it both tragically and comedically effects them this refusal. But I then think about what it might be like upon the unfinished stage of God's mind, and I, having lived (sort of) approach and God hears my story and instead of embracing my existence, and me truly living, God refuses my existence, and I am lost as some sort of pre-existential concept that never took on physical being.

And I think of the horror of such a thing.

Then I look at the world's population, the overwhelming vastness of it, and how long we've existed, from the old earth theorists who put us at hundreds of thousands of years to the young earth who say ten thousand or so, both are incredibly large numbers. And right now, today, there is estimated to be 6,878,656,906 humans existing in the world and if you multiply that by however many months go back to the beginning of creation you have an astronomical number that truly rivals the stars and the grains of sand on a beach itself. It almost makes you think, if God's creative process is similar...and why not?...perhaps He never says no.

Every single being that is in search of existence and meaning and purpose and a Story to insert their own story into, a God/Author to tell it, gets it.

I think few stories really show the reality of what being a meaning charged world looks like than Pirandello's Six Characters In Search of an Author does. Even those who don't believe in God search for a raisoti d’etre as Pirandello calls it, which means 'reason for existence'. We're all wondering what about us mattered, and why we're even here. Some of us give up and just embrace our desires for someday we will die, others embrace different Answers, and others Seek. Some are just content to know there's an answer out there even if they don't necessarily feel like looking for it. And some create their own answers, in a half desperate attempt to not be meaningless.

And I believe, in all of it, God sits there as the raisoti d’etre. The Author who's Story will give our story/being meaning. Purpose, reason. Order out of Chaos.

Hope.

The beauty is we can all find it. There's no one on this earth God won't give the Answer that they're asking for. He's just waiting for them to ask Him.

So Long and Thanks For All The Fish (Comments)

2010-11-12T09:38:00.000-08:00

I'll be shutting down soon, taking a hiatus from my own head. Heh, no, just taking a hiatus from putting it online.

The site will stay up for a bit longer so my fiancee can copy her favorite posts. But thanks everyone who commented/cared. It was fun.

I'll be around, in other people's lives, just not focusing so much on my own.

And Distance Til Then

2010-11-09T21:18:00.000-08:00

Cold and lonely
Reaching out across a distance
Our fingers cannot touch
Deserts and mountains, valleys and rivers

Stand between
Stand
Between
Between
You and me

Waiting is a long thing with a hundred
Possibilities
Stretched out over the night sky
Somewhere out there someone is loving me

Maybe for a second fonts cross distance and
black letters make a small respite
a voice crosses airwaves and phone lines
her voice, my voice, delight like children with cans and string

but nothing touches like a finger touching my finger
slowly, softly
exploration without lust
nothing sees like eyes do see
soft smile, blue eyes, fire hair

like planets orbiting the sun, we slip so
close by
but are millions of miles away
distance is relative, but distance is
a very big thing

count the time, count the hours, seconds and milliseconds
count the mornings and the sunsets, beauty reminds
me of you
count the stars and the moon itself
count the moments you breathe and the steps you take
each person you meet and each person you love
a glimpse, a corner of the eye, a figment of an imagination
a dream that will come true

but we'll just have to

wait

and distance

til then

Life, Death, and all the dark matter in between

2010-11-01T21:38:00.000-07:00

Pens of Doom Challenge #2.

Today's my birthday, though some would call it my death day, the day when I was buried in the ground so they could say their last goodbyes, and cry a few tears in cold memory. I remember watching from a distance as the shell passed through the dirt into darkness, and laughing at how silly it all was. That was life? That little flicker? I would begin to wonder what came ahead of me, and if I had known then, perhaps I would not have laughed so much.
It all began that day, when the Royal Crown of Hadesville welcomed me into my new residence. It wasn't anything like a physical apartment, more like a metaphysical cubbyhole where my consciousness could slip into an oblivion like state for a time, and rest, sort of. The Royal Crown calls it Sheol-sleep. I can't really tell you much about him/her/it, since I've never seen whatever it is, the closest one can get to a description is a gelatinous mass of pure thought. It never really existed as anything but the amassed hope/dreams/revelations of the masses that call themselves human. Apparently afterlife solely exists because we wanted it to. It makes scientific sense really, where do thought patterns go after the body which creates and sustains them ceases to function. I suppose you could call me a floating memory. A flickering spark from the flame of life, held together somehow by all the other floating memories out there, which is what creates The Royal Crown. There's really no story for how it gained consciousness, but it did, and that's that. I think you get the logistics now, and I won't bore you anymore.

Anyways, it all began when The Royal Crown called me in..more like thought me in..for a conference on life after death. The rules were I could not effect reality in any way, or touch those who had remained behind. Even thought has an existential power. It blew me away that I could actually effect the real world without even really touching it. The Royal Crown, or Turc as I came to call it, said that there had been too many hauntings as of late, and that people were a little too into the macabre, from sparkly vampires to tv shows about zombies for there to be less of a interest in the other world. It even remarked on that Clint Eastwood flick Hereafter and how it was having to build a new wing of Afterlife to reflect what the hereafter looked like in that movie just in case anyone chose to believe in that before they died. So either way, it was making sure I would keep my hands out of the cookie jar so to speak.

You're probably wondering what this has to do with my birthday, well it happens to fall on what the Celts called Samhain..October 31, I'm sure you know it. This is the night when thoughts of the undead, monsters, the realm of the afterlife are at their highest peak, and it also happened to be the night I decided to peek in on my family. Dad was doing okay, seemed fine actually, watching a football game and grumbling about having to answer the doorbell every five minutes. "Here have some candy." he would say absentmindedly watching the tv with his back turned to the children in their outfits of Dracula and The Mummy. Didn't even give them time to say their patented phrase. My mother was in her study, writing up a piece about the holiday for the local newspaper, all spooks and ghouls. My little sister was out with her friends. She's not so little anymore, almost 16. Anyways, that's my family, and if you really paid attention you have a pretty good idea of the social dynamic in that house. Needless to say I was never really there. I played football in high school, tried out track, and was generally popular. Not sure how that happened. Luck? Turc would call it the power of positive thinking. So there I am watching my family, wishing they would break out of their little shells when I get the bright idea to try to break them out myself, scare em a little into uniting with one another, and what better night to do it? I'd forgotten all about Turc's rule. So I tried a little poltergeistic action by turning off the tv Dad was watching. He looked at the remote, then turned it back on.
Off, again
On, with a growl
Off
On, this time with a curse
Off
"What the heck is happening!"
On
Off
"Dana! the TV is acting strange!"
"Why you telling me, I dunno nothing about televisions"
I snickered to myself.
"Well, call the cable company or something."
"You call em."
"I'm busy"
"Doing what?"
"Giving out candy of course."
"Oh right, the job you so heartily wanted to do."
Ding Dong, the bell rang, the spell was broken, already he was forgetting the strangeness.
I decided to try mom.
She was sitting in front of a computer, muttering to herself about a lazy husband, and trying to come up with a good headline for the article.
"Did you call em yet?" Dad's voice came from the living room.
"Sylvester!" My dad hates his name and when people use it, so my mom tends to use it when she's mad at him, we usually just called him Sal.
"What?"
"I'm writing a paper, give me a minute."
"I don't have a minute, the Giants were about to beat the Cowboys!"
"Giants...Cowboys...such big words for such small men," My mother grumbled to herself.
I tried making some paper fall.
She looked at the window, then the vent.
Sighing she picked up the paper, then rubbed her arms as if there were a draft.
"I'm home!" My sister called from the hallway.
Yes! She would "see" me, she would get it.
I tried something a little more desperate this time, passing in front of a mirror, projecting an image of myself behind her. She saw it, looked puzzled for a moment, then laughed nervously.
"The grief counselor said I'd see you sometimes."
She chalked it up to stress after seeing her boyfriend kissing another girl and went into her room to play a Taylor Swift cd.
That was it, somehow I had failed.
Positive Thinking, Turc would say with a frowningly sounding voice, or projected thought, I am so lost sometimes on how to describe this afterlife. For one it seems so upbeat, kinda like how that one book The Secret feels after you read it. Hey, life is a locked door and here is the key. Everyone looks like supermodels, yeah, we have a “look” but it’s not like you think, we don’t see each other so much as know each other. Anyways, if I had a penny for how many people looked like an Angelina or a Brad Pitt, I could buy my way out of this hell.
That’s what it really is…hell.
I always believed we'd go to heaven or just cease to exist after we die, but it’s really whatever the overwhelming thought is. And I guess that’s why sometimes when I’m passing by some people they’re weeping and gnashing their teeth, and if I try to help them it’s as if I’m not even there. The Ugly Ones we call them, the people who believed themselves into the Christian Hell. But then again, maybe they’re right. Maybe we’re all just in a prison of our own psyche. I read too many philosophy and physics books when I was in reality. I don’t say living cause I mean what do you call this.

So you can see why I so badly wanted to be a part of my family again. My messed up, broken family.
I missed them, and I was right in the room with them.

Love is a strange thing, you say it when you’re in reality, but you really only feel it when that reality is gone. Beyond your grasp. I would try though, try to find some way to cross a barrier, break down a wall, be whatever cliché it took to get through.

There’s a deck behind our house which overlooks a cliff, we live on the end of a cul de sac that ends at the sea, the gulf of mexico, and the paint is chipping on it. You can see where I carved my name while hanging from the lower railing, right over the sea. It was a dare. I was a boy. ‘Nuff said. I wrote under it, my name, that “we’re only living when we’re hanging by the ed…” I didn’t finish the g and e because my hand slipped, and I fell, becoming of mass of well…gross stuff, on the rocks below. Yeah, so now you know how I died, and how ironic that line I was writing was.

I tried different things, I even manifested myself as a bloody, decapitated body of myself in order for them to see me. I only ended up traumatizing my sister and causing my Dad to go into a rage.
They didn’t believe it was me, they thought it was some punk kid making a really bad holiday joke.
I wasn’t gonna get anywhere.
And I was feeling hurt and angry, and if that’s enough to justify what I did then I guess what I did was justified, but there’s kind of this feeling that it wasn’t. And I wish I hadn’t.
The deck is barely hanging on, and the wooden poles holding it have been eroded over the years by blasts of water flying up during high tide. One of the poles is especially loose, and we rarely if ever walked on that corner of the deck. Well, I knocked it off. I used every ounce of my positive thinking willpower and threw that pole out to sea, like a message to God. Hey, screw you for not being real. Screw it all for not getting to go to heaven, or at least be with my family, screw this stupid piece of crap afterlife where we just float around being whatever people think we are and whatever we wish to be.
Death sucks.
The deck began to crack, sand and rock flowing down in waves to the wavy watered sea, and a cold hand touched me. It was my sister’s. She was looking right at me.
The deck was falling, she was slipping, she had heard the noise, even heard my cry, there was something to be said for the faith of children, still being able to believe in the unbelievable, but this day it was going to kill her.
So I saved her.
A force knocked her back into the doorway as the deck completely fell, she fell into my dad’s arms, and he watched in horror as a chasm awoke right outside his back door. The sea, the gulf of Mexico itself was his patio.
“My god…” He said.
My sister was crying and he comforted her, she said something about seeing me and he told her it was just a hallucination brought on by the grief of that stupid prankster.
I let her believe it.
I began to realize why Turc had said this was all a bad idea. It wasn’t so much that belief in the afterlife and supernatural was wrong, it was that it was wrong for us to try to be somewhere we’re not, and be with people we can’t be a part of anymore.
I began to turn away, but did one last thing…on the rocks below I found the plank, the broken piece of wood where I had written “we’re only living when we’re hanging by the ed…” and I marked out a g and e to end the lesson. I guess if that’s the only true mark I left on the world, then maybe it’s a good one. It’s not a bad saying really, and mostly true.
The waves crashed, and I began to feel their rhythm, fading into a sheol-sleep, resting my weary conscious.

After one lets go, the world changes, we visit reality less, and the memories of fads and desires fade. I began to believe in God again, and I don’t even know why. Perhaps without the weight of the world on my shoulders I could seek truth a little more freely, and it came to bear that if all this, me really, was hell, then perhaps loss of it all was Heaven. Okay so that sounds Buddhist, and in a sense I more replaced one for something else. I began to see tiny points of light in the darkness, a flicker here, a static sound there. God was speaking through the haze of my own prison.
“We…fai…vant”
That’s all I heard at first, because I was still, well, me. Identity is one of those things that if you let it have too much power it becomes god, and in a sense you’re a humanist, but in a even greater sense you’re a horrible god, a devourer of all good things. I had let me be too important.
“Welcome…ful….ser”
It was getting less blurry. I could even see distinction now, as if the flickers were more than light, and actual things.
An eagle with 7 eyes watched me from the gateway made of pearls. When it spoke it’s voice was that of the sea.
“Welcome, good and faithful servant.”

It came back to me now, I might have only been about 16, but I had believed in Jesus, gone to church, lived a fairly good life, albeit a bit rebellious, since I was after all a teenager. My parents, for all their flaws tried to raise us with some semblance of religion. Either way, I guess the good and faithful part was right, well, He’s God, whatever He says is right, so I’ll take it.

Things changed, I felt a real person. Only real-er than real. All around me lights echoed and wind hummed. Electricity, or something much like it, filled the air. A shadow passed but there was light in the shadow, it was more like a thousand tiny fireflies flying over you, or a night sky filled with stars. A presence appeared to my left, but I did not look, for even in my peripheral vision the presence was blinding.
In the distance I could see cities, and time itself, centered and old, never changing. Eternal now. A beautiful woman laughed, and I knew it was my sister, much older now, in her 50’s. A boy and girl ran in some flowerbeds, my parents, reliving a memory from their romance that had lasted longer than most people’s.
So I guess today really is my birthday. Whatever that was before, I’m already forgetting, it pales in comparison to this.
I feel sorry for Turc, for the others, lost in the whatever that is they’re lost in. I hope some find their way out, like I did, but I think you kinda have to have God in your memory to do so…
The past is passing now, and I see a girl I always wanted to kiss giggling and smiling. She wants to talk to me. God Himself is telling me to go see her. He likes that sorta thing. Love, first loves, happiness, this is so much better than that positive thinking bullcrap.

The Magician

2010-10-28T19:54:00.001-07:00

It was dark, darker than pitch black, darker than void as the boys slinked across the old hermit’s lawn. They could see the house, knew it was there, but after they passed a copse of trees blocking it from sight it was gone.
“Witchcraft!” Tommy said.
“Demon worshipper, ghost lover…” they were all words the boys uttered. Their fear overcame their shock and they were running, not even looking back to see that the house was still there.
Behind them the old man watched, his silver hair waving in the wind and he caressed his small beard as he frowned. He didn’t like being referred to as a demon worshipper, but it was better than human interference. He passed his illusion, through the doorway, and into his house. The place was old, older than him, older even than the man who had sold it to him. Some said it’d been built during the Civil War, and others even further back. But it suited his purposes. A glass of wine waited for him at the table, and an old letter he was reading for the hundredth time. It was from his late wife, Cassandra.
Aldous Winkler, for that was his name, read the letter with little emotion. He had passed through many stages with this letter, there were tearstains for the grief, a torn corner for anger, a taped corner for denial, and lastly, it’s wornness signified acceptance. He could read it now without hurt, though it had been crumpled and nearly thrown away many a time. It read

Dear Aldous
I cannot tell you how happy I am to finally get to tour with you and be your assistant in your magic show, the days pass slowly here as I wait for your return and our trip. My love for you does not slow at all though, it only quickens and brightens like one of your light conjuring tricks. I love you very much, and I can’t wait to see you.
Yours forever
Cassandra

His eyes moistened despite himself and he realized the grief would be a stage never quite fully passed. Outside the cicadas and crickets sang of a different time, a time when he was growing up, and he liked to run barefoot through the Ozark Mountains, listening to the music of the spheres, like the old hymn his Pentecostal preacher father had taught him.
Outside a twig snapped and he moved quickly, old Victorian waistcoat rustling against his skin. He liked to look the part, even out here where no one ever saw his magic.
A boy was touching the wall of the house, in wonder and fear. He stared at it as if it was a miracle, a piece of another world.
“What are you doing here? Go away.”
The boy started, stepping back into the shadow a bit, his tiny face protruding into the light of the doorway like a chiaroscuro painting.
“My name is Simon,” He said.
“I don’t care what your name is, go away.”
“But I don’t get it, I saw the house, but then I didn’t, but it’s here again, or was it always here?” The boy asked ignoring him.
Aldous sighed. “It’s an illusion, a magic trick, the house was always there.”
“Oh…” The boy seemed disappointed.
Aldous knew that disappointment; it was the same he’d had the first day he learned there was no Santa Claus, and that it was his parents and not the tooth fairy leaving money under his pillow, the first chippings into the wonder of a child.
“You seem sad,” The boy said, his curiosity returned.
Aldous grunted and stepped back into the light, the door remaining open. Simon tentatively stepped through, the room around him like a never never land of story. There were crates in one room, forming almost a maze, each one bearing strange exotic names like metamorphosis, impalement, levitation, etc. A little toy contraption sat on a windowsill, head bobbing and a hand coming in and out of it’s chest, where one could see a hole.
A rug sat across the floor, and candle flames waved in the windows. Beside a table sat what looked like the blade of a buzzsaw, sharp, and glistening in the candlelight.
“From one of my escape tricks.”
“So you’re a magician?”
“Yes, magician, magi, illusionist, I am all of these and none of them.”
“My teacher says you’re a Satanist and a charlatan.”
Aldous grinned. “Well, it was not for lack of trying. I made sure to scare the town good with some old spirit tricks. A little ghost haunting will go a long way.”
“Why?”
“Why not, I wanted to be alone.”
“I hate being alone, it reminds me too much of when Father makes me wait in my room for a long time, waiting for him to punish me.”
“I like it because you don’t have to explain yourself to people, if you make a mistake no one is there to notice it, you can tell a joke and it’s funny cause you’re the only one that heard it, you can feel free, and alive, instead of trapped in someone else’s psyche.”
The boy grinned nervously.
“Sorry, I guess it’s been too long since I’ve been able to speak what I am feeling inside. Perhaps I should get a cat,” He trailed off as he saw the boy looking at his wife’s letter.
“Is she dead?” He asked. Perceptive, Aldous marveled.
He looked out the window, and the boy watched him as he did. He hadn’t wanted this, but then, perhaps the universe wanted it for him, or God, or whatever was up there. He was tired of being alone. He did realize that now.
Outside the owls spoke and he asked the same question they asked. Who, Who, Who
Who am I? Who are you?
“If you come back tomorrow, I’ll tell you my story.” He sorely needed to tell it, not because he was dying or anything but because he saw some hope in that boy’s eyes that he didn’t want to die just yet, and because he knew it would be healing.

That night when Simon returned home, he found his father asleep on the chair in the den, an old book sitting beside him. East of Eden by John Steinbeck, a first edition. His father was a professor at the local college, and a bookseller during the summers. He’d read many books to Simon over the years, always believing that story and life were what mattered most in a young boy’s growth, as well as a relationship with God. His mother had passed when he was just a baby, and he had barely known her. In the hall a tiny cockatoo rustled it’s feathers in it’s cage and stared at him passing by.
“Well hello, Glimfeather, and how do you do this fine evening?” The cockatoo chirped loudly, and in the den he could hear his father snort, coming out of one of his dreams. “That you Simon?”
“Hey dad,” He said, returning to the den.
“Son, it’s a bit late. I saw your friends returning home almost an hour ago, where were you?”
Simon debated whether to tell him, unlike his teachers at the Baptist School his father was a bit more openminded, but one never knew with him what might happen.
“I..I was investigating a new fox den.”
Foxes had been growing in population over the last couple months in the stretch of woods near their town. It had recently been reported in the IUCN that foxes were the least possible animal to ever face extinction. Simon and his father had been watching their growth and keeping charts and maps of their different ranges.
“Did you hear the wow wow wow?” His father asked, already forgetting about the lateness.
“No, there weren’t any near the den when I saw it,” Simon lied.
Wow Wow Wow is the call a fox usually makes when approaching another fox, when seeing predators it will make a highpitched whine, and when seeing prey, or animals on equal footing it will make a low growl called gekkering. Simon and his father had made a pact to hear all three calls of the fox.
“Well, you better get on to bed, but you should take me to where that fox den is in the morning, I’d like to mark it on our map.”
Simon winced, lies never worked.
“I didn’t see a fox den…”
“Come again?”
“We were…me and the other guys, we were over near the warlock’s house.”
His father didn’t speak for a moment.
“I don’t like you calling him that.”
“I know, he’s not really a warlock, but he does do magic tricks.”
“You met him?!”
“Yes, he’s nice, a bit odd, and sad, but nice.”
Glimfeather chirped again.
“He’s ready to be covered for the night, you should be slipping into your covers too. We can talk about the magician in the morning.”

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Aldous watched the boy leave, and felt a certain pang of loss for never having any children pass through his heart. The letter lay opened on his table, and he removed it from the surface, folding it into it’s familiar creases. When the paper was fully folded only two words showed through, “Yours Forever”. It was his way of hoping she was still alive somewhere out there, in the worlds that come after this one. He crossed the floor, blowing out candles, and looking at the books he owned, a copy of Hiding the Elephant by Jim Steinmeyer, a picture with an old photograph of Houdini in one of his famous pre escape poses. The shadows formed at his back, and he ignored them, for as much as he wanted to believe that there were ghosts, he could not believe that the face he sometimes saw in the deeper shadows was his wife’s. He knew that sometimes apparitions formed when one wants them to, deeply and desperately enough, a psychological magic trick, an illusion of smoke and mirrors. Sometimes he liked to believe God was the greatest magician of all, only he’d broken the code by not telling the world it was all a trick, letting them believe it was real. It was believed among magicians that if one were to never tell the audience that what they were seeing was not real, that you were in essence being a fraud. Men like his father, faith healers, had been known to be frauds of this kind. Performing miracles that weren’t miracles after all. It was all performance art. Except magicians did it to entertain, relying on the audience’s willingness to suspend disbelief and allow illusion to be as wondrous as miracle, while faith healers were simply creating a show to manipulate their masses. His father in particular had been quite brutal, picking up men and throwing them across the room, pronouncing them healed by how large the bruises formed on their bodies. Faith is borne out of violence he would say. He was just hiding that he was a violent man at heart. But Aldous knew. He knew all too well.
People were optical illusions at best, hiding who they really were in plain sight. A little misdirection and you could easily be drawn into the most heinous of crimes, because you were doing it for love, or redemption. That was the kind of faith his father had taught him. But it was the miracles that had made him believe in a deeper world, and become a magician. It was blind faith that had taught him to dream. He lay in his bed, fully clothed, unwilling to let go of the old clothes that had become a sort of armor, and he slept, dreaming of escaping the chains of life, if only he could figure out the trick to it.

A tentative knock on his door woke him and Aldous looked through the dew-misted window to see young Simon, an apple in hand, standing grinning on the step.
“My dad likes apples,” He explained as he smiled up at Aldous.
The old man smiled back, despite himself, and invited the boy in.
A shaft of morning light misted through the kitchen where they sat on wooden chairs. The floor was wood too, most of it was wood, and the smell of sawdust filled the air.
As they ate, Aldous an egg, and Simon his apple, they both sat silently, watching each other with slight interest.
"You said you would tell me about you, about how you came to be a magician."
"I did, didn't I?" Aldous said with a small smile.
All around them were the pieces of a life. And in each of the pieces Aldous saw more pieces, a whole line of lines, rabbit trails of the mind and heart. He began at the beginning, his beginning at least.
"I was born in a town called Hot Springs, just south of Little Rock, Arkansas, a place known for it's tourism, and for the Arlington Hotel, where the gangster Al Capone liked to retreat. In those days it was a bustling gambling town, but it found it's end in my lifetime, when Rockefeller and Britt shut the casino's down. The only place left was Oaklawn Park, where they raced horses. My father was a prominent preacher, known for his "spitting sermons" where if you were Catholic and believed my father was a saint, you'd truly get the idea that those on the front row were literally baptized in the holy water of my father's mouth."
Simon laughed.
The hook, you bait em in, you give them something to interest them.
"Every Sunday we went to church, and every other day we lived it. Bible verses were the bedtime story of choice, and not always those about Sampson, or David, my father read the whole book of Leviticus to me once over a summer. I tried to love it, but, the whole idea that if I didn’t I was a horrible person made me love it even less.”
“I always enjoy the bible, and other books, my dad lets me read it on my own…” Simon said, then grinned nervously. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“My mother was a quiet woman, devout to a fault. I often saw her on her knees praying, in the mornings, in the afternoon, when I should have been sleeping at night. She was always praying. I never asked her what for, cause I was worried she prayed about me, like she was afraid I wouldn’t turn out okay. When she wasn’t praying, she was cooking or cleaning. I never saw my parents kiss, except a peck now and then. They were not intimate, but they loved each other in their own strange way. It was around my 16th birthday that my father first showed me the gift of tongues.”
Simon sat listening, rapt
The reel, slowly, not too fast or they’ll notice. Everything was an art of performance, even telling your own story.
“He prayed over me, rather roughly I might add, he was that kind of preacher, just as apt to hit a man in the Spirit as slay him. That’s what we called touching a man and the Spirit taking him down, slaying…I guess it had something to do with living sacrifice or dying to self, not sure. He prayed for hours, but no foreign or angelic tongue would come. I was too nervous. Finally I just made up gibberish so he would shut up. It worked and he left me alone. I think that was the first time I began wondering if God was actually real.”
It was strange remembering his past, all coming back to him like familiar rooms unlocked and the same as they had always been. In one he told the story of watching his father heal a man, in another of how a man had risen from the dead. Over time those men would reappear, only a different audience, and Aldous began to wonder why, when he asked his father waved him off, but he got his answer months later when one of the men came forward and confessed to Aldous’ father being a fraud, and using the church’s money for gambling, and sin. Aldous’ father was ruined. He went to jail for fraud and embezzlement, and Aldous’ mother didn’t pray for the first time. She took up smoking, and Aldous took up atheism. The healings had all been faked, more than likely God was faked too. But he remembered the rapt faces of the congregants, how his father could change a room with simply a whisper of “Hallelujah” or a shout of “Amen” and he knew that people needed that kind of world, the possible, even if it was just illusion. Aldous began to long for true miracles, and took up magic, delving at first into the magic of witches and conjurors, but over time even that disappointed him, and he finally became a simple magician, doing card tricks and creating optical illusions. It was not 1900, and magicians didn’t make as much money or were nearly as popular as they had been so Aldous took his magic show to the one place where he knew people enjoyed that world that was not like this own. He went to San Francisco in 1967, with a flower in his hair.

San Francisco in the heydey of the hippie movement was a town bursting at the seams. If the intersection of Haight and Asbury had been a pillow, and each person a feather, the pillow would be so bloated as to be only seconds from bursting. This was the situation Aldous walked into, as all around him people swayed and danced to Jefferson Airplane and the white rabbits of pot and LSD, Aldous did magic tricks that the people were so sure had to be real.

Janis Joplin came to one of his shows, her wire glasses and wide smile just as eager to be drawn in as any person there. First he would start with something simple, and smoke was quite a useful thing, many of the hippies being used to smoke filled rooms. He especially got mileage out of the fake psychic stuff, many of his predictions followed by an exclamation of “dude!” and “no way man!”. They began calling him Sergeant Pepper, like some clever circus ringman who drew them deep inside his demented world, where skies were made of diamond, and you could run through fields of strawberries. People got high at his shows, and it became hard to pick someone out of the crowd, since you were never quite sure if they would understand what you were saying at all. He went through assistant after assistant, rarely ever seeing them after one performance. Homeless people began growing in numbers and before long Aldous found himself one of them. His father had been let out of jail some time ago, and his mother and he were back together, but Aldous could not go back to them, could not face his shame. He felt like the prodigal son, though there was no fatted calf waiting for him at the end.
He never did drugs his whole time there, which was in itself the miracle he was looking for. He tried to talk the community acting troupe The Diggers into using a magician, and did go around with them for a time, but he became tired of the seeming lack of any true change. And over time people were not as interested anymore. People began leaving the city in droves, taking their revolution elsewhere. It was the end, and Aldous didn’t even stay for the funeral. He left with one of the early migrations, and never looked back. He traveled for a time, living on his tricks and wit, writing a book even about his time among the hippies, though no one ever published it. He became fascinated with the history of magicians, and read biographies of Houdini and Herrmann, Maskelyne and Philadelphia. In late 1970 he joined the Society of American Magicians, and became rather well known for his skill and ingenuity in creating new illusions and new ways to do them. It was all he knew, but that was about to change, for in late 1975, when Aldous was just turned 27, he met Cassandra Matthews.
She was tan with dark curly hair, a quick smile and an even quicker body. A track runner, and sometimes ballet dancer, she liked to spend her evenings among the sights and sounds of New York City. It was during one of Houdini’s broken wand ceremonies where the Society honored his death in Queens that Cassandra met Aldous. She was dating a wealthy magician at the time, a businessman who performed magic less than he used to, and spent more time working illusions on Wall Street. They fell instantly in love. It was around that time that Aldous had been honing his acting skills, working on baiting and reeling an audience that he decided to work an illusion that would win Cassandra’s heart, as well as her hand. So that night, he gathered some friends, and plans in hand they proceeded to kidnap Cassandra, though they explained it was a practical joke, and took her to an abandoned warehouse, where with aplomb, Aldous entered the room, a rapier in hand, garbed in the clothes of a pirate. He proceeded to thrash Cassandra’s would be assailants, and when they were dutifully defeated, knelt down on one knee and asked her to marry him. The answer was of course, yes. They were married in a small ceremony, and though he hesitated at first, Aldous did invite his parents. It was the first time he’d seen either of them in over a decade. His father looked old, walking with a cane, and his mother spoke with a rasp, and had developed asthma from all her smoking. He greeted them with trepidation, but they seemed to not be hurt by his absence. His father spoke in
low tones of how he was sorry for how things had went, and how God had forgiven and changed him. That Aldous did not believe him was an understatement, but this was his wedding and he did not wish to rehash old wars. Cassandra was beautiful, with her dark curls and beautiful Greek tan. The white dress she wore was her mother’s, a lacy wavy affair that reminded one of older times, when brides wore vines in their hair, and curls of wire on their wrists. She was magnificent. She was a bride. She was his bride.
Their marriage was normal for most marriages. They fought, they made love, they hoped for children, and they grew together. She was from a Catholic family, Greek Orthodox, and he being an atheist, often had to tolerate their more religious side, which she somewhat embraced as well. Still, the wedding had been unreligious, and he had always been thankful for that, so he complained little. Besides as time went on, he felt his anger at the faith his father had taught him to soften, and in time he came to see himself as an agnostic. But that was all about to change on the night his wife helped him perform his last magic trick.
At this point Simon finally spoke, as if coming from a trance.
“Will you teach me a magic trick?”
Aldous was surprised…
“I don’t do that anymore, I can’t.”
Beside him the ghost of his wife, the memory, frowned
“Show him,” she would say. She’d always loved how children responded to Aldous. Still full of hope that everything he represented was the sign of a pure world.
“Okay.” He finally said.
The trick he taught was simple, using a deck of cards he asked Simon to shuffle them thoroughly saying that the cards had to be mixed for it to work. Simon began to shuffle them and in a few minutes Aldous asked him to stop. When he did he had Simon lay them on the table.
“Do you wish to cut them or I?”
Simon hesitated, already trying to figure the trick out
“Uhhh…I’ll do it.”
The element of control, or lack of it are each key, whether the audience trusts you or thinks they’re finding you out, this misdirection will always play in your favor. He was remembering the things he had been taught.
Simon cut the deck, and then placed the two parts back together laying them on the table.
Aldous placed an envelope on the deck.
“In this envelope I have placed a piece of paper, I wrote on it a prediction of what the card on the top of the deck is. They will match.”
“What? That can’t happen…” Simon was truly into it now.
When they don’t believe you that is when you truly have them hooked. Of course in the back of their minds they know you will prove them wrong, but for a moment they think either you are stupid, or the trick is being done wrong, in that moment is when they will truly find wonder in the trick.
“Open the envelope.”
Simon did.
“What is it?”
“The five of clubs.”
“And what is the card on the top of the deck?”
Simon turned it over and his eyes widened in wonder and delight.
“The five of clubs! How do you do that?!”
“A true magician never gives away his secrets, but if you become my apprentice, if you take my oath, I will tell you everything.”
He would too, he would show Simon all of it, if only to see those eyes again.
“Alright, I will, I wanna be a magician.”
“Are you sure? This is not a world lightly entered. It requires your whole life, everything. You will lose family perhaps, and love, and even happiness at times.”
“Sure, show me how to do it.”
Aldous said “Repeat after me…I solemnly swear..”
“I solemnly swear.”
“To uphold the secrecy of my craft, and to never reveal it’s secrets to those not interested in becoming a magician.”
Simon repeated.
Aldous smiled, “Good, then I will show you. When I did the envelope, I put my prediction in it, then I took out the card I predicted, placing in my palm under the envelope, when I placed the envelope on the top of the deck my card became the top of the deck.”
Simon looked at him for a long minute, processing it, his eyes slowly lost their wonder and he looked a little perplexed.
“That’s it?”
“Magic tricks are not real Simon, they are clever ruses…just like anything in the world the magic of it is overtaken by the day to day reality.”
Simon looked disappointed, looking up at the sky outside the window.
“Oh shoot! It’s almost noon, I should head home.”
He got up and left without a further word, and Aldous sadly watched him go. He had hooked him with a story, and never even reached it’s climax, then lost him with the very craft that had once dazzled them all. And he had not released the weight from his shoulders, the dead ghost in the room.
He’d gone to confession after Cassandra died, stripped of his rank in the Society, a forgotten scandal left by the side of the road as the circus of life rolled on.
He told the priest what was done, and the priest gave him his propitiation, but told him that the wound of it, and perhaps the ghost of her, would never be fully gone. He would always see her, the bullet wound in her chest, lying there with blood gushing like a river of death. In her eyes were surprise, fear, and even worry. Her fine dark locks mingled now with red.
It was called the Bullet Catch. Many magicians had performed it over the years, and it was considered one of the most dangerous tricks cause of the gun itself. The trick was to make the audience believe the gun was real, and that the bullets were not blank. Then to have the assistant shoot at you, and you catch the bullet in your hand. An audience member would come up, writing their initial on the bullet, and then as you palmed a blank into the gun, they thought it was their bullet. This was his method at least, and he had truly believed he’d done it right. What neither of them had expected though was that the gun, an old one, was defective. Any gun loving fanatic could have told them that very

old revolvers often came with a defect that would cause the bullet in the chamber to misfire, and fire backwards. This was later fixed when Colts came around in the late 1800’s. The gun itself fit the flavor of his show, which was a tribute the Wild West. But it hadn’t been fired in centuries, and of course no one was worried what it would do if it was shooting blanks, but Aldous had accidentally palmed in the wrong bullet. And this combined with its defect caused a backfired bullet to fly right into the heart of his wife. They pronounced her dead at the scene, and Aldous went under investigation, which caused the Society that sponsored his show to in effect fire him, and leave him out for the cold. He wouldn’t have performed magic anyways, torn by the loss of his wife. He decided to go home.
When he arrived there, an almost empty house greeted him. His father was very old now, faded as an old tree, his roots not as deep as they used to be. And his mother lived in her chair, weak from many heart attacks and living on oxygen. She slept most of the time. Aldous told his father what happened, and the response was not what he expected at all.
“That’s what happens when you go out into the world Aldous, marry a sinner and take up a trade that glorifies lies.”
Aldous had faced much, and lost even more, but with a few sentences his father could break him in two. And that was no illusion, he was truly in two.
“How can you say that? I loved her!”
“Love blinds one to the truth Aldous,” His father coughed, and Aldous was sad to see a used cigarette sitting in an ashtray by his father’s chair. Despite all they had done to his mother it seemed his father had taken up the habit too.
“You’re right, love blinds completely, your love of God blinds you to your wife, to me, to those people you hurt and swindled, to even God Himself, if He’s real.”
He left his father there, laughing to himself at his son’s words, smirking just a little.

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Simon returned home a little bit brokenhearted. For a boy who’d grown up on Narnia and Hobbiton, Hazel and Fiver, and so many other stories, to see that there was no real magic in the world was truly disappointing. His father was sitting in his armchair, smoking a pipe, and reading Kafka’s Metamorphosis, the book he planned to teach on throughout the school year. This was his 8th time through it.
“It’s sad though isn’t it?” Simon said as he walked into the room. “People don’t really turn into beetles and wardrobes don’t really lead to other worlds.”
“Something on your mind?” His father asked.
“I went to see him again.”
“I knew you would, did you at least take the mace like I asked.”
Simon grinned and pulled the tube from his pocket.
“Good boy, now tell me what’s bothering you?”
“Well, his story was wonderful, full of adventure and hardship, but when he showed me a magic trick and how to do it, it was so anticlimactic.”
His father thought for a moment, looking at his books, one of them caught his eye and he smiled.
“Have you ever heard of Taliesin?” He asked.

Simon shook his head.
“According to legend Taliesin was a bard, the king of bards, a storyteller and harpist, a warrior too. His son was Myrddin, called Merlin, the friend of King Arthur, known as a magician by some. There was a world then that needed good stories, and not only that but great acts as to inspire. What Merlin began with his tricks he learned from Taliesin who told stories. In truth modern day magicians are like those bards of the tradition of Merlin, telling stories, and performing tricks to inspire the broken hearts. The thing about learning the truth behind the stories, that they’re not always real and the magic doesn’t always equal a miracle doesn’t make it any less, because the point of it was to change you.”
“I think…I think I understand,” Simon said, smiling to himself, cause he knew that his father had simply reiterated what the Stephen Lawhead book said that sat on the shelf he’d just glanced at. He checked it off in his mind as a book he’d have to read.
“I told him I wanna be a magician, but I think I only told him that cause I wanted to see how he did the trick. I don’t really know if I can carry that burden.”
“I think you should at least try, a promise made is a promise kept.”
“Okay.”
“Now, how about I read you a bit from this book…”
And so Simon sat, and his father read to him of how one day, waking from a bad dream, a man came to find he had turned into a monster.

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The trees whispered that night, and his wife came to him. She didn’t speak, she never did. Her eyes spoke only, and they said so many things. She was happy where she was, and revived. Her eyes shone like the North Star, guiding him through a dark night towards the dawn again
I miss you, he thought.
I know, her eyes said.
The room was cold.
Was she even there, was this a dream, or was he hallucinating?
Perhaps he had gone mad, creating her in some kind of desperate schizophrenia
But what if she was real? What if that meant the rest was real too, all his father had taught him.
“I..I can’t do this,” Aldous said, and blew out the candles, taking refuge in the dark. Something soft and cold touched his hand.
“If it is really you, Cass, just don’t forget me where you’ve gone…but you should go on.”
The weight was lifting from his shoulders, the guilt, and the pain. She missed him. She didn’t blame him, perhaps she had crossed life’s last doorway itself just to let him know that, perhaps it was his own psyche trying to cleanse him, or perhaps it was God. Why not all three?
“God, if you’re really there, I think I saw you in that boy’s eyes, in the way they watched with the wonder of a child. I saw myself, laughing and hoping as my father healed

people. I only hope that somehow, some of it all is real, just as much as those boy’s eyes hoped. Maybe it is, maybe I’ll give you another chance…”
He slept then, and for the first time in years he didn’t dream of losing her, he dreamt of their first kiss, and the way her hand felt in his, the tiny freckles on her shoulders, and the green of her eyes, the way she was always smiling even when things were rough. She would have told him the dark night of the soul was always going to have an end, and that the dawn is inevitable, and even in the dark the stars shine, proving that night is not the absence of light, or hope.

The next morning, a Sunday, on the 21st of June Aldous woke feeling changed. He was changed, though he knew it would take work and time to live that change. He began preparing a large meal, hoping Simon would come, maybe even bring his dad.

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Simon in fact was on his way, having rushed out the early service with a wide grin on his face, and his father’s promise that he would come join them shortly. He didn’t even notice the other boys following him. The forest was dark, almost mysteriously shadowed, like a passageway beyond death’s door, toward a light at the end of the long tunnel. He knew he would see Aldous’ house, he knew it would disappear, but as with all ephemeral hopes, it would come again just beyond the bend. He ran fast, and the boys closed in like wolves to prey, surrounding him before he even knew it.
“Where ya goin?” One asked.
“We know you’re goin to that warlock’s house, what do you worship demons now too?”
The place seemed darker, and beyond the circle of boys a large group of foxes gathered.
Simon knew it was completely abnormal for foxes to gather in one place, and he wondered why they did now.
“Look, he’s not a bad person, but I really need to go, let me pass please.”
The foxes seemed agitated, he worried they might have rabies.
The boys snickered, not even noticing them, but one of them cried out and jumped away from something moving in the ground. A tiny point of light, flickering among the leaves.
Lights began to float among the boys, Simon could hear voices in them, strange voices speaking in different languages.
The lights began dancing, and Simon knew it is what had attracted the foxes, pulling them together in that way, normally a hugely territorial species, their natural curiosity now ruled them.
The boys were freaking out now.
But one of them was marveling at how beautiful it all was, Simon watched the lights dance and the foxes chase the lights, and he felt as if that was the meaning of magic, not to be real, but to make wonderful pictures of life. He laughed as the boys ran away, and was not surprised when Aldous Winkler walked out of the shadows, the foxes also dispersing, returning to their dens.
He looked every inch the descendant of Merlin.
“I always wondered why they called it a skulk of foxes, such an ugly word for a sight that is rare, and beautiful to see.”

“I’m sorry about running out on you, I think I wanna try magic again, I want to create things like that.”
Aldous smiled. “Then we shall, and all the world will share in our wonder, in the beauty of illusion and the mystery of magic.”

On Hell

2010-10-19T20:24:00.000-07:00

This is not to say the literal version does not exist, or even to speak on it at all. Hell is a concept I've always struggled with, even growing up in the church. I remember rarely liking any explanations for it. It's always been something I said that I would just have to ask God about when I get to heaven and have a more enlightened mind. Tonight I read some thoughts by Christian author, and friend, Jeffrey Overstreet. They're not speaking against hell, but adding, in a beautiful way, to the idea of it...something I think I can agree deeply on, and still letting the mystery be real, and leaning on God and not my own understandings. Either way enjoy...

"Hell is the house we build for ourselves to wall out Jesus and his invitations. And even then, he shows up in the house, inviting. We can still choose to stay there.

So shall we sin, then, since his grace is irrepressible? Hey, you try it, and let's see how that works out for you.

Hell is the misery we get when we ask for it.

Hell is the falling down, the attacks by predators, the fear, the loneliness that comes from seeing the light and choosing to walk in the opposite direction into the dark.

Hell is what Adam and Eve tasted when they tasted the fruit that had been forbidden. Immediately, they were insecure. Ashamed. Afraid.

But God found them. And the judgments that had been promised them (that they would die on that very day) were lightened. They were offered grace. Hardship, yes. Suffering, yes. But grace and ultimately redemption.

We can become so lost that we can't find our way back. Even so, he'll find us there.

We can look at a kingdom of glory and choose to walk away and build a creaky little shack in the dark, where there is only sadness and self-loathing and emptiness. Still, there's a knock at the door. Because he descends into hell to find us.

We are made in his image. His spirit resides within us, groaning. So if we're ever in hell, he's there with us, suffering, urging us to surrender.

And isn't that the glory of love? If the beloved cannot choose to walk away and reject the glory of union, then there is no way to know the joy of two parties willfully embracing one another.

But I have difficulty believing that there is anything like eternal damnation unless there are souls that persistently choose it, no matter how far Christ goes to invite them out of it. I don't think you'll find anyone in hell saying, "I keep on asking God to help me and he won't." You'll only find those who go on saying, "I have seen the Lord and I still choose this."

But if Christ asked God to forgive his enemies even as he was killed by them, then I believe that grace trumps all. Is God going to answer Jesus and say, "No. I don't forgive your enemies. I'm locking them up for eternity and they don't get a second chance?"

Scripture tells us that every knee shall bow, every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. EVERY knee, EVERY tongue.

And "whosoever believeth in him" shall. not. perish. (John 3:16)

The writers of scripture chose the most frightening metaphors available to them to describe what life is like when one turns away from God. So we get pictures of fire, of gnashing teeth, or a devouring misery. And which of us hasn't felt some of that misery? We invite it when we turn our eyes away from the light.

But the gates of hell shall not prevail against the church. Notice: The gates will not prevail. That means they'll come down. They're permeable. Even on the other side of them, you'll find Christ can find you there.

I'm writing this with broken words, from a broken understanding, in a broken world, hoping that some glimmer of truth comes through the cracks. May God grant me insight if I am wrong, as I so often am.

But whatever the case, I take steps toward hell every day in my foolishness. He always welcomes me back, accepts my repentance, blots out my sins, grants me what I don't deserve. So I trust him. I trust him completely, even in matters of heaven and hell." - Jeffrey Overstreet.

And now I will keep the quote here for posterity.

The Classics

2010-10-08T18:13:00.000-07:00

I determine a classic novel by three ways,

1. The impact it had on society

2. Thematic material (by this token I consider books like American Gods by Neil Gaiman or Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell as classic novels, or pre-classic)

3. Timing...in the same way as classic rock most novels written in 70's or back, maybe even 80's and early 90's I'd probably consider classic, especially if they fulfill the first two criterion.

That said, here is the novels I am proud to own for their classicness

Jack London - Sea Wolf, White Fang, Call of the Wild, and Martin Eden

CS Lewis - random nonfiction, but of fiction I consider The Space Trilogy and Chronicles of Narnia as true classics. Don't have Out of the Silent Planet, unfortunately, but do have Perelandra and That Hideous Strength

A book of The Complete Poems of Edgar Allan Poe

Tolkien's Lord of the Rings Trilogy, and The Hobbit

As I Lay Dying, The Sound and the Fury, and Light in August by William Faulkner

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Hunter S Thompsen - Hell's Angels

Madeleine L'Engle - A Wrinkle in Time

The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane

Chaim Potok - I Am the Clay, and The Chosen

Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov

Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Golden Apples and Losing Battles by Eudora Welty

Silas Marner by George Eliot

John Steinbeck - Of Mice and Men, The Pearl, and East of Eden

Ray Bradbury - The Illustrated Man, The October Country, Something Wicked This Way Comes, and Fahrenheit 451

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through The Looking Glass by Lewis Carrol in one book

The Epic of Gilgamesh

Heidi by Johanna Spyri

The Pathfinder by James Fenimore Cooper

A Tale of Two Cities, Great Expectations, David Copperfield, and Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens

Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

Pigeon Feathers by John Updike

To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf

Robinson Crusoe by Defoe

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne

Treasure Island, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Jungle by Upton Sinclair

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

Captain's Courageous, and The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway

One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey

Animal Farm by George Orwell

The Quiet American by Graham Greene

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon

Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell

Swiss Family Robinson by Johann Wyss

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Jude The Obscure by Thomas Hardy

The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgsen Burnett

The Invisible Man by HG Wells

The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

That's it, for now. I am considering myself a classics collector

What Is and What Will Be

2010-10-07T18:33:00.000-07:00

Silvered lining of clouds nestled
close to the brain
and the pitter patter pondering
the flitter flutter wondering
paths myriad in concept and wonder
a face a smile an enraptured laugh

hiding among the leaves blue eyes wait
watching, baiting with a giggle
seeker sought after something unfound
a child's laughter is the only sound
in his ear
he cannot hear any other

behind the doors lie wooded trails
leading to illuminations of intellect
and wonder
paths shadowed in similar to stained glass
light passing in shafts of floating dust and colors
so many colors
he cannot see an end to the colors

blue eyes watch where he goes
they see how he curls his toes
and they wait with worry as he chooses
but he knows to Whom he will ask

Each way could be easy, breezy or hard
different faces, different chances, different glasses in shard
but he knows to Whom he will ask
for he is not alone

it starts as a hope, it ends as a paternal song
perhaps that is life, and all the day long
it begins in wonder, it ends in wonder, and so they go
on wandering
blue eyes and he who hopes, hands held on far paths unseen

For Phillip

2010-09-26T22:11:00.001-07:00

Life is given us that we may learn to die well, and we never think of it! To die well we must live well. -- ST. JOHN MARY VIANNEY, Cure of Ars, France

I knew a man once, not well, but enough. He was a friend, a mentor, a brother in Christ. His name was Phillip Strople, and in truth I still know him, for his life echoes on like a ghost, a living memory. He was a strong man, a lover of the good kind of violence, the violence that creates brothers and men. He could tell you hundreds of different types of guns, and other kinds of artillery. He sought after truth with the same kind of violence, seeking the Kingdom as only violent men do. (Matthew 11:12)

Phillip spoke his heart, not just his mind, he said what he felt, and he felt what he said. There was no wondering what he meant, or questioning of his motive. You knew straight out where you stood with him, and he with you. He was prone to jokes, mostly of the crass kind, and was a modern day man in all aspects of the word. Some once called him a dirtbag, and it stuck, and for a time we all reveled in the reality that we are sinners in need of grace, but we remembered in time that sin itself is a thing to be hated. He was a father, and he truly loved his children. In every picture you would see them shining in his eyes, their faces slowly taking his form, as he taught them about life, how to live well.

And Phillip did live well. He made his mistakes as we all do, and maybe even more than most of us do, but remained square with God. And that, if anything, is the greatest lesson he taught me, to not let my own self get me down, but to remember forgiveness and grace, and to embrace life as pristine as a newborn child, with the wonder and joy that you rarely feel as an adult, but always felt as a kid. I will remember Phillip as a man after God's own Heart. And no one can tell me otherwise. He was closer to God in ways we will not understand.

I will miss you my friend, I will miss our banter (here's your mancard back by the way). I will miss your jokes, and your freedom of speech, I will miss your prose, and the singular way you had of telling a story. I will miss your friendship, and mourn that I did not take advantage of it more. I will miss your example, as a man, and as a father. But I will glory in your being Home, in the arms of the God you loved, and I know you and he are laughing now, and if they have beer in heaven, surely enjoying a pint.

I love you my friend. And thanks.

Pens of Doom Challenge 1 Take 1

2010-09-21T17:14:00.000-07:00

A writing group some friends and I started, to challenge each other...this is the first challenge

Write about being in a dust storm, without using the words dust, storm, or sand in 500 words

This is Take 1

The tent shook and the sound outside was cacophonous, I lay huddled in my blanket, fearful of the wind. I had come here for a trip, a 70 year old man, tired of living in a old folks home, tired of dying, I needed to prove in life that I could live with fire. This desert was well known to many, a vast stretch that covered thousands of miles, home of the Bedouin, and the true birthplace of those beautiful horses called Arabian. My name I suppose is nothing abnormal, they call me Jack where I come from, a small plot of land in the United States going by the name Rhode Island. I had come here, to face the mouth of hell and spit in it's eye. As I lay in the tent, the winds pummeling my tent, and the tiny particles of rock and glass as numerous as the stars, I could feel that perhaps I had made a mistake.

The earth had risen like a dragon taking wings, the hot sun it's fire and my frail old body it's victim. All around the wind howled in the language of ghosts, those who had come before me, prideful in their desire to face this land sea, and conquer it.

They howled on and on, screaming their desire to the unforgiving sky, and though I had prepared for this, trained, and ultimately proven that even though I was 70 I was still hardy, I felt a child cowering at the hand of a drunken father. Their words were unknown to me, but I knew they spoke what we all have inside us, the fear of death, the fear of the world beyond, or the nothing we return to. Right now the earth flew round me like a billion, nay a trillion tiny buzzing wasps, each looking to sting, each looking to show where Death's sting had gone.

I waited, I waited for the earth to swallow me up, and the line of shadow, tiny landscape in itself formed on the sides of the tent, it grew, and grew, and it formed hills, and valleys, peaks and depressions, as if laying out the line of my life. I looked all around me to all sides of the tent and I could see my life laid out before me, and I knew that it would end, as all lives end.

I slept, and the ghosts howled in my dreams.

When I woke the ghosts were gone, buried again under the earth, and it's madness was ceased, inside the tent the shadow still loomed, but outside I could see the sun. I zipped the flap up and dug my way out, the dirt getting in my fingers, blackening the edges of the nails, betraying me with my sin, but I was a man drunk with life at the moment and I did not care. I crawled through the earth itself as if I had died, and been reborn. When I stepped out on the land I felt the beating sun, and it's heat was life to my loins. I laughed at the glaring sky, angry at it's failure to destroy me, and I beat my chest like man gone wild. If anyone had seen me they would have thought I was a lunatic, or perhaps a djinn I spoke so loudly my words seemed gibberish. I turned back to see my tent buried, and I smiled. I began to dig it out, then lay it again, setting it up as it had been before. There was no line of shadow now, only light, only the beginning again, a new birth.

(I could end it here, and maybe I will, but what follows comes from perhaps my more moral side, than my humanist side)

Drunk on that wine of life, and filled with a fervor to mock that which had tried to take me, I began to beat the tent, hitting it like I was the earth, howling like the ghosts, I would do what the old dragon could not, I would destroy the home I lived in. I tore the tent, ripped it to shreds. My fingernails were no longer black with dirt, but red with the blood of all men, all those who have cheated Death itself, and I felt no pain. I did not even noticed the howl beginning again, or the wind picking up, I was the Old Dragon, and the old dragon did not like my lie.

A wasp stung my hand, and then another, and suddenly there were hundreds of them surrounding me, flying at my face, my hands, my feet, my legs, stinging where they could. It was as if God Himself had chosen to throw dirt at me, reminding me from whence I came. The ghosts flew round me now, driven by the wind itself they howled in laughter at my stupidity. And a wave formed in front of me, the earth rose and I know I saw the eyes of the old dragon staring down on me, judging my sin of pride, and then I was gone, into the earth, just another ghost, a memory.

864 words, gonna have to pare it down some. I do like the added on part though. I think I will keep it.

The Road To Nowhere: A Morality Tale About Nothing

2010-09-19T21:31:00.000-07:00

Seems like theys times when good things happen and theys times with bad things happen, and this'n was one of those bad times. I was 16, a redheaded boy with a toothy smile, the son of a Baptist preacher, a real fire and brimstone yeller, he was a cold man, the kinda man who only talked in the pulpit and the rest of the time was silent cept for his prayers. He only talked to me for real twice in my life, the first was to tell me he was proud of me, the second was this time, when he and I took a walk into the woods to find Nothing.

He'd happened upon it one day while hunting deer, my ma liked to make deer sausage, and he said it's never done been there before, since he'd been that way a few times. When I first saw it my back prickled in a cold way, and the goosebumps covered my arms like a billion tiny hills. It was nothin, like I said, a void. I've read some few smart people books since then, and it was really a space where matter stopped existing, much like dark space, where even stars can't be seen. One could reach your hand out and pass it through the "curtain", but it felt nothing, and when one brought it back the hand was unchanged. Whatever it was, this black, cold, matterless thing, it simply wasn't there.

Well, news travels fast and farmers came to see it, pa's congregation came to see it, even scientists came to see it. Some of them called it dark matter, and I had to agree whatever was a matter with it had to be for a dark purpose. I stopped going after a few times, my mind and heart unable and unwilling to comprehend it. My father though, he became quite enamored with it, and his congregation. And that's about the time the suicides began happening.

I call them suicides because what else could you call the willing entrance of oneself into the Nothing, never to walk out again. We learned later that when one entered he stopped seeing anything, or feeling, even his hands, which unlike standing in a pitch black room and you can lift them to touch your face and reassure yourself they're there, in the Void if you lifted your hand, well, your hand never touched your face. It was as if only consciousness existed, and body was gone. Many liked this idea, seeing it as an escape, literally, from reality, and walked into it. Others, like my friend Barney, were just curious, and stupid.

Others came in time, Buddhists mostly, to worship it, calling it Nirvana, and others to form communities near it. Some used it as a place to send their unwanted, others as a place to scare their children into obeying.

I called it The Road To Nowhere, and I stayed away. I was glad I did, when about a year after it had appeared, it went away, leaving nothing behind, or something in this case, except a long mile wide expanse of black rock somewhat like obsidian, but different. It was said over time that the children who played on the black rock could hear voices in their heads, screams of pain, or the lack of pain, sadness and wailing. Those who had entered it were still there, trapped for Eternity. Unable to have bodies. Unable to feel, or love, or hope again. All of them had embraced nothing for some reason, and all had lost Everything. Myself I took a lesson from it all, that running away from reality is a bad thing, no matter how hard it gets. And so to this day that's the tale I tell my kids and grandkids.

But there's some days I wish it was still there, just for a short respite, then little Susie or Tommy tells me of the voices they heard when they stole up one night to the Black Rock, a favorite pasttime of young boys and girls, and a rite of passage, they'd tell me of the weeping, and the crying, the true ghostlike hauntedness of the place, and I would thank the Lord I had not given up and embraced Nothing.

And that's my story I guess, there's not much to it, as most parables or morality tales go it's probably not that good, but it is what it is, a tale about Nothing, that is indeed about something very important to me, to all of us.

DiscoReconnection

2010-09-16T20:32:00.001-07:00

No it doesn't have anything to do with disco

I like epiphanies, it's a literary term, look it up, this is one of my own

"I'll tell you something I never told no one before, the world don't spin around like it used it, my life don't make sense like it used to."

"Are you hiding from yourself?"

"I ain't hidin, I just ain't existin."

They were two very different people, a psychiatrist and a young man fresh out of the Ozarks, a country singer bred and buttered in the foothills of Arkansas. He was going insane, the other was just trying to make without dying.

"Stars seem to fall all around me, pieces of puzzles I ain't never tried to put together, and now never will, you know what I mean?"

"No, not really."

"Shoot, doc, you ain't sposed to say something like that right?"

"I don't want to understand, and even if I did how could I?"

It was a moment of zen, an epiphany like no other, they were two passing ships in the night, and neither saw the other or heard the calling horns.

He had no name as he walked the streets, nothing that seemed right anyways, he could be called anything and it would be someone else's projection, a thought thrown into the air by sounds that one could only understand by processing those sounds into words, and then defining those words with what one was taught they meant. A hand reached out to touch his, a gesture in the blind dark, but it missed his, and he never knew. He came home, or at least what he called home, to a building full of boxes unopened. He couldn't remember if he was leaving or just coming, it was all one blur, time itself had ceased to exist, he was just living in one eternal moment, where things clashed and faces passed that had no eyes or mouths. But he saw one thing in the midst of it all, a passing screen of streamed data

What's On Your Mind

"A black batlike demon, perching at the corner of my eyes, a thing with feathers, a Possibility that I want to be true."

In seconds comments arrived

"what?"

"are you referring to Emily Dickinson?"

"is this some kind of agnostic crying out?"

Even the faceless letters could not cross a wide divide, the divide that does not exist

Music began playing in the background, words sung to the tune of an old banjo

"Faceless people passinA cold and lonely roadGhosts before they diedAnd old their lies were toldAs truth and burning edificesA God who never seemed thereIdols in the making, a coldunseemly affair

Ask me what falling in love is likeIt's kinda cold, and everybody wants hugsShe laughs at the joke I never told, cause sheOnly heard the punchline in her headAnd I'm dyin, sweet dyin, since the day I was born"

He was crying, he didn't know why, he'd heard a tune, and words that might mean something, they stuck to his heart like cement glue, and his soul explained the meaning to his head, which laughed at the joy of it

He'd never meet this singer, never buy him a beer, but this man got it, and that was good enough.

He walked the same path the next day, and faces became people became names became friends or enemies. A hand reached out to touch his and he recognized his wife, and little red haired daughter.

He saw the country singer again, this time he listened to his every word, and by miracles, and Providence, he understood, he got it, and he told him about that song, the country singer cried this time, and revealed it was his song, eyes met eyes and souls met souls and in moments they were brothers in the heart. A divide was crossed, and they knew each other intimately.

He saw an old friend the next day, a man he hadn't talked to in years. They talked about his depression and he said he'd realized it wasn't depression at all

"Truth is, friend, it's a miracle any of us ever get each other, disconnection is by far the easiest of paths because love and relationship is the hardest, to think outside yourself? Is that even possible? I got totally lost in myself and didn't even know I was. There's gotta be a God for all this to even make sense."

His friend nodded, unsure, but listening, they clinked their glasses, and the lights went out. The show was over, but the real story had just begun.

Stuff from writing class

2010-09-13T22:53:00.000-07:00

Mostly from my portfolio

The nature and purpose of the arts.

As quoted in The Liberated Imagination:

"Throughout the history of Western art there have been two main theories of what art is. The classical theory that art is an imitation of reality (mirror of reality) dominated aesthetic theory from the time of Aristotle through the eighteenth century. The other theory is that art is a created artifact, to be explained, not so much as a copy of real life but as a new imaginative world that the artist creates [ a lamp that illuminates reality]."

In defense of both these views we must turn to the Bible, itself a lamp unto our feet. In the Word we see two interpretations of reality. We see true stories told, which in themselves are fascinating stories. Like the story of Abraham and Isaac, or of Samson, or David, or even Jesus Himself. In this telling of stories, God is reflecting man's need to see reality, and react to it. Often we need to examine our own lives, and as Socrates would say, live lives worth living.

But simply seeing is not enough. We need to interpret as well, and in these telling of stories, real life ones, we are called to interpret the inherent truths within. These real life stories mirror our own reality and cause us to see it deeper than we did before. In the book it is said "art is not about things as they are, but things as they matter."

Life matters, real mundane life. So much of the Old Testament is filled with what we would consider boring matters of life. From census' to laws and how not to break them. But these pictures of real reality speak volumes of the truths within. Such as God cares about us, even down to the little boy who was begot by jim begot by joe begot by steven.

On the other hand, there are stories in the bible that are not real as well. Their truth is in the imaginative/creative aspect of them. When asked "what is the kingdom of God." Jesus often told what is now called parables. Little stories with a hidden meaning. These stories, sometimes later on explained, illuminated the truth in reality that those who were blind to it could see. As we see in Genesis God is a Creative God, and as we are made in His image, you would say we must be creative as well. Especially writers, who take on that prophetic role of a parable teller, illuminating into flesh the reality of the Kingdom of Heaven.

But art, and it's illumination is not only about us. The epiphany's like James Joyce or Anton Chekov would write are not only what we as artists, and writers should do. For truth, while it can be, is not only subjective. In most illumination of reality one saw Jesus speaking to many, not to one person. For the communal aspect of love one another is lived out in community. When we go to a movie, or a play, or listen to a song together or read a book together, we are realizing a universal truth that touches us all. Sure we might realize some things about ourselves as well, but good art reveals other people. Illuminates the reality and meaning of others-ness if you will.

In the Bible God spends most of his time talking about how we should treat others. He in fact identifies himself with this others like mentality. In creating art we must create art that glorifies God's desires, as well as illuminates our own conditions. We must speak the truth in love. Seeking always to speak universal, and communal truths, as well as insular ones.

Journal #1

To be a writer?

It all began with Hardy Boys. They were my first book I ever read all the way through by myself, and the first time I realized I wanted to make stories that were just the same. Something along the lines of a great fiction novel. He he. Not too long after I began into Nancy Drew, and to read some of the books my dad has read me for bedtime stories, for myself. Hardy Boys was one thing, but Tolkien, Lewis, Watership Down, they were another. Whole new worlds opened beneath my feet and I flew in them, exploring them.

Not long after I found the fiction section in a local library, and my journey was begun, you couldn't have found me even if you were staring right at me. I was missing, and perfectly happy to be so.

The writing began one day when I was on the internet, visiting my friend's site, and found an online community who wrote stories together. We called it, The Story, and it was quite complicated. I was not reading about characters anymore, I was them.

I was Taliesin the cyborg, who was a prince on another planet, and had a magic called the White Light, not long after he also aquired the ability to Dreamwalk, garnered half an angel's soul, and half a demon's, and fell in love with a Dryad.

Those were the good old days I guess, I read, and I wrote, and rarely did I do anything else. But the biggest setback to it ever going further than that was my father, and my deep need for approval. I think why it's taken me so long is cause I never was able to get him to say, "this was great Justin…keep it up."

I guess he just didn't understand, even though he was the one that had enflamed the passion in me by reading the stories, by taking me to those worlds. Somehow along the way I've had to take God's approval, and be okay with it.

Journal #2

To be a writer part 2

Something else I found interesting, and perhaps the thought of it being more lucrative helped, was journalism. Their was that fascination for a time with the reporter, finding the scoop, chasing after the bad guys, investigating.

The more communication classes I took the less and less I desired to be a reporter. Perhaps it's that I've always been a bit of a recluse, or the reality that the story of the chase, the investigation is what fascinated me, not so much the actual doing of it itself. I'd rather write than have a beat, rather be holed up in a cabin in the middle of the woods on an old typewriter, just me and nature and God, than in a big city in a giant office building cubicle.

I don't even know what it really does mean to be a writer yet, other than it is to glorify God somehow. To have that incarnational and ascensional model as taught in class. To see past the veil of reality into something real, something deeper than Here and Now.

All I know is ever since I decided to be a writer, I've never felt so -right-. A lot of other things may still confuse me, like God, and Christianity, and myself, and other people, but writing. It's right.

There's a beauty in realizing that, in waking up and knowing you're fulfilling your purpose God has made you for. Speaking his truth in the language he's given you. To me that is what being a writer is. To be given the gift by God, and to use it.

That is the hardest part of this new deal, to trust and obey…cause I'm still afraid, and the wounds of needing that affirmation from my father are still deep, but I'm getting there. You can only hide from who you are for so long.

Journal #3

Poetry

I have always had a thing for lyrical poetry, and when I say lyrical poetry I mean literal lyrics.

Musical lyrics that is.

I guess there's an inherent beat and rhythm moreso than even normal poetry embedded into lyrics to music, but the beauty you can find in the way the sentences are shaped and the words within always

Run like a race for family

When you hear like you're alone

The rusted gears of morning

To faceless busy phones

We gladly run in circles

But the shape we meant to make is gone

Above is Iron and Wine lyrics, Sam Beam is one of my most favorite poets. He's not even trying to be one. But almost every poem I write has a song to it in my head. Sad thing I can't write music.

So when I write it, it's song lyrics, but it's also poetry. And that's the way I like it.

I guess it's the idea that life has an inherent beat, and deeper meaning in itself like music. God would be the composer and we'd all be notes on a string, but we'd also be words, the lyrics in a sense, and God is the poet. Weaving us in and out of each other, seeing what cool sounds can be made, how to make sentences end without losing the meaning. Etc.

So how does one go about doing that himself. I guess it's like I think, sometimes, to think of a song when I am writing a poem makes it far easier to write it than to just be writing it. Because then you already got the beat going, you already are searching for lines that beautifully go together, for words that sound musical, etc.

And that's how it all makes sense to me.

Journal #4

Poetry part 2

The first poem I ever wrote was inspired by a DC Talk song, which kinda makes me feel all cliché and blasé, but hey, you gotta start somewhere. The only lines I can remember are "Blinded by attractions, looking for satisfa-action, we don't seem to understand, that our God has a plan, it's a plan lined with gold, a plan to make us bold, to wake us up from our sleep, to get us up from the deep. But we're all chasing butterflies, daydreaming about those blue eyes, sleeping in God's grace, not seeking His face."

There was more, but yeah, I forgot.

I went through my romantic poetry period, where I wrote lines all over the place about things in nature, and the way they made me think about God, or myself, or a girl, or anything else. Then I guess I tried to be more abstract, and stream of consciousness, then I wrote "stories" in poem form. Some of those latter are some of my best I think.

When it comes to writing it, I never met a poem I simply hated. Even some of the Dada stuff is interesting. I guess it's the same as it is with me and art. I usually don't -hate- an art piece I see, cause there's something to it that represents a seeking, a hoping, a search for meaning. Even if it's to reject the established understanding of meaning. And to me few things other than poetry really show that search for meaning in a way that resonates with the soul. For a boy that grew up reading all the time, the whole visual, but not direct object-based visuals is the way I think, the way I learn, the way I grow.

Every now and then though, I will have a moment when it all ceases to make sense to me, and then I end up seeing life in a whole new way…it's almost like God takes my glasses off and I see the world, without the abstract words and the insular thinking, and suddenly I am in the world but not of it. To be honest I love those times, even though I love the inspiration times as well. Now if only I could find a way to intertwine them together.

Journal # 5

What to write?

That is the question really, I love all kinds of genres. From fantasy to sci fi to mystery to thriller to classic, etc. etc. etc.

Every now and then I'll read a novel, or a series which I just have to write like. Neil Gaiman does that for me, so does Cormac McCarthy, Timothy Zahn and Dean Koontz. I think if I had to write like one author, but keep it almost in a classics vein, it would be these four.

Some ideas I have are a bit out there. There's the story about the man who goes to the Klondike during the gold rush, is terrorized by a pack of wolves, led by an alpha who is demon possessed, returns home but can't get away from the nightmares. So he goes back to the Klondike, and learns the ways of wolves so he can track down the pack and kill the alpha.

Kinda a strange homage to Jack London.

But then there's Dostoyevsky. Yeah so I really haven't read any of his except parts of The Idiot. But there is a certain…I dunno…prestige, to saying you want to write like the guy. But in reality I like Hemingway more, and Orwell.

One style I'd like to try is the dystopian future. I'm working on a "series" right now called Only the Lonely in which my main character is a psychopathic killer, a Virus has been set free which breaks man's normal inhibitions and causes them to be truly totally depraved. They become like Zombies, and my character is kinda a anti-hero as the story goes on. But if I had to start over again, I think I'd try to write it like Farenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury. I just love the way he writes, almost as if he's in a dream of his own…and describing it. Not so easy to understand, but the beauty is there.

So what to write? I guess that's up to me and God.

Journal #6

I hate writer's block.

Perhaps it makes me feel weak, or stupid, or fearful that I'll fail, but it's always been a struggle of mine. I like to wait for inspiration, and sometimes that takes weeks if not months. But there are quotes I read like the one my friend told me, which is "if you don't write today, you are not a writer." and Neil Gaiman's "just write, even if it's not good, just write." And I think that's my problem. I don't want to write something not good. Perhaps somewhere along the way this all became more about affirmation of me as a person than me writing. Do I love writing? Or do I love being seen as a great writer.

Last night I watched the movie Orange County, which I tend to do when I'm in a process of having to write a lot, and as always got a lot from it. Like the first part, the prologue. The young man finds the book on the beach, reads it 52 times, and decides he wants to be a writer, so he starts writing. Every day. For hours. I've never been able to do that. And I think it's cause of a fundamental struggle in me to be loved.

My identity is off, I don't get that God loves me. And it's been hard to accept His forgiveness for my mistakes in relationships in the past. Especially with my dad. I remember asking Dr. Smith if I have what it takes, and I know, as at any time I am asking that, I am waiting to hear those much desired words. "You're a great writer, Justin."

Because at times this has been more about me than about writing.

But I am a good writer, and there are those times when I get into the process itself and just simply love it, then it becomes about writing and not about me. I have come to hate the in between times, the ones where I'm waiting to return to that "flow" where my balance is off and my insecurity is strong. Where my relationships have left me wounded, or I have left others wounded.

In the movie the young man meets the author that inspired him to write and the author tells him he is a great writer. And suddenly the man realized he doesn't need a degree, or prestige, or anything to be a good writer, but just people to inspire him. And that is what I long for, to take my eyes off myself, and my insecurities and see the people around me, and the inherent stories within, and just write.

Got a lot of wounds to deal with, but I'm getting there.

Journal #7

Anchor Men

So I know that at some point in my life I need to write me and Dad's story. Looking at it even from a completely objective point of view I can see that the story bears all a good story has. Relational conflict, death, despair, hope and life, etc. There's really enough in there for a duology. And I've often thought about how to go about it. Should I fictionalize it? Or as my friend Brandon once said, just tell the true story. I never really thought about creative nonfiction til coming to class, so that had not even crossed my mind.

Something about it seems to appeal to me. But I'd love to keep the name. It embodies so much of what the story is all about. Anchor Men, in church one day the pastor gave all the men little pins that looked like an anchor, on the back was a quote about how a true man is one that finds his anchor in Christ. In my life I believe that is the strongest thing Dad taught me. To find my anchor in God in the stormy seas of life.

The story would follow the father, as he grows older, dealing with life, getting married, having a daughter and later a son, and then losing the wife and daughter in a car wreck. This would be the big climax in the middle, and as the rest of the story goes on, filled with more stormy seas, the father is teaching the son to hold on to God no matter what. As it winds down, the son is older, and returns home from bible college to spend time with his dad who's falling into depression. Then his father kills himself, and the boy has to relearn it all over again, but it ends at the father's funeral. With the boy having hope that things will be figured out.

I thought about following the boy into the coming years, and that would definitely have to be a sequel if done, and I just might considering it's a cool story in itself, but for now Anchor Men is about the father. If creative nonfiction it will be more of a memoir, but perhaps I can do both, at different times in my life.

We'll see.

Journal #8

A Code of Ethics for a Writer

So for my Ethics in mass communication class we had to write a Code of Ethics at the end of the year, which we geared towards the individual careers we wanted to go into. Mine was a bit harder than others since simply being a writer is a bit more abstract than say being a reporter or broadcast journalist, but here's some of what I came up with.

Code of Ethics -

It's alot harder to write a code of ethics for a career in creative writing.

When writing I want to write for the glory of God, in a incarnational, ascenscional way. To use metaphor and symbolism in a way which shows Christ always.

I want to have redemptive themes. To not have violence for violence's sake, or sexual innuendo for sexual innuendo's sake.

I will not write all the time, with only money as a consideration. I will take time for my family.

I will not see people as only characters in process that I could use in my stories. Or events, or reality itself. I will live in the real world as well as my stories.

I will take times of rest. I will attend church. I will spend time with God outside of seeking him in guidance with stories.

I will tell the truth, even if in metaphor, or symbol

I will write stories of hope, which cause those to read them to seek that Hope.

I will not use other's writing and call it my own.

I will do my best to write every day.

I will keep cursing to a minimum

I will not have a totally depraved character, or a totally good one. I will try to reflect the reality of the human condition.

But every now and then you simply have to have a Samwise Gamgee.

Journal # 9

Quotes I really enjoy about writing.

Fiction is a lie, and good fiction is the truth inside the lie.

Stephen King

(I hear something similar in Dr. Smith's lectures.)

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero, but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.

G. K. Chesterton

(Every story is about a character, unless it's creative nonfiction, then the author is the character.)

A purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved.

Kurt Vonnegut

(I tend to love Vonnegut quotes, but this one really applies to writing for me)

We read five words on the first page of a really good novel and we begin to forget that we are reading printed words on a page; we begin to see images.

John Gardner

(I hope that is what a story does. I think it has to do with how you describe, not what you describe.)

I have a duty to speak the truth as I see it and share not just my triumphs, not just the things that felt good, but the pain, the intense, often unmitigated pain. It is important to share how I know survival is survival and not just a walk through the rain.

Audre Lorde

(Exactly. I often think that as long as we are sharing hope, and truth, there is no limit to the darkness we can share as well. But then again, we cannot be extremists as we see below.)

Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass. ~Anton Chekhov

(Show, don't tell)

The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies. ~Ray Bradbury

(Leave it to Bradbury to discuss extremism so well)

Journal #10

A Scene From "The Ballad of Weiden Nebelstreif"

-And as I slept, I dreamt of elves. Especially one named Weiden.

In my dream I walked through a deep dense forest. It was almost primordial, with green canopies growing over the forest roof, leaving shafts of light following in my path and bugs buzzing around, but not in an annoying way. It was scary, at times, but the more I walked, the more I knew this was a good place. Fairies danced in dark shadows like fireflies at evening, and Weiden walked the path with me, but always a bit ahead. I followed her through a green arch made of branches into an elven kingdom, a place with eyes everywhere. In the midst of it all was a treasure, and she stooped among the flowers, picking one and putting it in her hair.

I looked at the treasure, but she was looking at me.

"Do you know what I am most afraid of…" She asked.

I shook my head, and my body sweated in terror.

"I am mostly afraid that I don't even exist."

I put out my hand to touch her, to prove she was there, but that was when I awoke. I wondered if she ever felt my touch, if it ever helped her exist.

But my alarm clock was ringing and the day had begun.-

So I was reading a poem one day written in German I think, and those two words really stuck out to me. Weiden means "willow" and we always associate that with sadness, and Nebelstreif means "wisp of wind". So I started getting this idea of a story about a girl. A little tiny girl who saves a whole town. Kinda a counter story to all the hero's who are masculine (even the women) and strong. Weiden is not strong at all, fearful, and such. The story is written from the boy who falls in love with her point of view. She always carries a bit of mystery to her, and we never really get to know her that well. I dunno, I want to write it, have written the first couple pages, but still working on it.

Journal 11

"The Word became flesh to communicate to us human beings caught in the mud, the pain, the fears, the brokenness of existence, the life, the joy, the communion, the ecstatic gift of love that is the source of all love and life and unity in our universe and that is the very life of God."

I've read few quotes (I think it's Mother Theresa) that really get the essence of what it means to be a Christian Writer, but that one comes close. The Word becoming Flesh.

God sometimes seems such an abstract idea to me, who is this guy anyways? What does it mean to be a christian in the kingdom of God. Not how you get there, it seems obvious how in the Bible, but how do you be there, if you want to use an existential type phrase. And I think that is one of the hugest callings of a Christian writer. To show, not tell, what it means when the Bible says this, to show who God is by sharing the life of one or more human beings and how God relates into their lives.

In the Bible whenever Christ is asked "what is the kingdom of heaven." he answers with a story. I think that really speaks to the heart of writers. We flesh out concepts and abstract ideas into reality. We reveal in fact, as a friend of mine would put it, what is Really Real. We here are in the veil, the gateway of reality, half in and half out of dreamland, but God is in reality, and our blind eyes rarely see, or our deaf ears hear.

To be a writer is to take a journey into that Reality, to record what you see, and bring it back with you in a relateable understandable way. At least that's what it is to me.

Journal 12

"you are so young, so before all beginning, I want to beg you, as much as I can....to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you cause you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answers." Letters to a poet, Ranier Maria Rilke, 34-35

Allow me to be a bit postmodern for a minute. Life is just as much about questions as it is answers. I wonder if sometimes writers spend so much time trying to get to the moral of the story that they don't enjoy the story itself. I wonder if sometimes we are called to leave stories open-ended and questioning instead of all wrapped up in a nice bow. Hope is not hope because everything works out, hope is hope because it's like stars at night, guiding us through the overwhelming black.

I know a lot of people have criticized Cormac McCarthy for the way he ended "No Country For Old Men.", or questioned the way Beckett writes Endgame, etc. But frankly I kinda like it. I think the biggest problem in a human's life is not having to question, but when he stops questioning. We must be seekers of the truth. It is out there, as X-Files would say.

I think I want to write sometimes with the idea that questions are reality too, that sometimes life does not make sense at all, but there is hope of answer, and to keep looking for it. I want to leave them, the reader, imbalanced sometimes, and insecure, afraid of what this could really mean to them. And that causes them to get up from their TV, or their video game, or their dull life in whatever form it is, and go and question, and live, and maybe find the answer.

But I also want us to enjoy life now, and live the answers we do know. So perhaps a balance of both.

Journal 13

Shining eyes and golden hair

Walk with angels unaware

Sadly awakening

From a good and pleasant dream

Living in memory

Love's reflection in their eyes

Quiet whispers in the night

A cry in the morning

Feel the gladness, know the pain

Just to hear them call my name

And I know...

They were just a fading

portrait of eternity

A taste of what will be

And if it's so...

They were just a glimpse

Of what He has prepared for me

I can't wait to see

What Heaven will be.

-half of a poem by Garry Hanvey, not long after Paula (his first wife, and my mother) and Joy (his 3 year old daughter, and my sister) died in a car wreck.

The only poem of my Dad's I've ever read. It really captures a lot of really cool things to me. But I think as a writer what I take from it is the idea that we should in our writings share somehow the Hope of Heaven. In the daily beauties of the people around us, and the things we say and do. Some writers like Lewis or Dekker in his book Black, get very allegorical about it. But I think I agree with my friend Andrew that something as mundane as laying tile on roofs can have heavenly meaning as well. That reality itself must reflect like waters the beauty of heaven and God. I don't think we have to look far to show Christ. He is Here and Now. Immanuel. Not in the polytheistic sense. He is not everything, but I think in a very real sense he is in everything. Rob Bell has some interesting thoughts about that. I think writers must find way to find that reflection. Like my dad did with Paula and Joy. Like I will do with my own life.

Journal #14

I think it's very easy in a writer's life to fall into selfishness. To get so into his writing that he forgets to live for his family, or even take care of himself ironically. We writers do tend to live in our heads.

Two movies that I think of when I think of this is The Door in the Floor, and Funny Farm. Vastly different from each other, but similar in their plot. Both highlight an author who becomes so obsessed with his work he doesn't live in the real world, and his family falls about around him. One does this with great comedic hilarity and the other with a more subtle, dramatic menace.

It's as if we start seeing reality like a story, and we're still in author mode. People become characters and we find ourselves manipulating situations that we would never touch if we remembered we're humans too, on the same playing field.

This is so easy to do, and that's why I included the part that goes along with this in my Code of Ethics. Because not only as a writer but as a Christian I must be in this world, if not of it. I must love one another.

And contrary to what most writers might think, life is about more than actually writing. It's about other people too, and mainly about glorifying God. I hope and pray I never fall into that trap. Especially since I already have some disassociate-like tendencies.

Sure sometimes in order to meet a deadline I will disappear into the woods somewhere off in some out of the way cabin and write, write, write, but the majority of the time it must be about my family, my walk with God, others, and life itself. That is the only way I think I will actually be a good writer.

Journal 15

Gotta break the fourth wall here (I think that's what that is called), and speak directly to some people here.

Dr. Smith. I just wanted to say thank you. In my whole life I have always wanted to be a write. But never been brave enough, or healed enough to try. I think it was your ideas, and philosophy on what it means to be a writer that woke me up, that reminded me that I need to enjoy what I do, as well as do well at it.

I probably could have been a pretty cool reporter, but I would have never loved it. I only wanted to do it cause it opened the possibilities of providing for family better, and other things. But it was you again with your talk of publishing journals, and more recently the discussions on creative non-fiction that really opened my eyes to the hope that I can do what I love, and be able to provide as well.

This past semester, while being really hard, has also been my most freeing. It's been great to explore the writing field, and the different ways of doing it, to see that there is a chance for a 25 year old almost college dropout like me in being able to figure all this out, and do God's will as far as writing. You really opened my eyes to all that, and for that I will always be grateful.

And to Sarah, who may never read this, but should, I just want to thank you too, for all your encouraging comments about my stories and poems. Seeing you walk up there for that award, and knowing you liked my stories and poems, really made me see that I could make it too. I hope we continue to have fun working together.

-Justin

The Broken Smile and The Eyes of God

2010-09-09T17:14:00.000-07:00

In the movie Eye of God, a story is told in nonlinear timing, narrated by a world weary sheriff recounting a case of murder, spousal abuse, and abortion. It's a hardhitting movie which leaves you feeling kicked in the gut at the end, mostly because of the graphic depiction of abortion that holds no punches. I literally wept at the sight of it.

There's two views of God in this movie, one is the view of the sheriff, who tells the story of Abraham and Isaac at the beginning of the story, pointing out how Abraham does not ask God why, only binds his son and proceeds to wield a knife above his head about to sacrifice him. The old sheriff asks the question "I wonder what Isaac had to go through, seeing that above him, how it effected the rest of his life. And never being able to ask why." He goes on later to say...

"Faith. God tells a man to sacrifice his own son. The man has faith, and he will do it. He doesn't ask why. Maybe Abraham, as he binds his son, knows why they are there. I don't anymore."

Now before we go on I have to say that it's never really said how Isaac came to terms with this, but this God is the same God who allowed Job to question him for a time, and allowed Jacob to wrestle with him...I am sure Isaac got his turn as well.

The other view is by the young woman, a stereotypical young naive small town girl, who writes letters to an ex con in prison, who when he is released comes to stay with her. Immediately he wants to start a family, and asks her to marry him, he has become deeply religious and believes God wants him to have a family. What's truly going on is that this man is simply walking the same path he did before only now he is using God as his conscience, to blind him to the truth. Blind faith seems a strongly hateful thing in this movie, as the Sheriff's opening words about Abraham, and later the depiction of what this man becomes in his blind faith shatters one's concept of a faith in God that doesn't ask questions.

I find it no coincidence that the girl is half blind, one of her eyes made of glass, but unable to see through it into her soul. Her view of God is innocent, though she does not believe in him, she still prays innocently to him, at the end of the movie "Children. That's all we are, Lord, if you're out there at all. Your children, boys and girls. Forgive us."

I think one walks a fine line here, between the Sheriff and the girl, between a one eyed God leading a world of the blind, as Erasmus said "In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king." and the God who sees with both eyes completely the world he loves and watches destroy itself. My father wrote that that gave him hope, to others, like the Sheriff that gives them despair, because what God would allow this to their children.

I find myself in the middle as well, weary of the world, yet hopeful in God. I have to believe He allows pain for a reason, even the kind of pain as stark and unrelenting as this story....the ex con makes her never leave the house, she gets pregnant then he almost strangles her later, she won't have the baby, she leaves and has an abortion. The abortion is graphically depicted in the same scene as a young boy of 14 is committing suicide. His story is wrapped up in hers, his mother killed herself, and his aunt takes care of him, and at night he goes on drives to get away. He meets the girl (after she's left her husband and had the abortion) and drives her to her favorite spot by the lake, there the husband finds them, and thankfully we do not see the murder, but the aftermath of it makes the boy go insane and he later kills himself.

All this is depicted out of place, and mixed and matched together for the thematic elements to be portrayed poetically, the death of the baby mirrors the destruction of the innocence of this boy...

All throughout it we are reminded that God is watching. And all throughout it we are asking why.

And that's the point.

Common Children once wrote a song called Eyes of God. Notice the plural. In this song God sees all, and reacts in a different way than in the movie, he offers redemption, and in the end, I think that's all God is offering, not to make us change but to give us change should we take it. It's the difference between seeing the world with doubt or wonder. Pain can be beautiful, or it can be terrible, it can change us for the better or the worst. Sometimes we don't have much of a choice in how it does, but it all works together for Good.

the lyrics to Eyes of God

Do you wake up without speaking
Outside in a shallow state of mind
You come down - you're slipping on your feelings
This breakdown may one day lead to healing

All the while the eyes of God shine on us
The broken smile and the eyes of God shine on us

Do you wake up without breathing
Rub on your faded smile (The tears of love fall down)
You wanted to be perfect
You'll have to wait a while
Dress yourself all up in Heaven
Let the angels dance inside these feelings

All the while the eyes of God shine on us
The broken smile and the eyes of God shine on us

Feel the pain, you need to show
Take the time, now let it go
Embrace this day of healing

His tears of love redeem us
The eyes of mercy shine on us

All the while the eyes of God shine on us
The broken smile and the eyes of God shine on us
Even now His tears of love redeem us
The broken smile and the eyes of God shine on us

Shine on us (Tears of love)
Shine on us (Fall on us)
Shine on us

Maybe like the sheriff I still ask why, but I feel like maybe I see a bit clearer each day.

Pontificating, Pondering, in the Pond of Ponderance...and Pogs?

2010-08-24T19:18:00.000-07:00

Nope, nothing about pogs, oh well. They were a fad. A pretty cool one though.

There's several passages in Steinbeck's East of Eden that I feel like could have been written by me, if I was a better writer and lived in the 1950's. It's an interesting story, about a couple different generations of families, and the problems that seem to flow ever onward down a stream of sin, with little to no effort to stop them. I can't really talk about the story more than that, other than to say that it is incredibly well written, and might end up being one of my most favorite novels, along with White Fang, American Gods, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel, and now East of Eden. Few books really deeply change me, and those four are the only ones so far.

Family is a weird thing, the kinda story that leaves you broken and healed all at the same time. It's where you get love, discipline, signifigance, life, and it's where you get insecurity, loss, despair, and the most brokenhearted. But without family, I think we would have little concept of the meaning of love. You have to love your family. Many would feel otherwise, but I think it's biblically mandated. And also humanly. It saddens me when I read facebook statuses, or thoughts about hating one's parents, or other family member, albeit at times I felt like I hated my father, or my mother. But you just don't say that, you grit your teeth, and you love them, because they're family, and because without them we'd just be conglomerations of molecules bouncing against each other like so many single celled organisms. Your first words are taught to you by your parents, you learn how to walk from them, you learn what morality is, or isn't. So many of the beautiful things about a person and so many of the completely ugly things come from familial interaction, but without family we'd be nothing. We wouldn't even know what the word insecurity means, much less feel it. How many orphans have we seen as lost in themselves and identity as they are in the world? Too many.

Don't give up on family. Even if they do the most evil things, cause sometimes in the end, they're all we have. And I don't think God will ever make it easy to break that tie.

I always wanted to write a story, and will someday outlining what life was like with Dad. The good, the bad, the ugly. And there was so much good. I loved him more than I have ever loved anyone else, and that will always be true. Of all the people in my life he probably hurt me the most. I will carry wounds to my grave, but I will carry love too. There's more in blood than platelets and red blood cells, there is a mystical connection, a symbiosis almost between parents and children, something that if truly tapped into will reveal a love that cannot die. And I mean that, it never dies. Some part of that seeps into other relationships, the ability to love someone just because, no reason, perhaps because deep down underneath it all you see they're a human, and you're a human, and there's something lovely about that connection. In a way blood binds us all. And you learn that from family.

You learn a lot of things from family. I learned how to forgive. I learned how to communicate (that's actually arguable, perhaps I learned how not to communicate hehe), I learned to hurt with just a word, and I learned the power eyes hold over a heart, but I also learned that one hug can change universes and turn back time, that music is the language that a heart can't speak, and that this world is beautiful because God is beautiful, and all he does is beautiful.

So many say they will never raise their kids like their parents did, and in a way I hope to learn from the mistakes, but then I also know that if I had to go back and do it all over, I would in a second, exactly the same. My father was my father, but he was also Garry Hanvey, and through all his flaws, and beauty, he was himself. I wouldn't change that, it's why I loved him, even if it meant less hurt. If you know how my dad died, then some of that perhaps really boggles your mind, and possibly it should, maybe even repulse you, but it's the truth of how I feel. I am who I am because of him, so much of me, is because of him. And God is still God. There's a reason. That reason wouldn't exist with none of everything that happened. So, it's all beautiful, even the flaws. I'll be who I am, broken and whole, proudly.

All things work together for good.

Generationals Conclusion

2010-08-19T16:12:00.000-07:00

They came like monsters from the shadows, men armored in black leather, carrying guns, and rods that emitted an electrical pulse when pointed at a person. All around him Foraty heard yells of anger and fear. Some fought back, some surrendered on the spot. Himself, he tried to hide, but it was not long before they found him, and along with Whitacre and the others he was dragged from the underground compound into the bright, and painful glow of the day. He wondered what had become of the time machine thing, and the generational the old man had had. He felt just a bit selfish for wondering.

He woke after a fitful sleep in a white room. There was no door, only smooth, somewhat glowing, white walls. A face appeared in video on one wall, Cohen's face.

"So, I hope you are enjoying your new accomodations. The White Room is highly effective is it not?"
Foraty guessed he meant that it was effective in breaking him. And he had to admit, there was something starkly terrifying about it.

"It is impenetrable, so I would hold no hopes of escape. The walls are porous and so air passes in and out without need of a vent. Food, and waste needs will be taken care of at precise hours, and the wall will disintigrate at one point. Be ready, and don't try to break through, any movement detected will cause the wall to regrow, and it will kill anything in the way."

He found this out two hours later when a hole opened in the wall, and a tray of food appeared along with a pail. They passed through the wall without triggering any collapse. He took them and waited. Some time later he was sifting through his pockets when he came across an object he knew had not been there before. It was the generational. He took it from his pocket, wondering about any cameras that might be recording him, but no one appeared to snatch the thing from his hand. He looked at it for what seemed hours, pondering it, it seemed to have a wire which ended in a needle, which he figured you stuck into the flesh somehow, then turned on the machine, thus retrieving the memories in it. He turned it on finally, seeking some kind of instructions.
~Hello Frank.~ The words appeared on the screen in black font on white.

~Please stick needle in ear.~

My ear?! He thought, but that would hurt like the dickens. He laid the machine on the ground and stood up quickly. Frank, the thing had called him Frank. Could that be his real name?

He picked it up, wincing at the thought, then shoved it into his ear waiting for whitehot pain. It never came, the needle went right into some kind of receptacle deep in his ear. Something he coulda sworn had never been there.

~Think about your wife, and children, think about the car wreck~

He thought about it, experiencing the double vision again, but this time it was as if he was experiencing things over again both from his viewpoint, and the old man's. Sometimes he was the old man, standing in front of his kids opening christmas presents under the tree, or watching his daughter look for eggs on Easter. At other memories, he was himself, meeting people he'd never met, watching The Who at their first concert, reading a first edition of Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle. All around him memories swam, his and the old man's, but he knew that they had lived all these lives, and that this ocean was an ocean that had been swum in before, in another life.

How many times have we done this? He asked himself, this machine, it knows, it knows all the lives we've lived, even if neither of us know, and I am the only one who ever finds out, because I'm the only one who uploads the memories. Does anyone else know?

He thought about his ear, and realized that it meant one thing. He'd done this before, he'd gotten out of this place, traveled in time, lived, and died, and been reborn to live the same life again, and sometimes other lives. Choices changed outcomes, and while in one life he was a writer living with an older woman in the Cascade Mountains where he wrote supernatural thrillers, in another life he was the man he'd known, a doctor, Frank Wiley, husband to a woman named Emily, and father of Jessie and Henry. The memories on this one generational were his own, of all the lives he'd lived, as well as the old man's. He knew that in order to get out of here he would have to download his memories of this life, just like he had done many times before. So he did. Letting them go, as the machine whirred and the white room glowed.

A hole opened in the wall. He knew what he had done before, and what he would do now. He stepped forward and grabbed the tray of food as it was passing into the room. It was a molecular code, and whenever this specific dna strand came near the wall, it would open, and stay til the strand passed through. He figured a new strand had to be loaded daily, since the food was different. But with the food still standing in the path of the opened wall, it would not close. This was not enough though, since the hole itself was not that big. He pondered for a second, then moved the tray up, the wall receded from it, widenening the hole for a short instant, but it began closing on the other end almost as fast. He would have to be quick, and incredibly accurate. Outside the hall he could hear approaching footsteps.

He made a wide circle, making sure to not pass the tray too far in or out of the line of the wall, but he did it quickly, sweating at the strain. He had tightened his muscles so that he didn't shake. A cry was heard beyond the hole. It was barely wide enough but he dove through nonetheless, his only hope that if he failed, he would be here again soon, and wouldn't fail every time. Life, and Death, it's all a circle.

A guard was approaching holding a pulse rod, but no gun, and he ducked as an electrical pulse singed the top of his hair passing over him.

"No one ever escapes The White Room."

"I have, plenty of times."

He ran, pursuit not far behind, trusting his instincts, and memories of places and times he'd never been. He found himself in a dark corridor, and doors on either side. None were locked from the outside, and so he opened them, to reveal Whitacre, and many of the undergrounders.

"I knew you'd come," Whitacre said, smiling at the old man beside him, who grinned.

"Come, we must hurry..." They followed Whitacre from the building, he still knew his way around the complex, and all the hiding places to get out without disturbing any sensors. The alarm continued to sound, and now it seemed more urgent, as if they had learned of the other prisoner's escape too. When they reached a last corridor, a subterranean hallway Cohen and 15 men were waiting for them.

"We knew when we found Whitacre released that he would try the same escape route he used last time." Cohen said with a grin.

Whitacre ignored him and turned to Foraty, to Frank.

"You know what to do right? It's all in the memories..."

Frank nodded. Each moment existed in and of itself a wave pattern on the brain, and this existing wave slowly dissipated once not experienced anymore. But the memory, stored away in the mind, could recreate the moment, albeit altered, the only way to really do it was to transfer the conscious from memory to memory, from mind to mind, til the conscious was once again at the moment it wanted to be at. He would have to travel in time, but only in his conscious.

"Good luck." Whitacre said, then with one bark of command his people attacked Cohen's group.

Frank closed his eyes and turned on the generational. It wouldn't have as much power behind as the device back in the underground chamber, and his body itself would not be able to travel, but he could do this by mind alone. He followed the pattern, slipping from his mind to the old man's when he reached the point before he woke from the coma, and from the old man's to Whitacre's. He was astonished to find that each person viewed the world in such a similar way to him. That behind the eyes of Whitacre, then another man named Colby, then more men, and women, they all saw the world the same as him. He felt such connection with each one, and wondered if they knew he shared the same body for a short time. In each he shared memories of lives lived before, times that had never existed in this iteration, things that no man on this earth had ever seen. It was all so beautiful. What was locked in the human mind, beyond even the subconscious' grasp changed him completely. And behind it all, underneath every thread of being he saw a similar patter, a designer, a being of infinite wisdom and love who had caused reality. He wanted to know this being, to love this being. He knew that somehow, some way, he would.

Millenia passed, he had to live all the moments as if they were life, each second and minute, day month and year. Centuries, until he came to the old man again, this time sitting in his car in traffic, looking at the backside of a Camry. He could not control the memory, he could only relive it. The only person he could control was himself. He crossed just in time, just as the light was turning from green to red, and the old man in a rush to cross was deciding to run the red light, just as it was turning green for Frank. Frank felt the memories rush in upon him, causing him to stop as pain and whiteness exploded in his head. The information was too much. He was using too much of the brain at one time. So many smells, names, faces, sights, sounds, a whole 500 something years worth of them. He knew that in some other life, now branched off from he died in a future that would now not exist, at least for him, shot in the head by a man named Chief Cohen. But he also knew that he was Frank Wiley, a doctor who had forgotten to appreciate the beauty of his family and fellow man, overstressed by his work, callousing himself so he would not have to feel when death struck one of his patients. He had forgotten how to live. But these memories, this beauty, this pain, it was all changing him, sitting there in the intersection cars honking beside him and middle fingers raising to the sky as people drove around him, his scream of pain was also a scream of joy.

Love, connection, the realization that life itself was precious, so precious God had allowed it to be relived over and over for countless reiterations of time. He began laughing through the pain, feeling it slowly lessen as memories began to fade, being locked in his brain beyond his grasp even in the subconscious. He would carry whole worlds in there, and only remember a little of it, just enough to remain the better man he was now. He was alive. And that was beautiful.

Plodders and Revolutionaries

2010-08-17T19:38:00.000-07:00

Having grown up in the Bible belt, I've seen my share of Christian men and women. I've been to revivals where the pastor spit as much as he preached and every saliva soaked head ran to the front to receive or rededicate their lives to Christ. I was one of these people. I've seen men who the world will never know change my life and the lives of those around them with a quiet conviction that borders on fanaticism. I've loved the plodders, and I've loved the revolutionaries. I think after a few years of feeling a bit on the outside, some recent events, one touched on in the blog below this one, and an article written by Kevin DeYoung, I've found myself falling in love with Church again.

When I was young I wrote a paper on Billy Sunday. It's interesting that you never hear his name anymore, but the man during his life was a huge figure in the religious world. He was the Billy Graham of his day, long before electronic devices were used to amplify voices, or carry images across the miles to your bedroom. He was a revolutionary so to speak, because he brought revival. I think to some, that is a definition of revolution that makes a lot of sense. That it's not about bringing down political regimes, or breaking apart countries, but about bringing the kingdom of heaven, with passion. There were many like Sunday before and after him, names like George Whitfield, Charles Spurgeon, William Carey, Bonhoeffer, Dwight Moody, and Charles G Finney. These were men who were without scandal, and yet held a large audience in America during their times. The truth is that the Bible is full of revolutionaries, who cared not for changing the environment, or freeing the world from it's ills, but helping it to see it's heart state, then allowing change to come from God. Some of them were politically active, they supported Prohibition, much like famous evangelists nowadays support or don't support bans on homosexuality etc. But they were good men nonetheless, and the world was made better for them.

There's a Jewish proverb that speaks to the other side of this story, the plodders, the people, like me, like you, who sit in the pews, or preach in the pulpits and never really change that many lives and sometimes only our own. "Change one person, change the world." I think we can't deny the truth in this reality as Christ lived it out, with 12 men, a small number in relation to the world around them, but these 12 men, and those who believed on Christ, started a religion and built a movement that nowadays numbers in the millions. They plodded along, speaking to their neighbors, and carrying their mission to other countries, where they met with different people, but never a huge audience, and these people, changed, changed others, and so on and so on. In discipleship relationship is everything, and this Church is best fought for on the battlefield of hearts, one by one, seed by planted seed. The revolutionaries do their part and the plodders as well. But this begs another question, what of those calling the church on it's imperfections, what of those who wish to have a voice in more than just the evangelical arena? Is there a place for this too? I think so, and so those like Shane Claiborne, while maybe a bit overly done, still are speaking to issues sorely in need of speaking to.

I had a favorite teacher in high school, a man who I knew as Mr. Johnson. Mr. Johnson was a big man, with glasses, who looks alot like J.K. Simmons, and while we disagreed on a lot of theological issues, he was one of the few men in my life I would say actually changed me. I went from this rebellious teenager to a kid who actually respected other people's convictions and wished not to rebel against them just cause I disagreed with them. I suppose you could say, in his quiet, plodding way, he made a revival, a revolution in my heart. And what of those famous evangelists, we only see snapshots of their lives. But these men lived like us, day to day...and life itself is nothing if a little like plodding.

Recently some have spoken on the institution of organized religion, and the church, and what it all means, and as for me I stand on the side of the Body of Christ. The Kingdom of Heaven. But I would be remiss to not point out that nearly 90% of that Kingdom is a member of some kind of organized Church denomination. Some are leaving, finding a looser, but still intact faith, but most are sticking with, and in truth I cannot deny both sides their place. I can't really give up on the institution because the institution is filled with people I am called to love. But I also cannot totally stand inside it either. And that is probably the best place for any Christian...

Christianity, Anne Rice, and why I'm not leaving the Church just yet....

2010-08-07T16:57:00.000-07:00

I wanna take some time out to talk about something very important to me. As many of you know, Anne Rice recently posted on her Facebook about how she was leaving Christianity. Over time this has been clarified to be leaving "organized religion" but not The Body of Christ. When I spoke with her, she likened it to a wilderness experience, or like Francis of Assisi going off to the ruined church he loved alone. I get the analogy in that, even if she didn't mean it. The most beautiful church is one falling apart, with vines and roofs open to the stars, where the clamor of humanity is not heard and reverent, contemplative silence rules the heart. In some ways, I think I really would rather go to a church like this.

I was born in the church, a child of a music minister, and when I was five years old I raised my hand to accept Jesus as my savior in sunday school. I rededicated my life at 7, and 13, and began to doubt my Christianity around 23. When I was 21 my father committed suicide. During the inbetween of 21 to 23, I went through what some call a Dark Night of the Soul, the kind of night I am asking if anyone has passed through in my blog title. I lost a lot of faith in God, I began to question Him, but I never really fully questioned, because I was always afraid of making Him angry. I still am sometimes. I don't have the gall to wrestle with God like Jacob did, to bargain with like Abraham, to disobey like Jonah, or to plain reject and then re-embrace like Israel. But these people, they were the pillars of faith in their time. God both punished and reconciled with His followers countless times. Forgiveness came after Judgement, but it always came.

When I faced this dark truth, that I was sitting on the edge of a cliff, staring at the reality that either I needed to find a reason to love God, or live a life of despair cause I could never stop believing in Him, childlike faith and all, I asked God to help me to love Him. And things changed after that. I won't go completely into all of it. I've come to believe I've been a Christian since the moment I gave my heart willingly in Sunday School, and despite everything that's happened I've never regretted that decision. I've seen the ups and downs in the Church, from hierarchy to hypocrites I've seen it all. I've BEEN it all. Oh, have I. I think if right now I were to leave the church and christianity for the same reasons Anne did, I'd have to leave myself as well, cause I am all the things Anne listed. Not always, but many times I am.

But where does this leave me? Too much is true about organized religion, and those in power who use it for ill. Faith is a great danger, and a great beauty. But I think it was Paul who said the words "Follow me as I follow Christ" Emphasis mine, and this is how I reconcile my decision to remain in the Church as well as paradoxically stand outside of it rebuking, encouraging, etc. when need be. The thing about religion, about faith, about a strong concerted effort to know God, and learn what He wants from me, then do it, was created by God. He wants us to communicate with Him, to learn what He wills, and then go do it. The Bible itself, which a beloved pastor of mine once said "it loves to put it's worst foot forward", tells us exactly that. I think one could easily say, well it was written by men, but if it is, then we have to wonder how much of what we believe is even true. And I like to believe that God had to have wanted to give us a guidebook somehow...

But what is The Church, because you can easily divide the two, that one The Kingdom of Heaven, the hearts of men who love Jesus, and the other, that building where we gather to fellowship. And I think a great christian myth is that the latter has to look a certain way to really be church. When I sit with my fellow Christian friend, and we talk about, pray, and praise God, that is Church. When me and God are alone, and talking, fellowshipping, that is Church.

The Greeks built temples with outward turned walls, meaning the adornments were mostly facing the outside, and you were 'outside' more or less when worshipping this or that God. It was not til the Romans that temples, and later churches were inside buildings and seperated so to speak from the rest of humanity. In a sense this becomes normal, and humans now pretty much all live this way anyways, but I can't help but love the beauty of an outward facing church. It really brings home what Church is to me, it's people. In truth Church is The Kingdom of Heaven, and while Paul exhorts us to not forsake the fellowship of the saints, he is not talking about "Go to First Baptist or you're not a Christian." He is talking about not forsaking fellow believers, and going off alone to a place where you can't selflessly love an 'other'. Sure, retreat is important, and even Christ retired to the mountains to pray, so do not think that we must be around people all the time, but there is a goodness, and a humanity in the act of embracing one another, allowing other people to exist in our universe too, and especially in the act of fellowship with fellow believers we can live out the will of God together and find encouragement, empowerment, etc. in that.

There are a few verses that stand out to me in the Bible. one is Micah 6:8

"He has showed you, O man, what is good.
       And what does the LORD require of you?
       To act justly and to love mercy
       and to walk humbly with your God."

One of these you can do alone, but the other two are very much so things that must be done in the world, around others. How can you love mercy if you do not give it, not only to yourself, but to others. How can you act justly when you do not enact justice? These things the LORD requires of us. I think even the third thing is hard to do alone, for humility is best lived out among others where you have to be humble and not compare or become prideful. In the end, I'm pretty much of the mind that the only way to live the way God wants is to embrace humanity in our living among it. But what does this have to do with other believers? I think it has a lot to do with Christ's words in John "By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." At this point in time he was speaking to believers, telling them that the best way to share Christ, or one of the best ways, was to love one another. It's not only this, but humans thrive in community. This is not only a religious belief. We need likeminded people, to encourage us, and to walk beside us.

So I guess that's why I haven't given up on church. Or Christianity.

John Ruskin once wrote about Gothic Cathedrals, and one of the most beautiful thoughts he had was about the idea that man, given the brush to paint, or the brick to build, will build something both ugly and beautiful. When God asked Peter to build his Church, when God asked Man to go and make disciples, I often wonder how He felt about more or less handing the reins over. Though I believe He is totally sovereign I also believe that God allows man to choose, and in so doing the Church itself became a thing of shattered majesty, to coin a Ruskin phrase. It's both a picture of man's brokenness and wonderful beautiful desire to know God anyways, and it's also a picture of Christ's image on us, that we are the Art of God, very good and not basically evil, though not completely basically good either. We can create beauty and terror all at the same time. The Church has been both, and will remain both. That is a good thing. And the most beautiful analogy of it all is Christ looking to the Church, that organized and disorganized religion/relationship Kingdom of Heaven trying hard to love one another and make disciples, as a Bride. That's how much He loves us. And it would behoove me to love His Bride the same. And to walk with Her, and be one with her, for I am myself The Bride. As is Anne Rice, as is all who profess Christ. The rest are the Wooed, and it is a lot of our part to do the Wooing.

I wanna say in the end that it's not perfect, but I think that we have a flawed understanding of perfect. God sees us as beautiful, wonderful, and worth love. I cannot hide from that. Even as I admit that God hates sin, is repulsed by our actions when we sin, and needed Christ to die for us in order to even welcome us with open arms in His Kingdom, and in a way that's a paradox...but it's truth. I think The Church, and Christianity is what it is...humans relating to God the best they know how, and often that will translate to 'dirty rags' as Paul called it. But there's beauty and magic too, and it's there for the seeing and the taking should you really look with wonder and not doubt. With hope, faith, and a little bit of Holy Ghost dust. hah...took that analogy a bit too far, but hopefully you get what I mean.

I hope Anne finds fellowship, even in her wilderness, and I pray God helps her to love Him, and love one another in her process. I know a lot of people have been touched by her words, and her calling out in rebuke the church's imperfections. I pray that the baby doesn't get thrown out too, and that in the end everyone will find a deeper faith in God and the kingdom of heaven for it all.

Generationals 2

2010-08-03T18:24:00.000-07:00

The morning dawned bright, a faded yellow orange that almost seemed like gold. He could see out his window and even the walls themselves should he push the right button. Outside if any car or being had passed they would have seen a simple apartment wall, nothing special. But inside he was awash in a field of golden light, all around him tiny particles of dust and hair like glowing satellites around his own gravitational pull. He wondered if he could lie in the bed forever, soaking in it, but the clarion call of his door buzzer pulled him from the glorious scene.
"Enter," He said after donning some shorts.
Chief Cohen walked in with a small smile on his face, and a look of puzzlement when he saw the way that Foraty had untinted his side of the walls.
"Beautiful, isn't it?"
"I suppose, we must be off to work," He spoke with barely a breath.
"That's right, street washer," Foraty said, which he decided to call himself for now, not by wish to identify with these people's enslavement, but because the utter foundationlessness of referring to himself with no proper pronoun made him feel even more at sea than having been lost in time.
They left soon, the morning now a dull gray and the walls reflecting new feelings that hadn't been there an hour ago. Outside, the scene was much like the night before, only without color, and dead seeming, like the city itself was a stinking carcass lying putrid in the desert of men's lost souls. All around him people walked, but few talked to each other, instead they seemed content to speak into a microphone headset, complete with earphones connected to the ears with what looked like surgical implants.
He hadn't noticed it til now, but even Chief Cohen had one. He was talking into it now, being directed to what was being called the "job point for 482"
It was a dark, off the beaten path street, an alleyway really, down near a few warehouses, all abandoned. Foraty would not have been surprised to see a vampire staring at him from the rafters of the tall buildings, the feeling of devastation was so keen. All around him were blasted cars, old ones, ones he recognized, and what looked like the aftermath of a nuclear cataclysm. Old ash covered the streets except where the pavement had cracked to reveal the soil underneath, there grew small clutches of grass, or flowers.
"We're redoing this area to be a new complex in a year or two, your job is basically to level it, and bring up the pavement. We have machines that do most of the grunt work, you just watch over them. They even fix themselves. The job is basically cake, you will rarely have to lift a finger."
Foraty wondered what the point of it was, but when he asked Cohen the man simply replied "Existential meaning."
Not only are we the harbingers of a completely dystopian society, Foraty thought, but we're all junior philosophers now too.
He sat down in a plastic lawn chair, surprisingly intact, and watched as the machines began their work. None were programmed to differentiate between beauty or ugliness, so pavement and flower alike received destruction and fire. Their core was a furnace, a place to burn anything they picked up, turning it into a kind of fuel. They were voracious eaters, killing almost all in Foraty's sight before lunch. They spared the lawn chair, but only cause he sat in it. He began to think of it as his only companion, and realized he would guard it with his life. Soon the time came when the machines reached the last warehouse on his block and just as they were about to raise weapons of destruction a white haired man stepped from the shadows of the warehouse, holding a machine in his hand that issues a high pitched whine, which Foraty would later come to know was a code in binary, causing the machines to cut off their work, and shut down.
Foraty was sure he looked a strange figure, sitting in the middle of a blasted landscape in nothing but a blue shirt and blue shorts, on a white lawn chair, and the whitehaired man did indeed seemed startled by him, but only for a second.
"482," He said, reciting the number on the front of Foraty's shirt.
"For now," was his reply, which the man seemed to like.
"I am Whitacre, once Sergeant Major Whitacre of the Medicine Men, but no more." He shook Foraty's hand.
"Did you have a name before?" He asked as if he expected a specific answer.
"I don't remember."
He nodded. "Yes, that is what I expected, it's a byproduct of the hibernation, your memories will return in time, but some of them, the least important ones, will never return, or at least won't be remembered, though they all stay locked in your mind somewhere."
"You're some kind of doctor," Foraty said it with little surprise.
"A brain doctor yes, but we're all doctors here, the ones in power at least. The hippocratic oath means little nowadays, only an old phrase of an older time. Though recently it has come to have meaning to myself again."
"What's in the warehouse?" Foraty asked, only now realizing that Whitacre was protecting it.
"Would you like to see? It's my greatest invention, I think it will save us all."
Foraty followed him inside the building.
Inside it was quiet, almost reverent, with little light. The wide space of the warehouse led to stairs, which themselves, red in the color of a rosy electric light, led to an underground city. Foraty was amazed by the amount of people there, mostly coma refugees like him, none he recognized. Whitacre took him to a laboratory, situated in a cave far back from the city itself. He pointed to a heap covered by tarpaulin and motioned for Foraty to remove it. What he saw was a machine, it had nodes that you could link to your brain, and wires that extended into dark reaches he didn't even want to explore. He asked what it was.
"A time machine, in layman's terms, a time replacement machine really, it's more or less a way to transport a body, via brain waves, to another place in time. The problem being time itself is relative, and once not experienced ceases to exist, so, when the collective consciousness has stopped observing, there is no space or time there anymore. It's really relative to there being something there with which to measure time by. That's where the machine comes in, by using memories, we replace the body into the point of memory, itself an observation of that time period, and you reexist into the past. It's all very technical and I'm sure I butcher the whole thing trying to speak in less advanced terms, but there's the gist of it."
Foraty stared in wonder, could it be that he could go home?
"I don't have any memories," he said, realizing that hope was lost.
"Ah, but that's the beauty, you see, in our time now the very thing we hate the most, that Nietzschean way of life, where the fittest are allowed to survive, those with the most existential meaning, they have created a device which allows the memories of our elderly to be passed via brain link to a younger one of the species, it makes for a lot less time wasted in trying to teach a rebellious teen maturity. They call the devices generationals. You were chosen because one of our coma survivors is the man who hit you."
This last revelation rocked Foraty, and he stepped back in almost pain as the memory resurfaced, and he realized that Whitacre had softened the blow with a non sequitur, sort of.
The other man, the one chosen because of how he'd hit Foraty entered. He was a very old man, and looked very tired. His face was covered in wrinkles on top of wrinkles, but he smiled a small smile and all of it glowed.
A strange coincidence it was, that two men who were complete strangers, should find themselves brought together by such a strange set of events, a car crash, being taken to the same hospital and ward, being operated on side by side, falling into coma's together, being put on the same cryogenic list, and finding themselves now 540 years later standing in an underground bunker with a 50 something old doctor and a time machine, you almost had to believe there was a God.
"My only memory is of that day," the old man said. "I saw your face through my window, you were on the phone, you seemed distressed, I wondered if you'd seen the light, it was as if time stopped, and minutes lasted for hours, I knew were were gonna hit...I just knew it."
There was a device in his hand, the generational, it was glowing.
"Here, attach this into your ear, there will be some pain," He handed a needle connected by wire to Foraty, who took it with some trepidation, pushing it into his ear and crying out at the pain. A white hot arrow, which covered his whole head, worse than a migraine for it's sharpness, like someone had taken an axe to cleave his head in half.
He felt a different sensation then, and his eyes began registering two different environments, like double vision, only different visions, in one he was still in the underground bunker, but in the other he was sitting behind the wheel of a white truck, staring at a car as it ran a red light. His car. Time indeed seemed to stop and he watched himself speaking into a phone, then there was more a world of metal and glass, and all was black.
The double vision ceased and he fell to the ground, his stomach heaving up inside him and he vomited onto the cave floor.
"Happens every time."
In the distance they heard shouts, and someone ran past them yelling "Raiiiidddd."
Then machines, and men, both in armor and carrying projectile weapons appeared, guns, and strange light focusing lasers, but mostly explosives brandished in their hands.
"This is a raid, please remain calm, you will be reacclimated into society with no punishment." The weapons said differently, and Foraty was turning around to run when Chief Cohen appeared in front of him, a metal rod held aloft in his hand, then falling, ending in a crunch and bright stars which reminded him of his glorious morning, and the glass that had flown around him in the double vision.
His last thought was "don't crash, don't crash..." before he knew no more.
To Be Concluded

Generationals

2010-07-29T20:54:00.000-07:00

A Short Story?

It was 3pm and he was late, the long line of traffic ahead of him proving that he would be even later. He grabbed his phone jabbing at the numbers with a vengeance, his eyes barely on the road. That's when his car sped through a red light and an oncoming car on his left collided in a crush of glass and metal. The words "I'm sorr" were all he was able to type before unconsciousness overtook him, and his text was never sent.
When he woke he was in a white room, a place filled with men and women in white labcoats, what a coworker once joked to him looked like proctologists. They were doctors, and all around him was machines he'd never seen before. One of the doctors looked over at him, a mask not unlike a bike helmet keeping her face a dim shadow through the visor.
"How do you feel?" She asked.
"Wher...Where am I?"
"You were in a coma, you never woke up and in time the doctors opted you into a new program that had just been developed where you would be frozen, so as not to decay, and woken when medicine was more apt to be able to fix you."
"What are you saying? This is the future?"
"The year 2550 to be exact."
"I...I don't understand."
"Your body was destroyed sir, there was very little they could do to fix you, bones all over broken, brain irreplaceably damaged. Modern medicine of the time was just not advanced enough."
"Amy...I was late for our date..."
"I am sorry sir, all family has long passed away."
His whole entire life was changed, different, all in the space of seconds, or millenia depending on how you looked at it.
Another doctor, this one wearing a gray coat entered then, and the white clad ones dispersed, nodding in deference to him.
"I am Chief Cohen, welcome to the year 2550, I am here to take you to your new home."
After getting up, washing, and dressing the man followed Chief Cohen through the white halls to the outside. It reminded him of most of the movies he'd seen of the future, tall skyscrapers that made the Empire State Building seem small, flying car ships, people walking through the polluted streets wearing plastic and transparent cloth. A woman approached him as he stepped through the sliding doors.
"Lookin for some company tonight sugar?" She was naked from the waist up.
"He's with me," Cohen said.
She backed away quickly, alarm on her face, and deference.
"So what are you, police? government?"
"We don't use those things anymore, we are an anarchy these days, with certain cabals controlling different sectors. My cabal controls this one, we call ourselves the Medicine Men."
"Like Witch Doctors?"
He laughed.."Nothing half so primitive, but yes, we hold power like the witch doctors once did. At least in this sector."
They walked for a time, and despite his distress the man found himself fascinated with this new world, he wanted to fly in one of the cars, and stand at the top of the highest building, scraping the atmosphere. So high they had to have special plating to protect from the change in pressure.
The Medicine Man took him to a wide, gray building, more or less indistinct from the buildings around it except for the strangely shaped insignia that looked a cross between the old Red Cross symbol and the hammer and sickle of the Soviet Union. They entered through a sliding door, and instantly it was as if all life had stopped. The sounds and smells of outside were gone. They stood only in a small room, where a desk sat and a pudgy but pretty woman tapped on some keys in front of a monitor.
"We have another Traveler, his coma was broken today, and his body renewed."
The woman smiled wearily and asked him to step forward. She stamped his hand with a number, then keyed in that number into the system. 482.
"Your name is now Foraty Two, and your designation is street washer, welcome to the future and enjoy your stay."
Chief Cohen was watching him, guaging his reaction.
"So that's how this works, you just give me a job and a number and that's all I am now?"
The woman did not answer.
"Come," Cohen said, and they passed the desk down another hallway, up a flight of steps to elevators.
Cohen pressed 4 on the elevator and they began rising.
"I don't get it, you woke me from my coma just so you could enslave me?"
"That's not it exactly, you see, we need to regulate population. The world is alot fuller now than it used to be. Street washing is a dangerous job, so we have Travelers do it, keeps em from swelling the ranks so much."
The man began to wonder just what he'd gotten into. Cohen pressed a button and the elevator stopped.
He stepped over, looming over the man like a bear. "Look, you can fight it, or you can embrace it, but I will tell you now, if you fight, you won't win."
The man nodded, deciding to be respectful for now, he would find an escape later. Somehow.
The elevator resumed and they arrived shortly to the fourth floor.
Down another dimly lit, but more decorated hallway to a small door that had the number 482 on it.
"This is your new home. You will report here every evening at 1600 sharp, after fulfilling your duties of the day, if you do not report in, you will be designated as a fugitive, and you don't want to know how we handle fugitives."
He left then, and the man opened the door, entering into a small apartment. It was sparsely furnished, a small couch, facing a wide screen tv like thing, a tiny kitchen, already stocked with food, another room with a bed, and a nightstand. A closet. A bathroom. Nothing else. Above him he could see video cameras, even in the bathroom. There was no privacy at all. He was pretty sure they picked up sound too. As for blind spots there were a few, and he utilized these quickly, changing into some pajamas, and then padding barefoot to the kitchen. There were mostly vegetables and fruits, with fish, and eggs. The beverages were juices, and there was yogurt for dessert.
"What kind of shit town is this?" He asked himself. He walked to the bathroom, standing in front of the mirror staring at himself. He couldn't remember his name, or where he'd come from. He could only remember Amy.
And stare as long as he could he couldn't picture his own name. He was simply Foraty now. Foraty Two.
"I'm sorry," He said to no one in particular. In the front room, with the couch he turned to what looked like a tv, touching a button on what resembled a remote. Turned out it was actually a window, and using controls on the remote he could tint or untint what he was seeing out of it.He untinted til it was a fairly clear night sky, flying ships passing his loft left and right, the night sky was brilliant, and he was mesmerized by it in a way he never had been by the fake world on the television. He chuckled, in ways this future was far better, but in ways it was terrible. Outside a brilliant cacaphony of different colored lights created a rainbow hue of electricity. This was the height of technology, and despite it's jagged hold on man, man had made some beauty of it. He smiled despite himself, then yawned, realizing he needed rest, and headed towards the bedroom, shutting off the lights so he could sleep in peace.

Cohen watched the monitors a few minutes more after the lights went out, pondering going to night vision, but deciding against it.
"He seems a bit strange," Banner said beside him.
"No stranger than the others, they're a different breed than the humans now. They had different beliefs back then, human independence and all that."
Banner grinned. "We have that now too, we've just translated it to survival of the fittest, and for now, the Medicine Men are the fittest."
"Let's keep it that way, the Ubermensch will be pleased."
Banner bowed, the left the room.
Cohen waited a few minutes more, then realized the man was taking a shower, he could hear it, though not see, since the lights were off, but what bothered him the most was that the man was singing.
"I'll have to break his spirit," He said to himself.

To Be Continued

My Friend The Spider

2010-07-18T19:46:00.000-07:00

I have a spider living on the roof in my bathroom, he likes to sit there and cause me to laugh. I always laugh cause I ask him what he is doing....hanging around? It gets me to laughing.

I wrote a poetic thought about him too, he walks on the ceiling, crossing invisible threads, as if suspended in midair like an astronaut, exploring the paint and crevices as if they were the stars.

I love my spider. I'll name him, or her, Simon. Simon the Spider. It has a nice ring to it. And if it's a girl, Simone.

The thing about nature, animals, swashes of starlight on the water, waves that feel both silken and cold to the hand, a single surprise lily growing in a field, the waves upon waves of green forest seen from a mountaintop, the sound of the ocean. It's all saying one thing..."Glory, Glory to God in the Highest." And sometimes if you really listen, you can almost hear the whisper of a shout.

And I almost believe in magic, because the world, God's world, His creation, is so completely magical. Angels stand at the corner of your eye, iridescent wings a golden sparkle of firefly in the dark..their lights blinking in and out as if crossing between planes from spiritual to physical, but it's all real. That's the beauty. It's all real. Angels and fireflies. God, and man. Maybe even fairies.

Don't go looking for all the beauty though, it's best found when you're not looking for it, when you're just sitting...enjoying....breathing, and praising God.

Titles

2010-07-14T21:50:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you have to ask yourself why did I name this blog the way I did. And of course sometimes people want to know why did someone else do this same thing. Well (that's a deep thought for a shallow mind my father would say) I would like to try, in a poetic sense possibly, to say why.

The phrase comes from the war movie, The Thin Red Line. You should know beforehand that while I can appreciate war movies, such as Saving Private Ryan, that I find few of them very intellectually stimulating. Apocalypse Now was just depressing, though beautiful, and I couldn't even finish Catch 22. But The Thin Red Line is a thinking man's war movie. It's about a Private Witt, and some other soldiers, and deals more with the inner ramifications of war than the outward effects. At the beginning of the movie Witt has deserted the army and is living among some tribal Melanesian people. The beginning shares his remarks about how peaceful these people are, so different from the wars and hate of his own. He finds in them some of that Romantic Savage that is a beautiful thought, while not always real. But what the director Terrence Malick has done is create a war movie that is not about war at all, but the men in war. And the line itself is uttered by Private Witt, in his mind, during a march through a beautiful jungle.

"This great evil. Where does it come from? How'd it steal into the world? What seed, what root did it grow from? Who's doin' this? Who's killin' us? Robbing us of life and light. Mockin' us with the sight of what we might've known. Does our ruin benefit the earth? Does it help the grass to grow, the sun to shine? Is this darkness in you, too? Have you passed through this night?"

The band Explosions in the sky takes this voiceover and encapsulates it in 7 minutes and 19 seconds of pure instrumental glory. And it was the song which I was listening to when I came up with the idea to use the line as the title to my blog. To me the line is about finding human connection. The reality is we're all passing through the night together, following unknown stars and dark shapes in the gloom that lead us to possibilities, and hope. Night is not the absence of light. A line from one of my poems. It's the reason this blog was made, to let you know I'm passing through the night too. Also to let you know I believe in a dawn.

I can answer Private Witt's questions with a resounding yes, because I believe it all has meaning. From the shot in the heart that killed my father, to the crumpled wreckage of what was once a car that killed my sister and mother. It all has a point. So, if you're passing through the night with me, take hope, my hand may be a darkly outlined shape with little light to see it, but when our hands touch whole universes come together, and the stars above illuminate a path that only God could have created.

I love walking at night. I love the sounds of cicada's and crickets. The way water looks with the stars rippling above it. The purity of the air, it's all so achingly beautiful that I cannot but have hope as I metaphysically walk through night in my psyche, the beauty is all there too. You just have to be looking for it.

And that's why I named my blog so.

Staying On Target

2010-07-10T13:45:00.000-07:00

The last couple weeks have been rough, from job hunting, to dealing with a large move away from my fiancee. It's also been tough in that I've felt my faith in God waiver as tends to be the usual during really tough times. And keeping that faith has at times felt like I'm running a really long obstacle course. Today I was watching G4's Ninja Warrior, and thought about how sometimes that feels like how life is. You're not running a normal course where it's just get from point A to B. You also have to hang on a log, climb ascending slopes, jump off a trampoline and spread your legs so you can shimmy between walls. Seriously, it's like above and beyond got replaced by impossible and impossibler. But, they do it. One guy I was watching reached the ascending slope and was beginning to pull himself up the hand grips when he went to the left, getting stuck in a corner where there were no handholds close above him. Some of the fellow competitors tried to scream to him to go back to the right, but he kept on trying to go up from the left. In the end he failed.

In life, God puts people in your path, people to give advice, and people to help you along when you're tired. You don't have to go it alone, or try to finish the race without any help. God has put the most important helper, the holy spirit, inside you to guide and to strengthen, but how many times do we really ask for it? Or do we just ignore and try to climb on our own.

Another sort of famous picture of this is from the movie Star Wars: A New Hope, when the Y Wings are descending on the Death Star. Read the following quotes

Gold Five: [realizes why] Stabilize your rear deflectors... Watch for enemy fighters.
Gold Leader: They're coming in! Three marks at 2-10!
[Gold Two is slain by Darth Vader and his wingmen; Gold Leader starts to panic]
Gold Leader: It's no good, I can't maneuver!
Gold Five: Stay on target.
Gold Leader: *We're too close!*
Gold Five: Stay on target!
Gold Leader: [shouts] Loosen up!
[he too is picked off by Vader and Company; Gold Five tries to escape but is fatally winged]

You notice that Gold Five is trying to help Gold Leader, giving him advice to, in this case, stay on target. Gold Leader instead ops to ignore and listen to his own worries and fears, finally ordering everyone to loosen up and flee. And this is how we often treat life, not listening to God's voice, and only to our own fears and worries. This is what I did. And I've failed at some things I had no reason to fail at. So perhaps my best advice is the same as Gold Five's. Stay on target. Keep the vision and the goal God has given you, and fight for it with all your heart. When you're low, call on the Lord to give you strength, and let your friends be there for you. And if you feel like giving up, just hear Gold Five's voice in your head screaming "stay on target, stay on target!"

2010-07-03T19:30:00.000-07:00

You know, many part 1's never become part 2's, many chapter 1's never cross over into chapter 2's. I'm very proud of myself for finishing one story though...one that wasn't just a short story. There's parts of it I don't like, but for the most part it is my lovechild, and thankfully I'll have the chance to return to it eventually and polish it. Unless that becomes a never-happening project too. The name of the story is Only The Lonely. Some have read it, many loved it. It's still a work in progress despite the first draft being complete. Plus it's not long enough to even be a novella I don't think. It's sorta like a tiny picture, a replica of a larger one, representing potential, but not success. And sometimes I wonder if I am really a writer.

But what of the world of Only The Lonely, where the heroes are the villains and the villains are the heroes, or is anyone really a hero? Perhaps Sasha, but strangely she is just a victim who says "I forgive you." and that makes her the only hero in the story. How do you capture though those moments before the climax, the long months on the road, where zombies who are not zombies at all roam, and man's depravity is set free not by any uncontrollable virus but by choices and lies. How do you write about a serial killer with a heart, a man completely and utterly twisted, psychotic, depraved, and perverse, who somehow still finds it in the core of him to sort of care about this girl who is his daughter. A place where being sinful and accepting it is somehow actually a virtue than to be sinful and try to hide it, or think it's not your choice. In acceptance is control. At least in this world. Picksel knows he is scum, and somehow that makes him stronger than every human being he comes across lying about who they really are.

And then there is New Jerusalem, a city created by a man who had no good intentions, on the foundation of a man who had only good intentions. A people given to judgment, yet not realizing they carry the same "virus" as those they hate. No one's a good guy in this world, not even the Christians. In fact, they're more evil...because they carry the cure, and yet hide it under a bushel.

There is a garden, and an Eve, a woman who knows the truth, and who is perhaps the first one to know it, but chooses to allow the evil anyways. A man who is the architect of the lie, the real Devil of the story, and yet he is driven by darker forces, those of pride, equality, symbiosis, the greatest lies of all, that we are the masters of our fate, the captains of our soul.

And then something changes, a Deus Ex Machina, a God in the Machine, a green light explodes, everything changes, the world itself changes..man changes, and James Picksel, the darkest antihero to ever be becomes a man lost in a new world, a world changed by the Emerald Wake. And he himself is changed. His old demons still live, but now...now somehow he wants to fight them, now not only does knowing the Great Lie change the face of man's choice, but knowing Grace changes the desire in this man to be evil.

And that makes a second part. And suddenly I realize the story is not finished at all. Emerald Wake is not a sequel, it is the same story, told over again, in a new light. And so pen to paper, or at least heart to pen, and with a hundred other unfinished stories still crying for completion. But since Only The Lonely was written -for- The Circle, and for my online friends, so too will Emerald Wake be. Here, in the halls of my dreams, you will see what the world really is to me. Because Only The Lonely is not the true story, it's just a lie. Emerald Wake is the truth, and though perhaps even more flawed, is a far better world nonetheless. So stay tuned, and thanks for reading.

Lost The Series - A Retrospective

2010-05-31T18:04:00.000-07:00

I would like to take a few blogs, maybe many and really delve deep into the philosophical and metaphysical aspects of the tv show Lost. Join me if you would like.

My initial thoughts following the finale were quite all-over-the-place. I remember the first few words being "that was so beautiful", and then a bit of confusion, and an overall awe at the twist that I really never saw coming. But over the last couple weeks, the real understanding has begun to seep in. And so here are the thoughts and ideas as brought to fruition in my brain. First off, the real clincher to understanding Lost is that it is a story about humanity, not about The Island. I will explain this in detail throughout the next few blogs, but I definitely am going to focus also on each character, their arcs, and the lessons within. I believe Lost is truly a story with a moral, and a growth arc for each character. Though perhaps these arcs are not necessarily intertwined completely, they are almost little mini stories in themselves. Today we will start with The Island itself though, and a little defense I have for one of my major hypotheses.

The Island is a Human - not literally, but quite metaphorically.

1. The most major clue towards this is that the island has a heart. The heart has "life, death, rebirth, it is the source, the heart of the island." as Jacob's surrogate mother says. While this is not necessarily probably the whole truth of the island or the light itself (it is later revealed to be a electromagnetic pocket of incredible energy.) it is existentially the truth, for much of what happens in our story, the story of the castaways, and The others, jacob, possibly even his mother's story, begins at this place, this heart of the island.

2. Philosophers speak of the heart being the seat of the emotions. While this is true to an extent, what they are really referring to is the mind, the processes, both chemical and metaphysical by which we decide we are sad, happy, by which we know we are alive. The heart of the island itself becomes the place by which the very life of the island is determined. And the actions taken within and for it effect it's impact on those same lives. Without Mother Jacob and MIB would have never known of the Heart, or it's power, and perhaps even the intruders, those who would later be Others, would just have noticed the magnetic properties of the island, but never really come to understand it. Still it is a perfect picture of how something mysterious, even another human, can really effect the environment around you.

In this heart was life and death, and though we can't really say the heart of the island itself was actually these things, what one believed about it created these things. The Smoke Monster was created by Jacob's actions. Jacob named himself Guardian of the Light and the Heart of the Island because his "mother" had done the same before him, and because of the electromagnetic powers, they actually had some ability to guard what they truly believed was the heart of humanity itself. This is so much like how actions we take towards each other effect the stories we create as we live. Cruelty towards each other creates Smoke Monsters in a metaphorical way. I'll talk more about the Smoke Monster in it's entirety later, but just think about what was happening with Jacob and his brother (named Samuel in the scripts) when Jacob threw him into the heart, hatred, revenge, grief, these created out of the heart...a Smoke Monster. A being who was often cruel in it's judgements, and broken in it's wounded desire to be free.

John Locke's name not only provides an excellent commentary on his story, but on the island itself. The island was covered with the vestiges of the civilizations that had lived on it. From the ancient Egyptians, including some Hindu statues, to the Dharma stations and town. The Losties even left their mark with the beach camp, the wreckage of Oceanic 815, and later Ajira 316. All of these were the pieces of the lives that touched and were touched by the island. The island itself perhaps a literal "blank slate" or tabula rasa as spoken of in the philosophy of John Locke the namesake of our beloved castaway. The philosophy itself purports that when we are born we are a literal metaphysical blank slate, what we become is borne out of our choices, and the effect of those around us, both human and non human. Truly if you really think about it, the island itself was whatever each person believed it was. It was the fate on which all humanity stood, it was a place of strange phenomena in need of exploration and to some exploitation, it was God himself, it was home, it was a prison. It was all these things, and probably many other things. But all these realities about the island were brought upon it by those effected by it, not by it itself. Would the world really have died if the light went out? Who knows. There's no real indication that anything would have come to chaos. But, in the arc of Jack, or Locke, or Kate, or the others, this belief is what changed them, and in that way it was belief that was the real power of the show, both literal, and metaphorical. I'll talk more about this later as well.

So what was the Island to you? There's your answer to all your burning questions. We come into this life not fully done yet with our identity, and alot of times who we become hinges upon others just as much as ourselves. I'll say that I believe the island was simply a piece of land with a pocket of electromagnetic energy that allowed for some incredible things to happen, not only through time and space, but also through the power of the mind itself. Other than that, it wasn't much more. But what it became to those effected by it was so much more. To them. To their stories. And especially to the stories of our favorite Losties who got so caught up in the lives of many of the groups who believed different things about the islands. Got Lost in these stories you might say.

Well, I'll come back later and expound if needed on any of my points, but for now this is Part 1. Hope you enjoyed it.

2010-05-28T19:49:00.001-07:00

First blog about Lost The Series coming tomorrow.

Ponderings on Reality

2010-04-30T23:23:00.000-07:00

I joined an MMORPG. A very immersive one even, thankfully it's free. Called Eternal Lands. It's very much WoW lite, and a fun fun game to play. You can go on quests, fight dragons, look like a warrior, harvest flowers, whatever you want.

I've never been the fullest fan of video games cause you pretty much play alone. I always liked multiplayer games, where you interact, and get to know people. A mmorpg does just that, and it does it on a level that is so freakishly real. You really feel like your sitting by your friend talking about music, or the "weather". I even joined a guild which makes the game all the more fun. You laugh and joke in a special guild chat, and all the while you can do your own thing, or hang out with your friends.

It sometimes makes me wonder, what is reality anyways? I once asked my friends, what is most real to you, and then I went on to say that God is most real, and that in a way we are simply ideas of God. That if God were to think "don't exist" we wouldn't. And neither would time, it would be as if we never had. And in a way we delve into the ideas of that kind of real being when playing these types of games. The character we play is simply pixels and geometric shapes, lines formed by computer programming, all of it not a real actual touchable feelable thing, but once a personality is put behind it, it blossoms into something deeper. And that's us, it's the soul of us, the Imago Dei that makes us more than simply skin, chemical processes and biology. We exhibit self awareness, and need. We long for love, and signifigance, heart change and to love others. We get wounded, not only physically but emotionally. All of this lines up to a real living being.

And sometimes I almost believe that the mmorpg characters are just as real. sure the skin and the processes are different, but the same soul, same personality, self awareness, etc is behind the computer drawn lines. it exhibits free will, and chooses where to go, because it has a mind behind it. The world itself may not be touchable by the outside computer self, but it's interactable with. And in a way isn't that like how the spiritual realm is. Isn't God in a way the ultimate MMORPG programmer?

Think about it.

There's implications, dangers of course, but I would hope we're all mature enough to know them. In the end I'm just talking about the idea of reality here, not much else.

Never Give Up, Never Surrender

2010-04-06T14:11:00.000-07:00

I remember watching my dad during some of those last days. He dealt with weight like a lot of men, and yet was always on the go. He worked late, practiced music at church, and went on little hiking trips and biking trips into the Shenandoah to get away from it all. He had a pretty full life. And one of the things he hated about himself was weight. He tried Slim-Fast, eating less carbs, exercise, etc. but never seemed to lose those few excess pounds.

I'm not sure why he fought so hard, he was a handsome man, and not overweight, but what I learned from my father is that while goals in life may be arbitrary at times, they're not a bad thing. And while it is true that in the struggle with bipolar disorder and suicidal thoughts, my dad lost the war (or won depending on your view, I like to think he won), he never lost that battle with weight. He never gave up, and never surrendered. I always admired that about him. He was not a lazy man at all. He pushed, and pushed til he could push no more, and then he pushed some more.

I never really took that lesson home, til years later, waking up and realizing that life itself is hard, and it takes work. Sitting in the wake of all the emotional/psychological baggage it's hard to think about the little things, or even the big things I loved about my dad. But that was certainly one of them, and one I hope to learn to emulate. When the going gets tough, keep on going. Don't let fear of failure stop you, don't let mistakes stop you, don't even let huge mistakes stop you.

If it comes to it, use the concept of damage control. It doesn't mean you lost, it means you're picking up the pieces, rebuilding and pruning what you won't need anymore. But you're not giving up. And that to me is so much better than just giving up entirely.

Sometimes we give up cause we want to return to the last place we felt safe. Failure after failure has left us broken. But you really only fail when you give up. As a favorite tv show character once said about human progress, "It only ends once, anything else is just progress."

So as I sit here picturing my dad in his daisy duke shorts and hairy legs getting on his bike and smiling as he thinks about the hills and mountains he is about to ride up, or walk his bike up, and long fun slopes down, the beautiful scenery along the way, I can think of no other better picture for life itself. Attitude is everything, and the smile says it all. It's harder to give up when you go in smiling.

So don't give up. Never give up, never surrender.

Are You A Geek, Nerd, Dork, or Dweeb for Jesus?

2010-03-30T16:55:00.000-07:00

The Venn Diagram Which Explains It All:

Geek -
            According to the diagram, a geek is one that is both intelligent, and obsessed. Now before we go on I must discuss obsession a bit, and I can think of no better way to describe it than through Matthew 6:21, along with 33. Obsession is having priorities, but also being passionate about them. A Geek is one that seeks knowledge of the Father with obsession without the expense of social aptitude. Social aptitude is very important because God asks, nay commands, that we love our neighbor as ourselves. How can we love well that which we do not interact well with.

A Geek in the Christian context, seeks after The Kingdom of God, trusting in him with all their heart, and placing Him as their obsession and desire. This is why I think of them all, being a Geek is the best.

Nerd -
           A nerd on the other hand has the passion of the Geek, and the thirst for knowledge, but he also is bogged down with social ineptitude, he doesn't know how to love others, and perhaps deals with insecurities and fears that keep him from truly being in Christ. Unfortunately I think alot of us fit in the Nerd catagory. Including myself. It is perhaps the hardest thing in the Christian walk to accept our place in Christ. But how can we love others as we love ourselves, if we do not love ourselves with the love God has for us? We simply can't, for the same judgemental finger we point at ourselves, we will often point at others, what we hate about ourselves we will hate about others. Cynicism itself becomes because we lost hope in ourselves, and in God using us for Good, and in us being happy, and this later translated to just hating everything. In essence we begin to lose our Strength, becoming weak nerds. The best way to deal with this is to inundate ourselves with encouraging scriptures, continuing prayer to God and learning how He sees us, learning to offer our weaknesses grace, forgiving, and asking for God's strength, and translating this to how we treat others as well.

Dork -
   A Dork is probably the worst of them all, for he seems to fit perfectly the biblical understanding of a Fool. A Dweeb does too, but we'll get to that. A Dork has passion, but it is directionless, and he is completely socially inept. It reminds me of that guy who thinks he knows what he's talking about, is passionate about it, and completely and utterly rude and disdainful in how he argues his point. This person is not teachable, and not seeking to learn anything more, for he simply has a passion to teach what he thinks he knows already. He does not seek to understand people, or how to deal with them, he only seeks to change minds, and talk louder than everyone else. A dork probably spends most of his free time on internet message boards, debating philosophy and religion, getting moderated often because of his behavior, and blissfully ignorant to how much of a butt he is. These are the kinda guys that you groan when you find out they are in your small group, and you pray that God changes them.

But really, how do we deal with a dork, the response is often to intensely dislike them, or to push them away. But this doesn't work, they could care less about your feelings for them. No, I think Jesus' command for us to pray for our enemies fits well. Pray for them, not in a disparaging way, but truly hoping for the best. And be careful, sometimes a person that seems like a dork, is not really one at all, and the truth is that they do know what they are talking about, and you really do need to be listening. Alot of prophets probably came off like dorks. So be careful. Don't be biased.

Dweeb -
             A dweeb also fits the proverbial fool, but are perhaps a little more forgiveable. They're your consummate scholar. The theologian who sits in his back office 99% of the day learning more and more about theology, philosophy, and other things, gathering up a wealth of knowledge, but have no idea how to apply it to daily life. They know what's right, but they do not live it. A Dweeb might appear nourished in the mind, but their body is malnourished, and weak, for they do not seek after the life which God offers. A dweeb can easily be what was once a nerd, or a dork, and because of things happening, life's sufferings, they lost their passion, but not their knowledge. Because of this, the best way to help a dweeb is to reignite their fire. As soon as they are a nerd again or for the first time, disciple them in how to love, and in no time they will surpass you in geekdom for all that knowledge in their head is finally free to soar in life.

So ask yourself, are you a geek, nerd, dork, or dweeb. Be honest. And then do whatever you need to do to work on it.

That's all for now. Comments are definitely appreciated.

I Wish...I Hope...I Pray

2010-03-24T23:04:00.000-07:00

I wish it was still the 90's

I wish Moses Lake was in Arkansas

I wish I'd been able to finish my senior year

I wish I knew what God's plan for me was, so that I could start doing it (career-wise)

I wish I lived with my Grandma still (irony)

I wish I didn't want to sleep all the time now...

I wish I was back in the south (2 kinda fits that)

I wish Dad was still alive

I wish some things had gone differently, though ended at the same destination

I wish I was stronger, more in shape, and able to enjoy physical labor more

I wish I could go back and make better choices, more informed ones

I wish I trusted God more

I hope everything turns out alright

I hope I prove myself, no matter how I prove myself

I hope I make a good husband/father

I hope I someday get a job/career I can come home happy in, and not be all snappy just cause I'm sleepy and tired and don't want to talk, or do anything (sorry)

I hope I don't fall asleep at my wedding

I hope I don't fail, but I also hope I don't think there's only one way to succeed

I hope I don't have hypotonia

I wish, and I hope, that God intervenes, somehow, some way, cause right now...I am really struggling, and I don't know which way is up, down, the right way, the wrong way, or the highway. I have every voice in my head but the one I want to hear, and I am seriously just kneeling here God...help me...show me Your Will, not my own, not hers, not theirs, Yours, and forgive me for not asking sooner...tell me what You need from me in order to hear You, fasting, repenting, sacrifice, you name it, I'll do it...Amen

Observation

2010-03-22T01:27:00.000-07:00

In physics there is this concept called the observer effect. Now as well as I can understand it, the act of observing something actually changes the outcome of that thing, as well as that if something is not observed it exists in all possible states before one observes into focus one possible state. The other states continue to exist in the now, temporal static, but only as possibilities, and will come into focus as the observation continues.

This phenomenon is best recorded in what is called Schrodinger's Cat. The thought experiment which states that there is a cat in a box, and no one in the world has seen it yet, so the cat is at the time both alive and dead. There are all possible states for it, since it has not been observed in any state.

Kinda reminds me of the old adage, if a tree falls and no one's there to hear it, does it make a sound?

Quantum Mechanics, and physics, fascinate me. Time Travel, etc. and often I think some of the huger questions it has, have such beautiful answers in God.

Most Bible versions record that in the beginning God floated over the dark and the deep, and in the original Greek, this deep and dark is meaning Chaos, Disorder, sorta sounds like that "all possible states" of Quantum Mechanics. And God spoke, said "let there be light" suddenly it's like a spotlight is zeroed in on the chaos, and some thing begins to form, a reality, an absolute reality in the midst of all the possible reality. You, me, ancient man, Adam and Eve, it's as if God looked through all possible realities and timelines and picked this one as the best one.

But let's get more personal.

I think in a sense the observer effect is saying something doesn't fully exist until it is seen. And the ramifications of that on humanity, on me personally, is the reality that God has seen me, known me, and caused me to exist by that observation. But is it simply observation? No, I think it lies deeper still, he observes, and finds very good, and even Creates, which is far deeper, far more wonderful, and in the Creation loves.

It's easy in the midst of daily life to forget how much we matter to God. But sometimes it takes things like a cat that is both dead and alive to remind us that God is seeing us, God is knowing us, and we are, we are important, loved, and known intimately because of God. How many nights do you lie awake afraid you don't exist? Well you do, because God created you, you wouldn't be here if He had not. And think of it, do you take the time to create things not totally in your belief worth being? Of course not.

Valuing worth by so many standards is a hard thing, sometimes it seems as if existence itself should -be- the only standard. You were created, it was created, etc. therefore it must have some value to God to allow into being. Sometimes the search for meaning, for purpose, it relies too heavily on felt needs, or social morals. On the reality of sin, and man's struggle with it, his level of depravity or goodness, etc. It even relies on faulty human love, which at it's best fails to provide the full on completeness of intimacy and acceptance that humanity was born in need of. On what we can and cannot do, how we effect or don't effect the whole, how we love or how we don't love, beauty and ugliness, intellect or lack thereof, etc. It all comes back to the simple reality...

I was sitting Pre Employment Training Class listening to this guy talk about communication and he said one of the best things we can do is treat everyone as if they are wearing this sign "Treat me like I am the most important person in the universe." and as silly, and even selfish as it sounds, it's very indicative of that hole we all carry, that constant need to be, to be real, to mean something, and not just something, but something good, to be important, to be loved.

Even the greatest cynic must admit in the end he does not wish to be ignored by all, to cease to exist, to not be loved. Sure he may struggle with even wanting to love back, but at the heart of him is this deep insatiable need to be loved.

But there's always that annoying little reality we think of, that we don't deserve it. We condemn ourselves with the wages of sin, and the none righteous no not one, with the judgements, and the reality that we are sinners on our way to hell but for the grace of God, and in true, we are in need of Grace...

But we were never at a loss for love. For God loved us even when we were yet sinners. Our worth and value, meaning, purpose, hope, perhaps even the Breath of Life itself, always existed NO MATTER what we did, do now, or will do, because it has no basis in anything at all but that God found us worthy to allow to exist, and to create us into that existence.

It's almost like we have to take a step back and observe ourselves, step into God's eye view for a moment, and remember, remember He made that being, and at the beginning when all was Chaos and Possibility and God shed light on the Reality he found of the most worth it was not just the Beginning the but all in between and End that existed in that moment, including you and me and everything that comes with us existing, our whole timeline, God called it all, you, and me, and it all, Very Good.

There's no question about God's love for us. Or our worth. Even the worst of us, there's no question about his worth. He's here and existing isn't he?

Take time to soak in that for a bit. Worth is in the eye of the beholder, and God has beheld us all and found us worthy. lovely, very good, and that's an incredibly freeing way to live.

How Much I Love You

2010-02-27T10:25:00.001-08:00

For Naomi -

The day starts out like that Ives song, The Unanswered Question, a question unanswered because he doesn't want to answer it.

Where are you going?

Away

He does not say away from you, but he of course thinks it

horn blow, violin answer, nothing makes sense in the vernacular of their otherworldly conversation, broken sentences running on and on into other broken sentences that had no relation to the sentence before, but make sense if you really think about it.

He doesn't want to think about it. He only wants to go get drunk.

He drives away, a splash of red light covering his windshield for a second as he runs a red light, or was it blood? He hopes he didn't hit anyone. No, no blood, just light, just a light screaming stop.

Can you hear me now, she calls him on the phone, he doesn't answer. He can't hear her now. Or any time really, lately. He reaches the bar, it's blinking neon sigh beckoning to lost souls and found alike that there is nothing better than drowning sorrows or joys in a mug of fine golden colored beer.

It's all the same anyways, he heard that once, in a movie, that sorrow is just worn out old joy. It is. Isn't it? He remembers the first day of their marriage and the way she looked so beautiful in her flowing white dress. How she grumbled about the train, cussed like a sailor at the DJ who forgot to play the right song during their dance. He loved when she cussed like a sailor. Everyone had loved her that day. Even his parents, who were strict Fundamentalist Baptists had found alot to love about her. She was just genuine, so real, so honest about her opinions.

Funny that what he loved then he hated now.

Your gettin fat babe, you need to work out. Hey, Mary's husband has such a nice haircut, why can't you get your hair cut like that. Damnit, James, I'm so sick and tired of your shit. So sick and tired. Sick and tired.

Tired. That was his word, not hers. He owned it. He'd bought it with blood, and sweat, even tears though he'd never admit it. He had worked 60 hours a week day in and out, going from line man, to operator, to supervisor, to manager. Now he sat in an office, that's where he'd gotten fat. He drank another swig, the golden juice burning to his soul, burning away all the words of that self righteous bitch back home.

His parents would have yelled at him for cussing so much, even if it was in his mind, even if it was her voice at times. Cussing wasn't the only way to express his anger, but at least it didn't draw blood, or cause pain.

He took another drink, and another. The night was becoming fuzzy. Why had he come here again?

"Hey bud, I'm gonna have to stop your tab, you're drinkin too much and I ain't gonna have a car wreck on my conscience."

He could have told the man to shut up, but then he'd be shut out, kicked out, and nowhere to go. He could go to Harry's, but it was Harry who'd started all this. That one remark on the golf field and suddenly James was a cyclone of anger leashed for way too many years. Suddenly everything made sense. Why he hated his job, his wife, himself. Why he hated God, and everything else. It was all her fault.

You don't really believe that.

Hello voice, he said aloud. Or he thought he did. He wasn't sure anymore when he spoke aloud and just in his mind.

"You know, it's like that classical song by Charles Ives, the Unanswered Question...those horns and violins playing back and forth at each other but never able to understand, still the stupid damn horn keeps on asking and the violins can't answer, but it just keeps on asking."

They liked to think they were cultured. Somewhere along the way, him and Harry had decided that the only way to make yourself better than the people you worked with was to become more cultured. So they'd listen to classical music, and read classic novels.

"And the horns, they just keep getting louder and louder, more insistent, angrier."

There is no answer to the unanswered question, babe, I don't know where I'm going, I haven't for such a long time. All I know is I'm going nowhere, fast.

Why can't you tell her that? The voice asks.

It makes me weak.

So you'd rather appear strong than communicate with your wife?

She wouldn't listen anyways.

You don't know that.

I'm scared.

"I know." He said aloud. The bartender looked over at him and raised an eyebrow.

"Almost closing time, better get on home."

It was a ongoing inside joke but the bar would begin playing that old Semisonic song as it was closing up, and the words "I know who I want to take me home..." played like a strange siren sound in James' ears.

You do know, don't you? The voice said.

He got up, wobbled his way to the door, he felt like crap. He stumbled on his way out and fell flat on his face. Suddenly without preamble he began to cry, and the streetlight above him reflected on the puddle his eyes were now staring at. Blur.

A cop car drove by, but didn't stop. Still, he knew the cop was watching him. He wasn't about to drive home.

Who ya gonna call?

Well I certainly can't call any Ghostbusters, they couldn't save the dead man I've become anyways, I am a ghost, they'd only bust me.

Or maybe you're just a myth, a legend, a forgotten folk tale told long ago and never heard again.

This was a voice he recognized more, it was her voice, but his words. He knew that, he knew that he beat himself up with her voice. It made it easier to blame her, and not the one who should be blamed.

I'm sorry...

Tell her then, tell her before it's too late.

It was six miles to his house, and he was very out of shape. He began to walk and the night was very cold, and it was pouring rain all the sudden.

Shoulda worn a coat, her voice said.

"Sorry," he said, dejected.

I let myself get away from me, from you, from everything. I let taking care of you become more important than loving you. I let the days get old and the nights get long, and my heart get tired and my eyes get droopy, and my stomach get fat. I left you years ago, before you started leaving me, I loved you once, I think I could love you again, I know I could.

Save all that, the voice said, could write a romantic movie with that...save it, she'll wanna hear it.

He kept repeating it to himself, and long after his legs ached like a fire was slowly creeping up them he continued reciting to himself those lines. He said them through tears, and through blisters popping and bleeding into his shoes. He was saying them as he half crawled up the two steps onto his porch and walked through the door.

He could hear Anne Murray singing in the living room.

His wife looked up at him, her face and eyes neutral.

"I started cleaning," she said. "Found this old record player and some of your parent's old records in the attic. I always liked Anne Murray."

She started into a new song

-The other night dear as I lay sleeping I dreamed I held you in my arms-

"I'm sorry..." He said. He started to say the lines, but realized he'd just forgotten them.

-When I awoke dear, I was mistaken, so I hung my head and cried-

And he did cry, and as he stood there, water soaking the floor she walked across to him, looking up into his eyes

-my only sunshine-

"I'm sorry too." She said. And they hugged.

-when skies are grey-

"I love you." They both said at once

-how much I love you-

The record started skipping, and for a second she turned around to go fix it. He stopped her.

"No, it's perfect." He said, and he didn't want to hear the next part, he was too scared of losing her.

"I'm scared of losing you."

She laughed and he smiled a little sheepishly.

-how much I love you...how much I love you....how much I love you-

"Just don't change the record," He looked into her eyes. "It's perfect."

She nodded not completely understanding, and though he knew sometimes it was like violins and horns going at each other trying to answer unanswered questions, he realized she was still the only one he wanted to take him home, or go home to.

"It's perfect," he said again, and this time he wasn't referring to the record.

-how much I love you....how much I love you....how much I love you-

Jesus and The Crazy Things He Does Part 1

2010-02-18T11:38:00.000-08:00

Opened to Matthew today for my reading. I kinda like reading about Jesus, so whenever I restart a daily bible time, I tend to gravitate to The Gospels. So for today I read Matthew 8. yeah I know I'm missing 7 chapters, don't worry they'll get read. I'm a boy. We like doing things complicatedly.

Verses 1 -4 Jesus heals a man with leprosy. I like that the man says "Lord, if you are willing." It reminded me of all those times I am praying and say "God, if it's your will." And Jesus says "I am willing."

Anyways, I read on and get to the crazy stuff. Every now and then Jesus will do or say something where you're just like...wha?

A teacher of the law approaches him and says "Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go" Jesus mentions how foxes have holes, and birds have nests but Jesus has no where to rest his head. Okay, that's cool, makes sense, if you want to follow me, you will have to endure hardship. Another disciple approaches him and says "Lord, first let me go and bury my father."

But Jesus replies "Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead."

Wait, what?

Does Jesus really want a giant pile of dead bodies rising to the sky stinking up the earth so that he can be followed? Sometimes I love how the Bible doesn't back down from incredulous statements. And it's a wonder why some first time readers will open the Bible to check out this Christianity thing and think...heck no. But really, what did Jesus mean here?

Well, thankfully my Bible has a little section where there are sort of notations on different verses. The one dealing with this verse says that what was wrong with the disciple burying his father is that likely his father wasn't dead yet. That what he meant is that he wanted to honor the tradition of taking care of his father, til years later, he died, then he would follow Jesus.

And Jesus basically told him "Let the elderly bury themselves when one of their own has died, you must follow me."

For a God who spoke so highly of taking care of the poor and widows, and the old, it does seem a strange statement. But it is a different time, and I think it's one of those historical context things. To follow Christ, truly follow him, at that time, meant leaving everything. Now we can follow him in everything we do, since he is Everywhere/Everywhen. So we can't blame Jesus for what he said, but we can blame ourselves if we don't understand the real meaning of what it takes to follow Jesus. It's about priorities. There might come a time when you have to let go of taking care of your dying grandmother, handing her over to someone else, in order to follow the will of God. You gotta be ready for that, and willing. It doesn't mean God doesn't care about her, it just means that he has other plans for how to care for her. So trust God, and follow Him. Don't be like the disciple who didn't have his priorities straight.

Chapter 1.1 (Prologue) of Only The Lonely

2009-08-20T16:15:00.000-07:00

He sat down on the park bench watching the leaves flow away in little dancing patterns. Awake and alone, he thought of the life he'd lived. As a child he'd hated everyone, from his parents to the girl across the street he never talked to. He hated the man who beckoned him to his car one day with candy, and he hated the men who'd used his body from that day on. Passed from sweaty body to sweaty body like a bottle of beer. Drunk clean.

They all talked like mafia men, perhaps that's where he'd picked up his accent, and his nickname. Joey Ramone. These days he killed for a living, and just to feel alive. He watched the empty street closely, wary for any sign of movement. Just the other day he'd followed his boss's orders to kill a broad on High Street, one of the first class hookers. She'd screamed like the little girl across the street as he slit her throat. Dead within seconds, her blood all over his hands. He'd stared at those hands for hours afterward, getting some perverse pleasure in them. Death was his only escape from life. And since he'd never quite been brave enough not to live, he could only touch it by killing others. And so he'd become a contract killer. One of the best, except for Picksel. Picksel was a man who could kill anyone. Picksel was a man everyone feared, even the men who hired him. He didn't want to think about him.

Several feet from him a pigeon bobbed up and down, waddling left and right, wondering if the strange man would throw some bread perhaps, or just thinking pigeonly thoughts. There was nothing Joey wanted more than to shoot it, to watch it explode in a burst of red and feathers, but he didn't, fearful that something would hear the gunshot.

There's nothing left for me, he thought to himself. I got da broad, and I got da green, I could just leave, go out into the countryside, steal a dead man's house, be alone.

He hadn't actually fully gotten rid of the hooker's body, opting instead to steal it, stuff it in his trunk and keep it.

A footfall and he looked up, there was a man there, in the shadows. He knew exactly who he was.

"Hello Joey," The man said in a soft, low voice. "I suppose you know why I'm here."

"I couldn't do it, I couldn't just leave it there, I had to have it...but I couldn't go either."

"I know Joey, I know," He said sympathetically. "It seems in the end even you succumbed. I guess I am the last of our kind."

A couple people walked by hastily, not looking at them, breathing masks over their faces, walking hurriedly. Afraid.

Joey looked at Picksel for a long time, the man was bald, and wore glasses, but beneath the lenses there were eyes so intense and cold that even the glasses could not hide their darkness. Joey swallowed, then put his hands to his lap. The pigeon took one last sad look at him then flew away.

"I have nothing left to give."

"It's okay, neither does anyone else."

Picksel pulled out his silenced pistol, and shot Joey Ramone square in the forehead, a spray of blood hitting where the pigeon had once stood.

"Welcome to the end of the world kid," Picksel said, then walked away.

A Tale of Night

2009-08-04T22:20:00.000-07:00

First there was Valon Night, who lived in the former empire of Ashdar, a lone warrior who worked as an assassin at times, and later would join Owen Darklock, Valadan, and Taliesin the Bard in saving the world Lyrica

His son was borne of him and a female demon, an evil witch who tricked him, she stole his son from him and named him Talon. Talon became a worse more evil assassin than his father. and when they found the gateway between worlds Talon and his mother passed to Etherea, the world of Caden, and Elda, and Talis' world. Here Talon reaked havoc for a time, garnering a dark name for himself, before meeting Arie, a woman who changed him...their daughter Ilfaer, was once again seduced by her grandmother into a life of evil, she lived this way for a time, before finding redemption as well, becoming the Seventh Queen of the elves, for her mother was the last of a line of elves that had been dying out, although she was mostly human. These Elves, The Ilveran, were a line that had always ruled...so Ilfaer, having become good, was brought to Edgereth, where she would meet Caden, and finally months later break his curse.

In time Ilfaer reunited with her parents, who were very old...they forgave her and protected her one last time, their powers united to protect her soul, since Talon was of Mienarian blood like his father, and they held powers over the soul, so that when Magic exploded in Etherea they protected her soul, so that she was able to survive, like Caden did when Elda became the Phoenix and protected him in her everburning fire. The day the gods died.

After this some 100 years later Caden awakens to a different world, Ilfaer is still queen of a dying race, magic is wild and the elves hide away, sometime later he meets her again, and in the end, they get together...living happily til they have a son...who is Talis. And the Circle begins again...for Talis it is who when his parents die, goes to live on Haven, there he becomes a farmer, befriends Avalar, falls for Rhiannon, becomes one of the Called, goes to protect the Gates, and later falls...because of revenge, for losing Rhiannon, and Avalar's betrayal...he takes the world Etherea, shapes it through time and space effecting outcomes etc. and ultimately making his own father into the man he becomes. Cursed and suicidal at the beginning. He realizes of course his sins when later he gets Rhiannon back, and they have Ulgronth, the first Titan, who then fathers the gods, who then wreak havoc on The Creators worlds, but the depth of his sin is not known completely to him until he dies for good, goes to the Older World, and then returns, reincarnated as Taliesin. A bard who travels with Valon Night, on Lyrica, who is also the son of a king, and later becomes the Leader of the Champions, who fight for the creator in the last battle. The story of the Nights is truly the core story of it all...

but then there is Caden, Valadan, Elda, and others, all of them pivotal as welll...their stories just as core, but for another day.

Story Time: Havenfall, part 1

2009-07-21T17:12:00.000-07:00

It is because of the light that I write these stories, these legends if you will. Long passed into the shadows and myth, as we sit here before The Creator of all.

I am Taliesin, son of King Miadoras, brother of Khel The Betrayer, lover of many a woman, and friend to the Champions, those who fought at the end of time itself for the last great glory of our God and King. But they all have their own stories, stories that interlock and weave together, as well as wind out into space, alone and starkly individual. But we must begin at the beginning, and there is my story...or the story of the first me, for I have lived two lives, much like the one named Caden who you will meet later. In that iteration, I was called Talis, and I had a very dark future ahead of me...

------------------------------------

He came to us in a dream, in that time we were merely farmers, workers in the field, and factory slaves. There was Talis, the farmer, a dreamer who liked to look up at the stars and wonder what was beyond his world, a world called Haven, many a night he would shun his duties to sit up at the top of the hill, lying in the grass, and count the stars.
There were others, Avalar the bricklayer, who worked in the town over from him. Avalar was a man with different kinds of dreams, for he wished to build, build cities and capitals, and great wonders of art. He saw himself as an architect and the world as his clay. He loved songs and good brew, and when you came to him to speak of your dream as his friend Talis did, it was with great mirth that he uttered the words

"What if it's real?"

Talis looked at him with ponderance in his eyes for a while. Avalar was his best and oldest friend, the two having met through a mutual acquaintance, another gardener named Rhiannon. They had long dreamed of leaving those lands behind, of exploring, of finding the home of the gods themselves and making their way to the stars, but the man in their dreams spoke of a different destiny. He spoke of a Garden deep within the mountains of Miriah, where there were 7 Gateways to other worlds, these seven gates had long been guarded by a knightly order, but the order had fallen from within, and now their Captain sought only to use the Gateways for his own power, seeking to use the other worlds to take this one.

There were only two others that recieved this dream. The old man named Gremen, who lived on his own out in the Wastes, far from the city and even the outlying farms. And the orphan child who worked in a factory in the middle of the city, the boy had never been given a name, but the other children called him Iam Song, because he liked to sing. Iam kept the name because he liked it too, and so he sang, and often in the music he felt a closeness to something deeper. Something more real than the world around him.

It was to Avalar and Talis that the dream gave the task of rescuing Iam from his enslavement, and of finding the hermit Gremen, and making him follow them on their quest, and so the two friends decided to believe the dream, and make their way deep into the city.

On their way Rhiannon came upon them, and neither could talk the beautiful girl out of coming with them, so the three friends followed the sounds of the factory til they came to it's wide gates.

I love my fiance'!

2009-07-01T15:44:00.000-07:00

She bought me two pretty awesome things, VH1's 100 best vinyl albums book, and the number 1 in the book which turns out to be The Beatles - Revolver.

And it's beautiful man.

So yeah...gotta love women who get their men.

Welcome

2009-06-30T20:25:00.001-07:00

this is a place to review albums...books....movies, and to post stories and book ideas i have as well as just random thought posts.