Two Amazing Videos

First, an Add from Sussex, UK which qualifies as art:


And now, the inspirational speeches from 40 different movies, all mashed together:

With Respect

I don't want to dwell on my heartache and emotional trauma very much more.  I feel grieved out and my boss pulled a sermon out of nowhere today which convicted me to the depth of my soul.  I'm moving on soon, and I'm sure that the attitude of my blog entries will improve.


As I'm moving on, I thought I'd mention this.  I've been searching for song chords to play on my guitar and came across the wide variety of songs written by Bill and Gloria Gaither.  Now, I grew up with Gaither songs in our church hymnals, and so I knew already that they had written "He Touched Me" and "It Will Be Worth It All" and   "Let's Just Praise the Lord" and "The Family of God".  But what I didn't know was that they also wrote all those great Sandi Patti songs like "Unshakable Kingdom" and "Upon This Rock".  And even "Because He Lives".


I recently came across one of their songs entitled "I Will Serve Thee."  I wasn't immediately captured by the lyrics, but then I saw the chorus, which says:


Heartaches, broken pieces
Ruined lives are why You died on Calvary
Your touch was what I longed for
You have given life to me


Those lyrics caught me.  I then went back and looked at other lyrics from the Gaither songs.  Here are some of them:


From "He Touched Me"
Shackled by a heavy burden, 'Neath a load of guilt and shame. Then the hand of Jesus touched me, And now I am no longer the same. He touched me, Oh He touched me, 
And oh the joy that floods my soul! Something happened and now I know, He touched me and made me whole.


From "Because He Lives"
Because He lives, I can face tomorrow.
Because He lives, All fear is gone.
Because I know He holds the future,
And life is worth the living just because He lives.


Songs that I've known from childhood have come back to comfort me.  And thought the Gaithers will probably never read this, I want to thank them for the work they've done.  For their courage in admitting that the Christian life is not always flowers and lambs and sunshine.  And for reminding me that Jesus came not just to save me from my sin, but to heal my broken heart.  My questions remain unanswered, but the answers seem less important now than just the process of asking.  And I have peace in my soul, knowing that this world and its trials are passing, and that "It will be worth it all when we see Jesus".

The reason I avoid associating myself with Baptists, even though I probably am one.

Catch-22

There are many occasions in my life that I can look back  and think, "Man, I behaved really immaturely there."  And of course I'm right.  I do behave immaturely quite often, especially when dealing with strife or emotional trauma.  


I can also remember on some of those occasions talking to my friends and having them tell me, "That's a really immature thing to do."  They were right, too.  But they were outside the issue and there's nothing saying that given the same situation they would have acted any differently or any more maturely than I did.


Finally, I remember times when my friend was going through a problem and was acting in an immature manner.  And guess what?  I knew it was immature at the time, and sometimes I said so.  But in that case, I was the one outside the issue.


So it comes down to this: emotional distress makes us act stupid.  And the more time passes, the more experience we get.  And hence, the more mature we become.


So yes, I've done some stupid and immature things in the past two weeks, and I'm sure there are many more stupid and immature things to come.  Not that I like behaving this way, but often it seems the thing to do at the time.  It's not until later, when I have the experience, that I realize how much I screwed up.  But I don't get experience unless I go through these things and screw up.

The phrase "Catch-22" comes from the book of the same title by Joseph Heller.  In it, he labels several issues with that term, all of them self-contradictory or circular in their reasoning.  The original Catch-22 is this: A pilot cannot be grounded unless he is insane.  However, he must request to be grounded.  The actual quote from the book is here: 

Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to.

The whole point is that the logic is circular.  And so it is with experience.  You can't avoid a mess if you don't have it, but you can't get it unless you make a mess.

Or, as a friend of mine put it, "Experience is the comb that life gives you after you've gone bald."

Let it be known:

when I write poems, they are not intended to be deep or intense.  They are intentionally bad poems.
Because my new favorite thing is writing bad poetry.  It's fun.

Flora

My memories of her
are dim
like the spiderwebs
of sleep
left over in your mind
early
in the morning.

Every thought brings only
a blur.
Long, thick, black hair
red lips
Softly manicured hands
slim waist
Perfect hourglass figure
smooth legs.

The occasional apron reaching
to her knees
She pops her foot up
and smiles
that perfect, radiant smile.

I remember now,
remember the envy
jealousy
covetous rage
in my heart.

I idolized her.
I wanted to be her.
She stood on that pedestal
sneering down at me
with her stupid
charm.

But now
after so many years,
here we are
in the same
sad
sinking
depressing
waterlogged
boat.

OLD

written Thursday March 04, 2009

I look in the mirror
Every day between classes.

Straighten my hair
Check my eyeliner
Make sure it's not smudged.

I try to look fresh for my students.
So I can fool them
Into thinking I'm not
A) depressed.
B) tired.
C) angry.
D) all of the above.

Today, I take another moment
to look.
The harsh fluorescent light is
not flattering,
for sure.

Deep, reddened lines accentuate my forehead.
Dark circles surround and ambush my eyes.
Dry lips feather out, disappearing into pale skin.
One deep wrinkle owns the space between my eyebrows.
My cheeks are mottled and discolored.

In short,
I look
old.

But with none of the
beauty that we see
in old Hollywood actresses.

No, I am the plain kind of old.
The kind of old of your second grade teacher.
Normal.  But old.

As I study my face,
wondering how I aged so fast
in only a few days,
I look at my pale lashes and
realize,
with horror:

I've forgotten to put on makeup.