I'm pretty sure that they weren't around when I was younger--or, indeed, when I was buying them a year or two ago--but oatmeal-flavored Teddy Grahams are delicious.
Dropped out of Visions of Reality (for more reasons than just the psychology), joined Popular Music and Representation (cooler and less weird than it sounds). I will miss the chance to read 19th-century American lit, since I love it. On the other hand, it's not worth being annoyed in class every day, not to mention that it's not worth trying to figure out how to reconcile my disagreement with the class premise with the need I would have had to write a ten-page paper and then a twenty-page paper.
1.31.2008
1.30.2008
[brackets]
Chris actually sent me a letter(!) in response to my note in his Christmas card. It came at an excellent time, inasmuch as this has been a really bad day. And I even got to use my PBK letter-opener on it, haha, except that he'd scotch-taped the envelope up so well that I made a mess of things anyway.
1.29.2008
(parentheses)
I have a decision to make: do I stay in "Visions of Reality in 19th-Century Am-Lit" and get annoyed all the time because Dr. Church is basing the course on "philosophy and psychology" despite knowing, from what I can tell, practically nothing that's actually borne out by the last thirty years of psychology? Like, his ignorance of research on personality would be fine if he weren't basing his entire class on some kind of psuedo-psychological model that he came up with and keeps contradicting himself in talking about. Maybe I'm being overcritical here, but I have a problem with, in a course on reality, having to work with something I'm pretty sure, from a psychological standpoint, is not reality. That gets in my way of his suggestion that we skeptics come at it abstractly, "like you're all working with radioactive materials, reaching into the box with the gloves," as he more or less said. Maybe I'm just being too closed-minded, but I can't help it.
But the problem is, into what class do I switch? The music-and-popular-culture class may well bother me at least as much because it has literary theory in it (though, surprisingly enough, I've read most of the theorists last semester, and while I tend to disagree with them, they make me much less angry than many other theorists).
Or there's Romanticism, which is run sort of like a survey course, but it shoves theory and a twenty-page paper down our throats.
Maybe I should start e-mailing professors and asking to see their syllabi. Drop/Add doesn't end until February 8th, which is the good news.
I don't think I'd have gone on to graduate work if I'd spent my undergraduate years here, if you want the truth.
I was really pinning my hopes on classes getting better once theory and creative-nonfiction were gone. But I really think I'm just going to have to resign myself to disliking graduate school, the way many Alfredian professors seemed to. In-class, I mean. Out of class, of course, I could hardly ask for more...except, say, that Alfred were even nearer to Binghamton than it already is.
But the problem is, into what class do I switch? The music-and-popular-culture class may well bother me at least as much because it has literary theory in it (though, surprisingly enough, I've read most of the theorists last semester, and while I tend to disagree with them, they make me much less angry than many other theorists).
Or there's Romanticism, which is run sort of like a survey course, but it shoves theory and a twenty-page paper down our throats.
Maybe I should start e-mailing professors and asking to see their syllabi. Drop/Add doesn't end until February 8th, which is the good news.
I don't think I'd have gone on to graduate work if I'd spent my undergraduate years here, if you want the truth.
I was really pinning my hopes on classes getting better once theory and creative-nonfiction were gone. But I really think I'm just going to have to resign myself to disliking graduate school, the way many Alfredian professors seemed to. In-class, I mean. Out of class, of course, I could hardly ask for more...except, say, that Alfred were even nearer to Binghamton than it already is.
1.27.2008
Culinary Endeavors: German Potato Salad and Cornmeal Pancakes
Why, you may ask, was I beginning to make German potato salad at 9 PM on the night before classes start?
I guess the smart-aleck answer would be, because I like it better than regular potato salad.
A truer answer would be, I tend to do my random cooking projects semi-late at night. The advantages are obvious: I'm not in class, I'm not starving, and I don't have to worry about other people trying to cook dinner while I'm doing it (though Mijeong will occasionally make herself some rice or an egg...I think she's usually, as she surveys the mess I'm making of the kitchen, a combination of curious, impressed, and amused). One disadvantage is that I usually end up making things and refrigerating them in order to eat them later, which does limit that freshly-made-and-served-hot experience. Another is that it tends to keep me up a bit late, since I'm a) keyed up at the end, and b) too lazy to do the dishes right away (well, and aren't you supposed to let hot pots/pans cool down first before you wash them, lest they warp? I'd always heard that. I'm sticking to that story).
So anyway, tonight's attempts were German potato salad, because it sounded good and could be kept in the refrigerator for later, and cornmeal pancakes, because I had some when my family recently went to the new IHOP down the street (see the entry "Long Weekend in Review" for why this should be funny), and they were delicious, and I've got cornmeal here and wanted to see if I could duplicate them.
About the potato salad: I think I just need to follow the recipe more exactly. For one thing, I was too haphazard in the way I added the onion. I should've used more and I should've chopped it finer; if I'd done the second, I wouldn't have felt so obligated to sautee it before adding it (the recipe didn't say to do so, but I usually only like raw onion in small doses). For another, I don't own common white vinegar because the only things upon which I usually use vinegar are lentils and salads, and it just doesn't work to use something as strong as white in those cases. So I was working with balsamic, and that made the salad too sweet--and by that time I'd already added sugar, per the recipe's instructions, so that didn't help.
While my potatoes were boiling and cooling, I also made some cornmeal pancakes, which were also a bit of a challenge on three levels:
1) Halving the recipe (I knew I'd be freezing extras as it was). How exactly does one halve a single beaten egg, I wondered? (The answer I came up with: I poured it into a liquid measure and worked from there. The other half I attempted to scramble once the pancakes were done, but I guess the pan was too hot despite my efforts, 'cause things got a little leathery.)
2) Frying them. Cornmeal pancakes do not need much heat. Even with it down lower than the recipe suggested, each side was done in something like ten to fifteen seconds--but they didn't cook evenly per side (as in, when part of it was done for that side, another part wasn't), so it was hard to flip them at the golden (haha) moment between not-quite-done and too-brown.
3) The recipe itself didn't get close enough to what I was looking for; it ended up too eggy and not sweet enough, and I couldn't taste the cornmeal well. At that point, why not just use all white flour and make regular ones? After searching online, I guess I want to be making these. Hm. Whole milk, buttermilk, and butter. And less baking soda. I can see why mine paled in comparison.
As cooking nights go, I usually do better than this, but it all gets a thumbs-sideways. Everything was edible, but not quite what I was going for.
Anyway, it's time for me to get to bed.
I guess the smart-aleck answer would be, because I like it better than regular potato salad.
A truer answer would be, I tend to do my random cooking projects semi-late at night. The advantages are obvious: I'm not in class, I'm not starving, and I don't have to worry about other people trying to cook dinner while I'm doing it (though Mijeong will occasionally make herself some rice or an egg...I think she's usually, as she surveys the mess I'm making of the kitchen, a combination of curious, impressed, and amused). One disadvantage is that I usually end up making things and refrigerating them in order to eat them later, which does limit that freshly-made-and-served-hot experience. Another is that it tends to keep me up a bit late, since I'm a) keyed up at the end, and b) too lazy to do the dishes right away (well, and aren't you supposed to let hot pots/pans cool down first before you wash them, lest they warp? I'd always heard that. I'm sticking to that story).
So anyway, tonight's attempts were German potato salad, because it sounded good and could be kept in the refrigerator for later, and cornmeal pancakes, because I had some when my family recently went to the new IHOP down the street (see the entry "Long Weekend in Review" for why this should be funny), and they were delicious, and I've got cornmeal here and wanted to see if I could duplicate them.
About the potato salad: I think I just need to follow the recipe more exactly. For one thing, I was too haphazard in the way I added the onion. I should've used more and I should've chopped it finer; if I'd done the second, I wouldn't have felt so obligated to sautee it before adding it (the recipe didn't say to do so, but I usually only like raw onion in small doses). For another, I don't own common white vinegar because the only things upon which I usually use vinegar are lentils and salads, and it just doesn't work to use something as strong as white in those cases. So I was working with balsamic, and that made the salad too sweet--and by that time I'd already added sugar, per the recipe's instructions, so that didn't help.
While my potatoes were boiling and cooling, I also made some cornmeal pancakes, which were also a bit of a challenge on three levels:
1) Halving the recipe (I knew I'd be freezing extras as it was). How exactly does one halve a single beaten egg, I wondered? (The answer I came up with: I poured it into a liquid measure and worked from there. The other half I attempted to scramble once the pancakes were done, but I guess the pan was too hot despite my efforts, 'cause things got a little leathery.)
2) Frying them. Cornmeal pancakes do not need much heat. Even with it down lower than the recipe suggested, each side was done in something like ten to fifteen seconds--but they didn't cook evenly per side (as in, when part of it was done for that side, another part wasn't), so it was hard to flip them at the golden (haha) moment between not-quite-done and too-brown.
3) The recipe itself didn't get close enough to what I was looking for; it ended up too eggy and not sweet enough, and I couldn't taste the cornmeal well. At that point, why not just use all white flour and make regular ones? After searching online, I guess I want to be making these. Hm. Whole milk, buttermilk, and butter. And less baking soda. I can see why mine paled in comparison.
As cooking nights go, I usually do better than this, but it all gets a thumbs-sideways. Everything was edible, but not quite what I was going for.
Anyway, it's time for me to get to bed.
In brief
The church here in Binghamton got broken into on Wednesday night; we heard over e-mail on Thursday morning. Nothing much was taken; they smashed some things and made off with loose change, basically. Something like five dollars. ...There're pictures of the mess up on the bulletin board. Frankly, I think this is an odd thing to put up on the bulletin board ("What's been happening at Good Shepherd lately? Well, let us tell you!"), but in a strangely amusing way.
Ife kids that he thinks I did it. He quizzed me for an alibi.
...The semester starts tomorrow, and I'm so not ready to be even more busy than I was last semester.
Ife kids that he thinks I did it. He quizzed me for an alibi.
...The semester starts tomorrow, and I'm so not ready to be even more busy than I was last semester.
1.25.2008
Scattered Thoughts Upon My Return to Binghamton
Christianity-wise: I am trying not to, but am I being in any way obnoxious about it? Lemme know if I am. I don't want it to look like I think less of you all as people if you're not Christian; that would be, for very many reasons, a bad thing.
Just checking.
So I'm back in Binghamton; came this afternoon. A lot of my stuff is still in my car, basically because I was too lazy to make as many trips to take it out as I made to put it all in. I tend to bring way too much stuff home over holidays. Then again, I've never had six weeks' break before. Especially with books, I was afraid I was going to have one of those moments of, "Dang! If only I could find that quote from The Great Divorce, because it would be perfect for what I'm trying to say!" So I bring home every novel dear to my heart, and end up reading, of course, none of them.
But I brought in everything I felt I really had to, and then I took my sweet time at Wegmans in restocking my cupboards, since I'd used up as much as possible before the break. I bought a little more than I necessarily needed to, telling myself that I'll cook a lot of things during my spare time and freeze/refrigerate them for nights like Monday and Wednesday, when I won't get home 'til 7:30. We'll see whether I was, as I sometimes am, merely dreaming.
Smells kind of strike me, so to speak, and I'd forgotten how much I like the way the apartment smells--it's not flowery, or like any food in particular, but there's a semi-subtle scent I can't quite describe that hints at warmth and, well, relative cleanliness. I also hadn't realized that the lavender-chamomile soap in our bathroom would take me back to the paper-writing marathon of finals week in December. I've always liked that soap, so I'm not sure how I feel about the association.
Jessica, the new girl, has truly moved in now, so it's funny to see what new things have appeared (for example, a toaster oven--still used to dorm life, I keep thinking, "Is that even allowed in here?"), and which things apparently weren't Polly's after all, since she'd have come back for them by now if they were (a pair of shoes, prepackaged cups of flan).
I hadn't quite realized that a bigger chunk of my identity than I would have admitted was wrapped up in being the best student of English I knew, or at least equal to everyone around me. Various circumstances have conspired since August to prove to me that sometimes people who weren't even English majors in undergrad are better at the subject than I am, despite my doing a seemingly-endless amount of reading and writing since I was about three. There's no accounting for innate brainpower, apparently.
Well, there's stuff I ought to be doing, so I guess I'll go and do it.
Just checking.
So I'm back in Binghamton; came this afternoon. A lot of my stuff is still in my car, basically because I was too lazy to make as many trips to take it out as I made to put it all in. I tend to bring way too much stuff home over holidays. Then again, I've never had six weeks' break before. Especially with books, I was afraid I was going to have one of those moments of, "Dang! If only I could find that quote from The Great Divorce, because it would be perfect for what I'm trying to say!" So I bring home every novel dear to my heart, and end up reading, of course, none of them.
But I brought in everything I felt I really had to, and then I took my sweet time at Wegmans in restocking my cupboards, since I'd used up as much as possible before the break. I bought a little more than I necessarily needed to, telling myself that I'll cook a lot of things during my spare time and freeze/refrigerate them for nights like Monday and Wednesday, when I won't get home 'til 7:30. We'll see whether I was, as I sometimes am, merely dreaming.
Smells kind of strike me, so to speak, and I'd forgotten how much I like the way the apartment smells--it's not flowery, or like any food in particular, but there's a semi-subtle scent I can't quite describe that hints at warmth and, well, relative cleanliness. I also hadn't realized that the lavender-chamomile soap in our bathroom would take me back to the paper-writing marathon of finals week in December. I've always liked that soap, so I'm not sure how I feel about the association.
Jessica, the new girl, has truly moved in now, so it's funny to see what new things have appeared (for example, a toaster oven--still used to dorm life, I keep thinking, "Is that even allowed in here?"), and which things apparently weren't Polly's after all, since she'd have come back for them by now if they were (a pair of shoes, prepackaged cups of flan).
I hadn't quite realized that a bigger chunk of my identity than I would have admitted was wrapped up in being the best student of English I knew, or at least equal to everyone around me. Various circumstances have conspired since August to prove to me that sometimes people who weren't even English majors in undergrad are better at the subject than I am, despite my doing a seemingly-endless amount of reading and writing since I was about three. There's no accounting for innate brainpower, apparently.
Well, there's stuff I ought to be doing, so I guess I'll go and do it.
1.24.2008
On the Upcoming Semester
Got an e-mail from Barb Walling, telling me that this semester, due to changes in all kinds of things, none of the TA/GA options I was offered were actually possible choices after all. She ended up assigning everyone to their classes instead of giving them choices. So, instead of TAing, and instead of being in children's lit, here's the course I'll be grading for (I'll also be putting five hours/week in at the Writing Center):
Spring 2008 ENG 300T - TALES OF VIOLENCE, LOVE, AND POWER
Credits: 4
Description:
Can we find love between innocence and violence? Through novel and film, we trace these images currently playing all across America. These stories raise the questions: Where do we look for compassion in this anxious world? -- and -- Can we build safety, identity or maybe a sense of purpose here? Can we find real hope in our elaborate cultural dreams? We will look at the tensions between faith, heroism, childhood and the "show of strength" that stakes the claim of authority and/or enforces privilege. How are "cultural purities" constructed and critiqued? How is violence justified and/or condemned? We will look at film and print fiction from before the dawn of the "New Age" through the Y2K, considering the role of art as potential "speaker" for a generative dreamspace (e.g., Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal, Lindsay Anderson's If..., Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth, etc.).
Spring 2008 ENG 300T - TALES OF VIOLENCE, LOVE, AND POWER
Credits: 4
Description:
Can we find love between innocence and violence? Through novel and film, we trace these images currently playing all across America. These stories raise the questions: Where do we look for compassion in this anxious world? -- and -- Can we build safety, identity or maybe a sense of purpose here? Can we find real hope in our elaborate cultural dreams? We will look at the tensions between faith, heroism, childhood and the "show of strength" that stakes the claim of authority and/or enforces privilege. How are "cultural purities" constructed and critiqued? How is violence justified and/or condemned? We will look at film and print fiction from before the dawn of the "New Age" through the Y2K, considering the role of art as potential "speaker" for a generative dreamspace (e.g., Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal, Lindsay Anderson's If..., Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth, etc.).
1.23.2008
Autobiography
Note: This is a post relating, in brief, what Christian faith is and how I came to it. (I know it doesn't look brief, but that's got a lot to do with the margins on this blog.) It is not in any way required reading; if you're not interested in such a story, then you're absolutely welcome to skip it.
Some of us in InterVarsity were asked, as part of a (non-academic) course we're all taking together, to think about how we came to faith and each write up a brief explanation of that process and how it's changed us, with the idea that eventually we'd share it with someone. And I agree with that; I'm not trying to share just because I've been asked to, but because I think it's right for people to know how I got here.
I'd be lying, though, if I said that I'm putting this up as, "This is the way I'm fulfilled, but you can be fulfilled any way you want." This is the story, simple and clumsy as it is, of how I came to follow the only true God. While, again, this isn't required reading, if you do read it, I can't help hoping that you'll be more curious about what life in Him is like. Not because my words are that good, but because God is that worth it.
This doesn't fully cover what being Christian is like, or why Christianity is the only true faith, or how it's intellectually honest as well as morally honest. I can do my best to answer those things if I'm asked.
So, if you're still with me:
As an elementary-school kid, I'd been told by my mom and my preschool teachers, and had read in books, that there was a God and that we should pray to Him, but I didn't really know who Jesus was, except that he'd been a baby born long ago in a manger. I tried to do what my parents said to, and sometimes prayed before I went to bed like I knew some people did, but didn't realize that God wanted anything more from my life than that.
But just after I started the fourth grade, coinciding with a move to a new house, we joined a church for the first time in my life (I don't know for sure, but that was possibly connected to my most recent babysitter having shared her faith with my mom). I had a new friend from school in my Sunday-school class, so I felt okay about going, and it was there that my two teachers explained to me about Jesus' life past babyhood. I was really interested: it literally felt like puzzle pieces were coming together, that things I'd heard about God over the years suddenly made sense. At one point I asked what the purpose of life was (not because it had ever exactly worried me, I don't think, but because I knew it was a big question and I wanted to see what the answer was), and they answered.
Over time, then, I learned that we were created by God because He loved us and wanted us to love Him. The problem is, while God is perfect, the humanity He created has since turned away from Him to try to follow other things (not just other gods; anytime we do what we want instead of what we should do, we're following ourselves and our own way...more or less making ourselves a god). Since nothing imperfect can approach God, but He still has such a desire to love us and we have a responsibility to love Him, Jesus (who is God) came to earth, taught us about himself while living a perfect life, and then died, and his death makes up for our imperfection. I believed this for probably a few months before I ever learned that people who believe it typically pray to Jesus to tell him that they wanted to "give their lives" to him (that is, to stop putting other things ahead of God and to spend life having a relationship with Him--receiving His love and following His commands so as to love Him back and act more like Jesus did). So I did that, but nobody was around at the time--it wasn't a big turning point as much as it was making official what had started some time before.
I was nine or ten, which isn't all that old. It's not that I had huge, painful problems to be saved out of. In fact, I had a pretty happy life before I became a Christian--my parents and brother loved me, and we were a secure, safe, normal family--though I was oversensitive and scared of a lot of things and kind of glory-seeking. But I must have known that the idea of just being alive, of everything around me being there, needed something to complete it, or I think I wouldn't have been so struck by how much sense the world seemed to make when I started learning about God. And, too, it makes sense that God wanted to change my life even if its problems weren't super-obvious. So change started happening: for example, I hadn't always had a good sense before of what a good friend was, either the ones I made or the one I was supposed to be. Being a Christian helped to make me a person who understands the importance of treating others unselfishly, of trying to find other people's need for love more urgent and important than my own need to be loved.
And though I've always been easily scared of things, as I've followed Jesus, there've been big fears within life that I haven't experienced, or that I've experienced to a much lesser degree. One is that I haven't had to feel the pain of defining myself by, say, whether or not I have a boyfriend or the "right" kinds of friends. I've seen people feel like they're somehow worthless if no one's attracted to them or if they're unnoticed socially, and run themselves into the ground as they try to change that--trying to be better-looking or more successful, or being in hurtful relationships, not realizing that they're way too valuable for that.
Before I ever even understood that God wanted to know me, He loved me enough to die for me. That means I've got worth that doesn't depend on anything I do or don't do. I'll always be loved, and as I devote myself to Him, my life will be fully, not just partially, satisfying--whether or not I ever get married or have a successful career, or whether I'm well-off or dirt-poor or anything in between. In the long run, I really am okay with the idea that life may not turn out quite the way I hope it will. One thing God does not promise to do is keep you from ever feeling unhappy, since becoming more like Jesus actually involves a lot of work and inconvenience and pain (though we're given the help we need with that--things like encouragement from friends, a knowledge of hope and of God's love, all kinds of things). But over time, I've seen that what God wants from me and wants to give me really are the best things for me.
As I'm sure you all know already, I still have a lot of work to do in acting more like Jesus--even the things that overall I feel helped with, I get wrong sometimes. A big weak point has always been fear; even though I know that what God wants for the world and for me is the best thing, and even though I know it's worth losing things for the sake of following Him, I'm often too afraid to do things that will get me stared at or disapproved of, even if those things are right to do. I'm usually afraid to take really visible stands against things that I know are wrong, both because I don't want to look like a stupid, insulting, closed-minded person, and because I don't like how it feels when people reject what I'm saying. I'm afraid to tell people that just changing a negative behavior won't help long-term, that the only way to really be joyful and fulfilled is to get out of the center of your own life completely, and devote it all to knowing God and following what that means for everyday life. But I'm trying to work on all that. It sounds counterintuitive and weird to say, I am whomever You want me to be, but I've discovered in my own life that God is trustworthy and won't hurt us when we do that--very much the opposite, really.
Romans 8:28 says, "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." And this I believe. As we love God and do everything we can to follow Him, over time things come together and we're fulfilled no matter what's happening to us. That's what happened to me.
Some of us in InterVarsity were asked, as part of a (non-academic) course we're all taking together, to think about how we came to faith and each write up a brief explanation of that process and how it's changed us, with the idea that eventually we'd share it with someone. And I agree with that; I'm not trying to share just because I've been asked to, but because I think it's right for people to know how I got here.
I'd be lying, though, if I said that I'm putting this up as, "This is the way I'm fulfilled, but you can be fulfilled any way you want." This is the story, simple and clumsy as it is, of how I came to follow the only true God. While, again, this isn't required reading, if you do read it, I can't help hoping that you'll be more curious about what life in Him is like. Not because my words are that good, but because God is that worth it.
This doesn't fully cover what being Christian is like, or why Christianity is the only true faith, or how it's intellectually honest as well as morally honest. I can do my best to answer those things if I'm asked.
So, if you're still with me:
As an elementary-school kid, I'd been told by my mom and my preschool teachers, and had read in books, that there was a God and that we should pray to Him, but I didn't really know who Jesus was, except that he'd been a baby born long ago in a manger. I tried to do what my parents said to, and sometimes prayed before I went to bed like I knew some people did, but didn't realize that God wanted anything more from my life than that.
But just after I started the fourth grade, coinciding with a move to a new house, we joined a church for the first time in my life (I don't know for sure, but that was possibly connected to my most recent babysitter having shared her faith with my mom). I had a new friend from school in my Sunday-school class, so I felt okay about going, and it was there that my two teachers explained to me about Jesus' life past babyhood. I was really interested: it literally felt like puzzle pieces were coming together, that things I'd heard about God over the years suddenly made sense. At one point I asked what the purpose of life was (not because it had ever exactly worried me, I don't think, but because I knew it was a big question and I wanted to see what the answer was), and they answered.
Over time, then, I learned that we were created by God because He loved us and wanted us to love Him. The problem is, while God is perfect, the humanity He created has since turned away from Him to try to follow other things (not just other gods; anytime we do what we want instead of what we should do, we're following ourselves and our own way...more or less making ourselves a god). Since nothing imperfect can approach God, but He still has such a desire to love us and we have a responsibility to love Him, Jesus (who is God) came to earth, taught us about himself while living a perfect life, and then died, and his death makes up for our imperfection. I believed this for probably a few months before I ever learned that people who believe it typically pray to Jesus to tell him that they wanted to "give their lives" to him (that is, to stop putting other things ahead of God and to spend life having a relationship with Him--receiving His love and following His commands so as to love Him back and act more like Jesus did). So I did that, but nobody was around at the time--it wasn't a big turning point as much as it was making official what had started some time before.
I was nine or ten, which isn't all that old. It's not that I had huge, painful problems to be saved out of. In fact, I had a pretty happy life before I became a Christian--my parents and brother loved me, and we were a secure, safe, normal family--though I was oversensitive and scared of a lot of things and kind of glory-seeking. But I must have known that the idea of just being alive, of everything around me being there, needed something to complete it, or I think I wouldn't have been so struck by how much sense the world seemed to make when I started learning about God. And, too, it makes sense that God wanted to change my life even if its problems weren't super-obvious. So change started happening: for example, I hadn't always had a good sense before of what a good friend was, either the ones I made or the one I was supposed to be. Being a Christian helped to make me a person who understands the importance of treating others unselfishly, of trying to find other people's need for love more urgent and important than my own need to be loved.
And though I've always been easily scared of things, as I've followed Jesus, there've been big fears within life that I haven't experienced, or that I've experienced to a much lesser degree. One is that I haven't had to feel the pain of defining myself by, say, whether or not I have a boyfriend or the "right" kinds of friends. I've seen people feel like they're somehow worthless if no one's attracted to them or if they're unnoticed socially, and run themselves into the ground as they try to change that--trying to be better-looking or more successful, or being in hurtful relationships, not realizing that they're way too valuable for that.
Before I ever even understood that God wanted to know me, He loved me enough to die for me. That means I've got worth that doesn't depend on anything I do or don't do. I'll always be loved, and as I devote myself to Him, my life will be fully, not just partially, satisfying--whether or not I ever get married or have a successful career, or whether I'm well-off or dirt-poor or anything in between. In the long run, I really am okay with the idea that life may not turn out quite the way I hope it will. One thing God does not promise to do is keep you from ever feeling unhappy, since becoming more like Jesus actually involves a lot of work and inconvenience and pain (though we're given the help we need with that--things like encouragement from friends, a knowledge of hope and of God's love, all kinds of things). But over time, I've seen that what God wants from me and wants to give me really are the best things for me.
As I'm sure you all know already, I still have a lot of work to do in acting more like Jesus--even the things that overall I feel helped with, I get wrong sometimes. A big weak point has always been fear; even though I know that what God wants for the world and for me is the best thing, and even though I know it's worth losing things for the sake of following Him, I'm often too afraid to do things that will get me stared at or disapproved of, even if those things are right to do. I'm usually afraid to take really visible stands against things that I know are wrong, both because I don't want to look like a stupid, insulting, closed-minded person, and because I don't like how it feels when people reject what I'm saying. I'm afraid to tell people that just changing a negative behavior won't help long-term, that the only way to really be joyful and fulfilled is to get out of the center of your own life completely, and devote it all to knowing God and following what that means for everyday life. But I'm trying to work on all that. It sounds counterintuitive and weird to say, I am whomever You want me to be, but I've discovered in my own life that God is trustworthy and won't hurt us when we do that--very much the opposite, really.
Romans 8:28 says, "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." And this I believe. As we love God and do everything we can to follow Him, over time things come together and we're fulfilled no matter what's happening to us. That's what happened to me.
Quick and Silly
Rereading the previous entry, I feel like I need a disclaimer:
No people or animals were harmed in the making of my long weekend.
Which is true; I didn't even fall down and bruise myself while ice skating!
No people or animals were harmed in the making of my long weekend.
Which is true; I didn't even fall down and bruise myself while ice skating!
1.22.2008
Long Weekend in Review
This weekend, I
got a mental picture of bringing one's lunch to work in a briefcase,
became semi-familiar with the ins and outs of proofreading and desktop publishing,
ascertained that sometimes it's better to purposely lose a round of Apples to Apples than to play the only card that fits the category,
was treated to a few stories of the odder pitfalls associated with ER waiting-rooms,
grinned at the air of mystery in which my touch-sensitive lamp was shrouded,
saw again some funny video footage of IV-Alfred people,
considered Christian authors (talky and otherwise) and related issues,
heard and then promptly forgot various fight songs and obscure vocabulary words,
told and heard stories about the majority of my Alfredian graduating class,
lamented poor spelling and grammar,
pondered my occasional tendency to apologize for things I know very well I haven't actually done,
spoiled my lunch with a single bowl of breakfast cereal,
recalled the amazement once caused by my going to church with four boys,
was informed that the Methodists keep messing up perfectly good Presbyterian hymns,
improperly gossiped about people's love lives,
watched some DangerMouse,
received a crash course in French royalty,
was forced by logic to warm to a ridiculous application of the word "posthumous,"
discovered that hockey skates are way better than figure skates,
had the basic physics of skiing semi-demonstrated for me,
imparted my secret knowledge of how to quickly get over the Canadian border,
was shown up by kindergarteners and short-skirted preteen divas alike,
somehow managed not to send anybody flying across the ice,
partook of insulting weather-wimp passersby,
had to then make sure I didn't lapse into similar wimpiness,
hunted and trapped Scrabble tiles,
stole words and had mine stolen,
risked starvation in the cause of not wasting six leftover tiles,
opined on which foods are good and which are disgusting,
wondered how a desk lamp (not touch-sensitive) could be so cute,
was richly entertained by the lengths to which geeky animators will supposedly go to impress girls,
refused to admit to having practiced facial expressions in the mirror,
discussed psychology and why everyone should like psychology better,
echoed Dr. Gagne's opinion that 800 years should have taught Yoda some English syntax,
talked grades and tests and academic tournaments while condescendingly reflecting on how unduly competitive everyone else was in high school,
explained the sway that poetic meter has over my life and speech,
found that I could no longer assume that all spoken French was obnoxious,
learned of the surprising resiliency of plummeting infants,
noted the surprising resiliency of plummeting lizards,
ruined the experience of anaesthesia by comparing it to possession by Voldemort,
purposely took the phrase "tell me about it" too seriously,
consequently met with a pillow to the face,
tried to explain how my dreams work,
laughed and laughed as I got very tired and silly,
read some Shakespeare and some memoir,
was mistaken for an IHOP manager,
extracted a sub-sandwich order,
racked my brains for information on virtually every Alfredian I could possibly think of,
waved goodbye,
went back inside,
and promptly napped.
Which is to say that Albert came to visit. And that it was good.
became semi-familiar with the ins and outs of proofreading and desktop publishing,
ascertained that sometimes it's better to purposely lose a round of Apples to Apples than to play the only card that fits the category,
was treated to a few stories of the odder pitfalls associated with ER waiting-rooms,
grinned at the air of mystery in which my touch-sensitive lamp was shrouded,
saw again some funny video footage of IV-Alfred people,
considered Christian authors (talky and otherwise) and related issues,
heard and then promptly forgot various fight songs and obscure vocabulary words,
told and heard stories about the majority of my Alfredian graduating class,
lamented poor spelling and grammar,
pondered my occasional tendency to apologize for things I know very well I haven't actually done,
spoiled my lunch with a single bowl of breakfast cereal,
recalled the amazement once caused by my going to church with four boys,
was informed that the Methodists keep messing up perfectly good Presbyterian hymns,
improperly gossiped about people's love lives,
watched some DangerMouse,
received a crash course in French royalty,
was forced by logic to warm to a ridiculous application of the word "posthumous,"
discovered that hockey skates are way better than figure skates,
had the basic physics of skiing semi-demonstrated for me,
imparted my secret knowledge of how to quickly get over the Canadian border,
was shown up by kindergarteners and short-skirted preteen divas alike,
somehow managed not to send anybody flying across the ice,
partook of insulting weather-wimp passersby,
had to then make sure I didn't lapse into similar wimpiness,
hunted and trapped Scrabble tiles,
stole words and had mine stolen,
risked starvation in the cause of not wasting six leftover tiles,
opined on which foods are good and which are disgusting,
wondered how a desk lamp (not touch-sensitive) could be so cute,
was richly entertained by the lengths to which geeky animators will supposedly go to impress girls,
refused to admit to having practiced facial expressions in the mirror,
discussed psychology and why everyone should like psychology better,
echoed Dr. Gagne's opinion that 800 years should have taught Yoda some English syntax,
talked grades and tests and academic tournaments while condescendingly reflecting on how unduly competitive everyone else was in high school,
explained the sway that poetic meter has over my life and speech,
found that I could no longer assume that all spoken French was obnoxious,
learned of the surprising resiliency of plummeting infants,
noted the surprising resiliency of plummeting lizards,
ruined the experience of anaesthesia by comparing it to possession by Voldemort,
purposely took the phrase "tell me about it" too seriously,
consequently met with a pillow to the face,
tried to explain how my dreams work,
laughed and laughed as I got very tired and silly,
read some Shakespeare and some memoir,
was mistaken for an IHOP manager,
extracted a sub-sandwich order,
racked my brains for information on virtually every Alfredian I could possibly think of,
waved goodbye,
went back inside,
and promptly napped.
Which is to say that Albert came to visit. And that it was good.
1.16.2008
"That's forever/Yes, and for always"
Memory: John, Simon, and me at 8 Park, in the living room one evening in late April or early May, singing "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" together, the first song I ever learned with them. Simon on his acoustic guitar, playing the opening (how many times did I hear that, freshman year?), and the three of us plunging in. And me thinking of nights in Miller, on the top floor, practicing as Icarus Two. The nights on the Miller stairs, the one on the bench by C.D. Smith in the near-dark, the two concerts at Terra Cotta.
There's a lot I don't miss about freshman year of college. But there's a lot, a lot, that I do.
There's a lot I don't miss about freshman year of college. But there's a lot, a lot, that I do.
1.15.2008
Um, so much for nonconformity. Anyway, I should bring you all up to date on my life.
So I changed my template one last time, since the other one just wasn't doing it for me, and so far this one does. Even though it's of the Blogger pre-set ones. In the grand scheme of things, this is not a big deal, so I'll keep this until someone designs a workable XML template that I truly like.
Oh! Incidentally, the HaloScan thing is just not working. So if you'd like to comment on any of my entries, click on the timestamp at the bottom of each, and you'll go through Blogger's comment service. I don't know why I can't get the comments to post outside of the timestamp, like every other Blogspot blog on the planet, but there you have it.
In the meantime, about my past two weeks: they've been full of surprises. One of the biggest ones came last Wednesday, when I heard from Barb, the secretary for Binghamton's graduate English department. She called to ask me if I'd be interested in TAing. This coming semester. For--get ready--a children's lit class. Needless to say, I replied with a surprised and grateful yes. I really need the experience, and it's great to be funding my own education again, since my pay will cover tuition for the semester. Children's lit isn't definite yet, but is the most likely outcome, and I'd love to TA within a field I love so well, and so far know more about than almost any other. (We're not doing much in the way of Newberys and stuff, though. This is mainly classic children's lit, Pinocchio and stuff.)
I won't be teaching per se, and yet I will; in Binghamton, since the liberal-arts school alone (and only counting the undergrads) is nearly triple the size of AU's whole student body, the lecture classes are big and sometimes include discussion sections. I'd be leading one of those discussion sections, so from a class of 120 or so, I'd be charged with about 25 undergrads. Ryan, who was in two of my classes this past semester (and my first acquaintence within the program, technically), is TAing two sections (for a total of 50 kids), so I don't know whether I'll also be given two or not. I've missed all of the TA training--it happened during finals week, when I hadn't yet been invited to the party--but I'll meet with Dr. Kinney (who's teaching my how-to-teach-English-to-undergrads course this semester anyway) sometime next week to get my materials and get an overview. She's not the professor I'd be TAing for, but she knows the most of what's going on.
I'm required to be going full-time to qualify for the tuition-coverage benefit, so I'll have my twelve credits' worth of classes to go to this semester as well. And, of course, there's Ninth Hour to co-coordinate. Thomas is already taking the lead with much of our planning, but the execution thereof will be a two-player game.
This means that I'm going to be busy like whoa this coming semester. Which is a little scary, inasmuch as I was busy enough already last semester. Still, things should be a little more fulfilling--I'm in classes I want to take, and some of my friends from last semester (Ryan, Jose, Natasha) will be in classes with me this semester. And, too, I've been reading (though, as usual, not diligently enough) some Shakespeare, so's to save myself some time during the semester. I'm on the second part of Henry IV, which is more interesting than I expected, considering that I have no prior experience with history plays.
On another note, last Thursday, Erik, Aneya, and Glenn all came together to visit me. It was really nice, even though the museums and stuff had all closed for the day, so all I could really offer them by way of entertainment was dinner and wandering at the mall, plus the stuff we did at my house, like look at my senior-year quotebook. I'd been all set to drive out to Rochester, but it was great to play hostess instead.
And now, since it's 5:00 or so, I'm going to get myself some dinner and go back to Shakespeare reading. This would be the perfect place for a heroic couplet, could I think of a suitable one.
Oh! Incidentally, the HaloScan thing is just not working. So if you'd like to comment on any of my entries, click on the timestamp at the bottom of each, and you'll go through Blogger's comment service. I don't know why I can't get the comments to post outside of the timestamp, like every other Blogspot blog on the planet, but there you have it.
In the meantime, about my past two weeks: they've been full of surprises. One of the biggest ones came last Wednesday, when I heard from Barb, the secretary for Binghamton's graduate English department. She called to ask me if I'd be interested in TAing. This coming semester. For--get ready--a children's lit class. Needless to say, I replied with a surprised and grateful yes. I really need the experience, and it's great to be funding my own education again, since my pay will cover tuition for the semester. Children's lit isn't definite yet, but is the most likely outcome, and I'd love to TA within a field I love so well, and so far know more about than almost any other. (We're not doing much in the way of Newberys and stuff, though. This is mainly classic children's lit, Pinocchio and stuff.)
I won't be teaching per se, and yet I will; in Binghamton, since the liberal-arts school alone (and only counting the undergrads) is nearly triple the size of AU's whole student body, the lecture classes are big and sometimes include discussion sections. I'd be leading one of those discussion sections, so from a class of 120 or so, I'd be charged with about 25 undergrads. Ryan, who was in two of my classes this past semester (and my first acquaintence within the program, technically), is TAing two sections (for a total of 50 kids), so I don't know whether I'll also be given two or not. I've missed all of the TA training--it happened during finals week, when I hadn't yet been invited to the party--but I'll meet with Dr. Kinney (who's teaching my how-to-teach-English-to-undergrads course this semester anyway) sometime next week to get my materials and get an overview. She's not the professor I'd be TAing for, but she knows the most of what's going on.
I'm required to be going full-time to qualify for the tuition-coverage benefit, so I'll have my twelve credits' worth of classes to go to this semester as well. And, of course, there's Ninth Hour to co-coordinate. Thomas is already taking the lead with much of our planning, but the execution thereof will be a two-player game.
This means that I'm going to be busy like whoa this coming semester. Which is a little scary, inasmuch as I was busy enough already last semester. Still, things should be a little more fulfilling--I'm in classes I want to take, and some of my friends from last semester (Ryan, Jose, Natasha) will be in classes with me this semester. And, too, I've been reading (though, as usual, not diligently enough) some Shakespeare, so's to save myself some time during the semester. I'm on the second part of Henry IV, which is more interesting than I expected, considering that I have no prior experience with history plays.
On another note, last Thursday, Erik, Aneya, and Glenn all came together to visit me. It was really nice, even though the museums and stuff had all closed for the day, so all I could really offer them by way of entertainment was dinner and wandering at the mall, plus the stuff we did at my house, like look at my senior-year quotebook. I'd been all set to drive out to Rochester, but it was great to play hostess instead.
And now, since it's 5:00 or so, I'm going to get myself some dinner and go back to Shakespeare reading. This would be the perfect place for a heroic couplet, could I think of a suitable one.
1.11.2008
::siiiigh::
Well, messing with a bunch of templates later, I've determined that I apparently can't re-install my old blogskin(?!), and that these templates are very cool, but the body-text boxes are too narrow for my taste (plus, my blog title doesn't fit in the NeoNeon one's box).
Since my high school friends and I used to be kind of snobbily intent on not using Blogger's pre-given templates, I feel ashamed to admit it, but I really like this one.
On the other hand, there's another reason I can't use it: Tuttle got to it first, and I feel too much like I'm imitating his.
So scratch the previous post: I'm still working on this, and who knows where or when it'll come to an end. For now, though, I think I'm going to bed.
I really do want to update everyone on, you know, my life pretty soon. It's been a full, rich week, that's for sure.
Since my high school friends and I used to be kind of snobbily intent on not using Blogger's pre-given templates, I feel ashamed to admit it, but I really like this one.
On the other hand, there's another reason I can't use it: Tuttle got to it first, and I feel too much like I'm imitating his.
So scratch the previous post: I'm still working on this, and who knows where or when it'll come to an end. For now, though, I think I'm going to bed.
I really do want to update everyone on, you know, my life pretty soon. It's been a full, rich week, that's for sure.
1.09.2008
::groan::
The new template and the way I lost everything from my old template: I don't want to talk about it.
I'll rewrite the Binghamton-people descriptions tomorrow. And play with the colors and everything else I don't really like.
I'll rewrite the Binghamton-people descriptions tomorrow. And play with the colors and everything else I don't really like.
1.04.2008
Go-o-o-oal!
I'm always up really late on folk dancing nights--and always thinking ruefully of Mrs. Pacatte's AP-psych-class warning (during the lesson on sleep) against exercise past the early afternoon, since the activity jump shoves rest back. Well, I can't help it if it starts at 8 PM, and neither can the leaders, who have jobs.
But anyway, I am not into making New Year's resolutions. For one thing, I tend not to keep them. For another, it's too easy to get self-critical about them (as archived entries of this blog have demonstrated). I've already got my hands full doing all the things I really need to be doing--English and Christlikeness, and hopefully not in that order, either--and don't strictly need to acquire any more skills than I have, except the ones that will help me be better at English or following Jesus. Take that, critical perfectionist self.
However, here are five things that I would love to learn/do this year if I get the chance, though maybe I'll run out of time, change my mind, or decide that they're just not worth the effort. In no particular order:
1. Knitting. For real this time. Maybe with some needles that aren't so dang slippery, and definitely with a little more patience. I know crochet is also an option, but I really like the way knitted things look, so that's what I'm picking if I do either one.
2. Basic car maintenance. Quite frankly, my parents are not dedicated teachers of life skills; they don't like inconvenience or fixing beginners' mistakes. So I err to doing things self-taught or not at all; they err to doing things for me without even trying to make me understand what's going on. So, at 22, I don't know how to do anything with my car, because my dad does it all. To understate the matter, that should change. (Besides, car maintenance is largely self-taught anyway, right?)
3. While we're at it, I wouldn't mind knowing how to drive stick shift. Not that I need something else to think about while I'm driving, as motorized maneuvering is definitely not among my talents, but someday I'm going to find myself in a situation where it'd really help if I knew it. And I bet I could get Erik to teach me. (In an abandoned parking lot or something, since we long ago decided that the two of us, put together, equaled exactly one good driver.)
4. I really ought to decide, preferably before the '08 presidential election, where I stand on pretty much every issue ever. There's precious little I know via consulting research, and a lot I assume based on my environment and upbringing, which so far has split down the middle between liberal and conservative influences, leaving me with a certain amount of political identity crisis. Anyone know any good point-counterpoint websites, anything fairly bipartisan?
5. And, on the cooking front, I'd like to invest in a knife that actually chops worth a holler (I'm getting nowhere with the dull cleaver-type thing I acquired somehow) and learn how to use it.
Maybe I'll review this list at year's end and see how I did. Or maybe it won't even matter anymore.
But anyway, I am not into making New Year's resolutions. For one thing, I tend not to keep them. For another, it's too easy to get self-critical about them (as archived entries of this blog have demonstrated). I've already got my hands full doing all the things I really need to be doing--English and Christlikeness, and hopefully not in that order, either--and don't strictly need to acquire any more skills than I have, except the ones that will help me be better at English or following Jesus. Take that, critical perfectionist self.
However, here are five things that I would love to learn/do this year if I get the chance, though maybe I'll run out of time, change my mind, or decide that they're just not worth the effort. In no particular order:
1. Knitting. For real this time. Maybe with some needles that aren't so dang slippery, and definitely with a little more patience. I know crochet is also an option, but I really like the way knitted things look, so that's what I'm picking if I do either one.
2. Basic car maintenance. Quite frankly, my parents are not dedicated teachers of life skills; they don't like inconvenience or fixing beginners' mistakes. So I err to doing things self-taught or not at all; they err to doing things for me without even trying to make me understand what's going on. So, at 22, I don't know how to do anything with my car, because my dad does it all. To understate the matter, that should change. (Besides, car maintenance is largely self-taught anyway, right?)
3. While we're at it, I wouldn't mind knowing how to drive stick shift. Not that I need something else to think about while I'm driving, as motorized maneuvering is definitely not among my talents, but someday I'm going to find myself in a situation where it'd really help if I knew it. And I bet I could get Erik to teach me. (In an abandoned parking lot or something, since we long ago decided that the two of us, put together, equaled exactly one good driver.)
4. I really ought to decide, preferably before the '08 presidential election, where I stand on pretty much every issue ever. There's precious little I know via consulting research, and a lot I assume based on my environment and upbringing, which so far has split down the middle between liberal and conservative influences, leaving me with a certain amount of political identity crisis. Anyone know any good point-counterpoint websites, anything fairly bipartisan?
5. And, on the cooking front, I'd like to invest in a knife that actually chops worth a holler (I'm getting nowhere with the dull cleaver-type thing I acquired somehow) and learn how to use it.
Maybe I'll review this list at year's end and see how I did. Or maybe it won't even matter anymore.
1.01.2008
First of the New Year
I had a lovely New Year's down in near-Binghamton(!) with Joe and Andrea and Tom and Joe's dad and stepmother. We (the Alfredians) played Nanofictionary and Apples to Apples; then the others played Catan while I half watched/listened to them and half paged through Tom's library-discard copy of The Hound of the Baskervilles (it's been years since I read it). We also received lots of love, both last night and this morning, from the two dogs of the house. This morning we watched some DangerMouse, and everyone listened to my stomach vocally prove itself one of the more annoying parts of my anatomy as we waited for the very nice breakfast with which the adults, glad to see that we like food, filled bowls and plates. Tom had left his car at my house (the middle point between Lyons and Windsor) the day before, and we'd ridden together to Joe's, so we left not long after noon so he could get back home in time to prepare for going back to teaching tomorrow.
I also talked to Kristin today. And read. A lot. And now I'm going to get some sleep.
This is a lame way to end an entry, and I feel like an English graduate student such as myself, at the dawn of a bright new year, should not just come to a screeching halt like this. But I am tired, and I miss my friends, so here it is, tire marks in a skid on the pavement.
I also talked to Kristin today. And read. A lot. And now I'm going to get some sleep.
This is a lame way to end an entry, and I feel like an English graduate student such as myself, at the dawn of a bright new year, should not just come to a screeching halt like this. But I am tired, and I miss my friends, so here it is, tire marks in a skid on the pavement.