the end of the month

This past month has been interesting, to say the least.
I've had my highs, I've had my lows.
May has been hell for so many of my dearest friends.
John's dad's in hospice, the cancer back and unrelenting. It's a waiting game.
Isaac's mom is in the hospital: invasive lung cancer, and the prognosis doesn't look good.
I want to be optimistic about June, but this spring is promising to be hard as hell.

Paul tells us that Christians don't grieve like those outside Christ, those who have no hope. We have hope, even in death, but that doesn't make death any less scary. In our modernist world, we've been able, for the most part, to keep pushing death's timetable back. When that timetable's violated, it's easy to feel like we've been jipped. Never mind that death has always been a facet of life, and up until the last few centuries, it didn't carry the same weight of fear as it does now. I'll be honest: I fear death. Ever since coming face-to-face with my own mortality back in May of last year, there's been a subtle terror clawing at my bones. It's irrational on many points, when I convince myself that I'm slowly dying, being eaten away by some mysterious ailment or cancer, destined to die within the next few years. This is certainly no way to live life, and I've brought it before God in prayer time and again, and slowly he's reworking the way I see my life, the way I see death, and all of it becomes all the more striking when death, or the threat of death, looms up in the lives of loved ones all around me.

Not all is Gloom & Doom, and nor should it be.

I'm hoping June will be a good month.

I'm hoping to quit smoking everything once and for all.

I'm hoping to start running again, and I have a zombie app to keep me going.

(It's never too soon to start preparing yourself physically for the zombie apocalypse)

I want to be healthy, wealthy, and wise.

Maybe I can accomplish at least one of those.

Speaking of wisdom, Ams says I'm one of the wisest people she knows. Really, I think that just shows her to be a fool (just kidding; but seriously). No, I do tend to be wise, the problem lies in applying that wisdom to myself. I've been reading through Proverbs, bit by bit, at least once a day (sometimes two to three times: I read it while I'm pooping, so it may be that my bowel movements become consistent with my growth in wisdom). I want to live a wise life, and I'm praying for God to give me wisdom, as James tells us to do. Dan Dyke defines wisdom as living in accordance with reality, and wisdom is ultimately manipulative: it's manipulating our world for our own benefit. It's a weird way of looking at it, but manipulation isn't necessarily a bad thing (Paul does it all the time in his letters; if manipulators are jackasses, Paul would be the supreme jackass). 

My coffee's cold and far too sugary.

It's time for me to get out of here and run some errands.

Goodbye for now.

the importance of being foolish (V)

Chapter 5: A Heart of Forgiveness

"The Teacher whose attitude toward sin was so inexorable, the rigid moralist who surrounded marriage with the lofty bulwark of indissolubility, the austere judge who condemned the mere intention to do evil, the sacred man whom no breath of suspicion ever touched was not only called to be but actually was 'the friend of publicans and sinners.'"

"Jesus' gentleness with sinners flowed from his ability to read their hearts and to detect sincerity and essential goodness there. Behind people's grumpiest poses or most puzzling defense mechanisms, behind their dignified airs, coarseness, or sneers, behind their silence or their curses, Jesus saw a little child who hadn't been loved enough and who had ceased growing because those around him had ceased believing in him."

Manning says that there are "two curious phenomena [that] dapple Christian life in America today." He identifies the first as "our tendency to criticize more than complement... Many hypercritical Christians quickly deny the presence of any value anywhere and overemphasize the dark and ugly aspects of a person, situation, or institution at the expense of the noble and valuable facets. They delight in exposing the flaws and imperfections of others and glory in the absence of goodness."

The second is "the preponderance of the negative self-esteem." He says, "As Christians, those of us with negative self-esteem see ourselves as basically unlovable. We negate our own worth, are haunted by feelings of inadequacy and inferiority, and close ourselves off from the value of others because they threaten our existence. The exaltation of another is experienced as a personal attack. When a colleague is appreciated, we become upset and irritable, belittle their motives as vainglorious, and decry the perniciousness of personality cults... We select from our reality only those aspects that confirm our dim view of ourselves. We single out the dimension of a situation that points to rejection... [When] we go to bed we ignore the pleasant, even beautiful experiences of the day and instead go to sleep dwelling on the one incident that enhanced our negative self-portrait. Consequently, every such encounter becomes a total proof or disproof of our entire being. Every incident becomes a blanket condemnation of self a reaffirmation of worthlessness."

A negative self-image flows into our love for others, because as Jesus commanded, "Love others as you love yourself." Failing to love ourselves (and not in the narcissistic way) renders loving others a greater challenge. "The tendency to continually berate ourselves for real or imaginary failures, to belittle ourselves and underestimate our worth, to dwell exclusively on our dishonesty, self-centeredness, and lack of personal discipline, is the influence of our negative self-esteem. Reinforced by the critical feedback of our peers and the reproofs and humiliations of our community, we seem radically incapable of accepting, forgiving, or loving ourselves... The ability to love oneself is the root and foundation of our ability to love others and to love God. I can tolerate in others only what I can accept in myself."

Manning quotes Francis McNutt (and I really like this): "If Jesus Christ has forgiven you all your sins and washed you in his own blood, what right do you have not to forgive yourself?"

"When Jesus' eyes scanned the streets and hillsides, he felt compassion because the people were leaderless. He wept over Jerusalem. His words were not full of blaming and shaming, castigating and moralizing, accusing and guilt-inducing, ridiculing and belittling, threatening and bribing, evaluating and labeling. His mind was constantly inhabited by God's forgiveness... He was merciless only with those who showed contempt for human dignity; he had no compassion for those who laid intolerable burdens on the backs of others and refused to carry them themselves. He unmasked the illusions and superficial good intentions of the Pharisees for what they were and called them hypocrites, 'a brood of vipers'... He had no mercy for those who showed no mercy and an utter lack of compassion for the uncompassionate."

"A Christian who doesn't merely see but looks at another communicates to that person that he is being recognized as a human being in an impersonal world of objects, as someone and not something. If this simply psychological reality, difficulty and demanding as it is, were actualized in human relationships, perhaps 98 percent of the obstacles to living like Jesus would be eliminated. For this is the very foundation of justice: the ability to recognize the other as a human being with the sign of the Lamb glowing on his brow."

"To be compassionate is to understand the conflicts other people have created in themselves without getting caught up in their poignant drama; you realize your compassion will be most effective if you stay centered in loving acceptance."

"To live and think as Jesus did is to discover the sincerity, goodness, and truth often hidden behind the gross, coarse exteriors of our fellow human beings. It is to see the good in others that they don't see in themselves and to affirm this good in the face of powerful evidence to the contrary. It is not a blind optimism that ignores the reality of evil but a perspective that acknowledges the good so repeatedly and  so insistently that the wayward must eventually respond in agreement."

"The axis of the Christian moral revolution is love (Jesus called it the sign by which the disciple would be recognized). The danger lurks in our subtle attempts to minimize, rationalize, and justify our moderation in this regard. Turning the other cheek, walking the extra mile, offering no resistance to injury, being reconciled with one another, and forgiving seventy times seven times are not arbitrary whims of the Savior. He did not preface his Sermon on the Mount with, 'It would be nice if...' His 'new' commandment structures the new covenant in his blood. So central is the precept of love that Paul called it the fulfillment of the Law."

"Thomas Merton stated that a 'good' Christian who harbors hatred in his heart toward any person or ethnic group is objectively an apostate from the Christian faith."

when you're feeling down...

Kill some zombies.

Really, what I miss is Microsoft Flight Simulator.
I've been watching lots of "Flying Wild Alaska."
It REALLY makes me want to fly.

the importance of being foolish (IV)

Chapter Four: Finding the Father

"Living in this place of supreme rest [the mind of Christ] is neither a dreamy abstraction nor an excuse for removing ourselves from the urgent needs of the world... Rather, this is a place of centering. In quiet listening, Christians start from where we are, discover what we have, and realize that we have already arrived. There is no need to pursue God, to beg for God to become known to us. Paul writes, 'Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you?'"

"There is no need to run after security, pleasure, and power, as the unbelievers do. The kingdom of God is within us. All that is necessary is to slow down to a human tempo, and take time to listen. God has been there all the time."

"Here we stop worrying about what we don't have because we are taking the time to appreciate and enjoy what we do have. The greater percentage of the unnecessary, self-induced suffering in our lives is eliminated because the addictions that once pushed us toward achieving security, experiencing pleasure, and developing power no longer assert themselves with their absurd demands for instant satisfaction. Worry and anxiety no longer drive us, for we realize they are not borne of the gospel and carry no redemptive significance. They only prolong the times of darkness in our life and can be eliminated by submitting our thoughts to the Lordship of Jesus Christ."

"When the outside conditions of life no longer make for security or insecurity, when the trivial and inevitable problems of our daily routine have lost their power to splinter our concentration and fragment our existence, we perceive the world as a friendlier place. We experience everyone and everything around us in a different way--not in terms of how they meet our addictive needs but as singular manifestations of truth, goodness, and beauty in the world."

"The perception of God being enough is the hallmark of the transparent life. Gone are the tensions, hassles, and struggles that signal entrapment by our basest desires. The restless scanning of the horizon for new experiences ceases; the constant churning of the mind for escapes and distractions disappears."

"Our ability to put on the mind of Christ Jesus comes by virtue of our sacred union with him... The power to love God wholeheartedly is the birthright of those reborn in the Spirit of Jesus Christ. It is what allows us to move out into the world as crystalline bearers of God's image."

the 24th week

"A pair of monsters!" - Brandy Rae Galloway

Monday. Dave & I opened, and after an afternoon of hanging out with Blake and Traci and Ams & Isaac, I went to The Anchor. It was almost too hot for coffee. The rest of my evening was spent at the Loth House watching Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure.

Tuesday. I opened, went to The Anchor, and spent the evening dicking around with the Internet. All of a sudden it’s stopped working. Ams came over, and we played Call of Duty since we couldn’t watch Netflix.

Wednesday. Another day absent internet, so I went to The Anchor to get online but their internet was out, too! What luck. So I cruised through downtown to hang out with Amos at the Loth House for a while.

Thursday. I forewent The Anchor: the cable guy came over and fixed our internet. “Weirdest thing: your upstairs neighbors seem to have somehow gouged out your internet box by running into it and smashing it with their car.” The culprit diagnosed and dealt with, it was nice having internet back. I went to the Loth House for a while but didn’t stay long.

Friday. Ams had to move out of her house a week early ‘cause her landlord’s an idiot. After opening with Eric (such a slow day), I jetted up to Dayton to watch the dogs while Mom, Dad, and Ams were in Georgia for Alex’s graduation party. Tyler came over, and it was so good to see him: he’s living with his girlfriend, is in love, has a great job, life’s going great for him. I fight the envy. We got Wendy’s, chowed down on ice cream, watched Arrested Development, and chilled out in the kitchen. He headed home and I spent the evening hanging out with Tanner and Sky and contemplating, once again, the goodness and love of God. Reading Romans 1, we find that God “gives people up.” But he doesn’t do that to his own children. His love isn’t just seen in what he gives us, but also in what he keeps us from. He sabotages our own self-sabotage, as I put it several days ago. He stands in for us when we’re weak, thwarts those aims that will leave us in a far worse place. It’s an incredible thought: for all my issues, for all my waywardness, for all my sins and shortcomings, God genuinely likes me and is looking out for me when I’m not looking out for myself.

Saturday. Stephanie and I got breakfast at Bob Evan’s. We’ve decided we’re best just being friends, though we did explore (at least verbally) a romantic relationship for a bit. Truth be told, I’m still hung up over Mandy K. The hang up cost me a relationship with Mo, and it’s possibly keeping me from a great relationship with Stephanie. But until I deal with these… feelings… for the Wisconsinite, I’m in no place to date. I’ll just reinforce my reputation of leaving broken hearts in my wake. I spent the day writing before heading to Columbus for John’s bachelor party. As I was nearing the city I got a call from Josh: the party was cancelled. John’s dad is in really bad shape: apparently the lymphoma’s back (he was declared clean a few weeks ago), and it’s worse than ever. Both John and Brandy cancelled their respective parties to high-tail it to Dayton to be with John’s dad. It’s awful, simply awful, sickeningly awful.

Sunday. Oh man. WHAT A DAY. Not only did the fourth season of Arrested Development come out, but I went to North Park and sat on the log down by the ravine and Mandy K. texted me, initiating a 4-hour talk about “us.” She dropped the equivalent of a bombshell: she wants to try again, or at least is thinking about it. Basically she likes what I want, she’s still interested, and though she isn’t 100% sure, she wants to try again. She said timing in 2011 was off, but we’ve both done a lot of growing since then, and she wants to pick up where we left off: Skype, phone calls, visits. She wants to really explore this, see if it can work. I’m excited, hesitant, scared, disbelieving. I’m on edge, half-expecting her to call everything off come sunset and sunrise. So I’m just going to see what happens. I headed down to Cincinnati to watch Clover (John & Brandy spent most of the day in Dayton, and Amos is in North Carolina with Blake & Isaac getting tattooed). When John and Brandy returned to the Loth House, they gave us the scoop: chemo isn’t working, they can’t do a bone marrow transplant without successful chemo, and they say Jim has days or weeks to live. He’s being set up in hospice and then he’ll get care at home. We cried, we consoled one another, and we took steps to just shut down our minds. All of this, the hope of Mandy K. and the tragedy of Jim, just makes me feel… numb.

a post absent hashtags, brackets, ellipses and asterisks

I noticed the last thirteen posts have been resplendent with hashtags, brackets, ellipses and asterisks. It reads like something a preteen girl would put in her junior high scrapbook. One of them was even inspired by Ke$ha, for God's sake. If only to try and look like a respectable adult (hilarity), here's a post to stop the train-wreck before it gets out of control (although, by nature, a train-wreck is absent control; so who knows what the hell I'm saying). 

I've been kinda sad lately.
An odd sort of sadness. An empty sadness.
I feel lost and alone, adrift with nothing and no one to look forward to.
A subtle sadness underscoring everything.
A quiet sadness, only noticeable when I stop to take a breath.
A lingering sadness. I'm sure this is how Frodo felt when he left Rivendell.

I've written a lot about girls and dating and my issues lately. I look a little obsessive, and that concerns me. So I'm asking myself, "Am I being obsessive?" And, no, I don't think so. Although it may seem that this occupies every ounce of my mind and spirit as I write it about it on this blog, it's not that big a deal in "real life." The posts themselves come off as overly dramatic, but that's just the overthinking, passionate writer in me (coupled with a dose of recovering-emo-kid in me). It may almost seem that I'm "desperate for a girlfriend." That's not at all the case, and if it were, I'd easily have a girlfriend right now. Hell, I seem to be desperate for singleness, breaking up with every good soul that comes my way. Truth be told, I may be a little too picky. I'm always picking women apart, comparing them to this or that, seeing if they measure up. It really stifles the dating process, erects a barrier to actually getting to know the person. No, I'm not desperate for a girlfriend; last month I had three women who simultaneously wanted to be with me. I'm not saying that to brag; it's only happened ONCE, EVER, and it happened to be recently. Point is, I'm still single, I didn't want to be with any of them. Thus I'm not desperate for a girlfriend. I think I just know who I am and I know what I want, and I take that seriously enough not to be nonchalant and casual about it. Dating for me is purposeful rather than recreational, and that makes it all the more wearying and frustrating. 

What I mean is: I know what I want, and I'm not going to settle for less ("Speaking of settling, how's Anne?"). What I'm looking for is this: [leave computer for ten minutes to write out a brief list so that it's not evident I'm writing this on a whim] I'm looking for a woman who's faithful and loyal, caring and affectionate, a woman who has a good sense of humor (I know looking for a woman with my sense of humor would be akin to looking for an openly-practicing Jew in 1944 Germany). I want a woman who's welcoming of my quirks and accepting of my flaws, a woman who doesn't judge me for my issues and struggles, but who will love me despite them and encourage me in the midst of them. We'll never be free of such things, so that's a must. I want a woman who's a good conversationalist, and who's intelligent. We need to have a connection, we need to be able to be open and vulnerable and honest with one another. I want a woman who wants the same things out of life, primarily sharing in life's adventures, partnering together in our mission, and raising our family in Christ. On that note, I want a woman who's Christian and not just in name only. I don't think less of women who don't share my views, but it's helpful when life's approached from the same worldview. And as for those "feelings" that I wrote so much about several posts back, I need to accept the fact that love doesn't flourish overnight, and I can't "make or break" my next relationship with a wonderful woman based upon some nostalgic longing for a feeling that took years to produce and weeks to come to a head. 

I feel that being a good husband and a good father is part of who I am meant to be.

I feel that this if there's ever a reason for me to be here, this is it.

I can't detach myself from it, and it's a bitch to accept but I've done it.

So, no, I'm not desperate, I'm purposeful and passionate. And so it winds up on the blog.

Now that we're past the disclaimer, what else is new?

Tazza Mia has been completely redone; pics to come!

I'm house-sitting in Dayton for the weekend, keeping Sky and Tanner out of trouble.

Tonight I'm doing dinner with John, Josh, and a bunch of others for John's bachelor party.

He and Brandy are getting married next month in Stubb's Park.

I think I'm going to go walk around there before heading to Columbus.

TTFN (Tigger). 

*D*I*N*O*S*A*U*R*S*

The asterisks represent glitter. This is how Ke$ha would title a blog post.
I found these videos while cruising the interwebs.
It would be incredible to see this, and even better to be inside the dinosaur.
I want a robot suit like these. Oh, the things I would do to with it. 

[sleeping sickness]

I awoke only to find my lungs empty, and through the night.
So it seems I'm not breathing. 
And now my dreams are nothing like they were meant to be.
And I'm breaking down, I think I'm breaking down.

And I'm afraid to sleep because of what haunts me,
such as living with the uncertainty 
that I'll never find the words to say
which would completely explain
just how I'm breaking down.

Someone come and someone come and save my life.
Maybe I'll sleep when I am dead, but now it's like the night is taking sides
with all the worries that occupy the back of my mind.
Could it be that this misery will suffice?

I've become a simple souvenir of someone's kill,
and like the sea, I'm constantly changing from calm to ill.
Madness fills my heart and soul
as if the Great Divide could swallow me whole.
Oh, how I'm breaking down.

the 23rd week

John: the definition of a MAN!

Monday. I was sick all day, and work was hell. I skipped out on Monday Nights, but Ams gave me a banana boat (epic fail on my part, got it all over the oven), and Isaac gave me some homemade, delicious chicken spring rolls. I was awake for only a couple hours after work: I took a long nap and crashed early. Damn allergies. The culprit: two days of rain followed by a sunny, cold day. So many people are sick.

Tuesday. Tibbles and Isaac helped cover most of my shift so I could recuperate: I didn’t sleep much, went in at 6:30, the espresso machine was off and so was the water, and I was sick as a dog. Absolutely miserable. Tiffany, like I said, bailed me out; and I went home and took a longgggg nap, and Ams came over and fixed me pasta and salad for dinner, though I could hardly stomach it.

Wednesday. I felt much better today. It was nice just to be able to breathe! I went to The Anchor after work, and before Mario-Kart with John, Brandy and Amos I went by Ams’ and she made stir-fry and Roxy got so riled up at my presence that she vomited three times.

Thursday. Frank didn’t show up to open so Amos covered his shift. Frank had to take Amos’ shift, but he passed it off to Isaac. I yelled at Dave again. He hates me. *SIGH* After work I went to The Anchor and spent the evening at the Loth House hanging out with John and Amos.

Friday. I had the day off work. I spent it reading, made a trip downtown to do the food order, and played video games and watched Doctor Who with Amos. I headed north to meet up with an old friend named Stephanie; we’ve been chatting off and on. She has an adorable little condo, well-kept and peaceful. We made ice cream and I delivered two bags of coffee: Sumatra and Honduras. We spent the evening on her brand-new porch swing, talking and listening to music. I left for Cincinnati around 2 AM.

Saturday. Andy, Amos and I did Dusmesh for lunch, and after hanging out with Isaac and Ams I headed north and met up with Stephanie at her condo. We watched TV, played UNO at Stubb’s Park, and got ice cream for dinner. Another section of my exhaust broke, so I spent the night at Mom & Dad’s.

Sunday. I joined Stephanie for church at Centerville Community, and then Mom, Dad, Ams and I belatedly celebrating Mother’s Day with lunch and flowers at some pub in Lebanon. Dad & I worked on the Celica, tied up the loose exhaust. “If you hear what sounds like a World War One biplane, don’t get excited: it’s just my car idling.” I swung by Stephanie’s to see her before heading home.

am i expecting too much? (III)

A better title for this post would be "resolutions regarding dating," but I want to keep the chain in this three-part thought process alive. Thinking about all that I have written, and much that I haven't, I've made a few resolutions when it comes to dating:

Don't Be An Idiot. Just because I go out with a girl and don't feel that same feeling I felt up in Wisconsin doesn't mean the relationship won't work. Love takes time. Mumford and Sons has a song about that. Expecting love to blossom overnight is ridiculous: it didn't blossom overnight with her, I just have a tendency to remember things wrong. It's quite okay to go on a few dates and then decide not to pursue something with a girl. I do it all the time. But the reasons should be legit, not, "I'm not reminded of Wisconsin, so this just doesn't feel right." Yeah. I've got issues.

Be Proactive. (this has nothing to do with the acne cream) Tyler and I were talking the other day, and I told him that when it comes to dating, and going out with girls, I already find myself looking at things differently. My eyes are more upon their qualities and personality than upon how they look or make me feel. I've got my eye out for Red Flags (lots of experience has shown me things I absolutely do NOT want in women), but so often I let the false red flag, that of not feeling a newness of life around them, dictate whether or not the relationship moves forward. I've got to be more proactive not just in paying attention to a woman's character but also more proactive in not expecting to find my heart all aflutter and aglow in her presence and in her laughter. That takes time, and for me, perhaps, quite a lot of time.

Keep My Eyes Open. If I'm of the persuasion that when the "right person" comes along I'll find myself smitten by love and head-over-heels, wanting to sacrifice everything just to be with them, then I could be waiting for a long time. It's funny: were I to go back to 2009 and base my pursuit of the Wisconsinite off of how I felt about her in 2011, then according to my current mode of operation I'd be saying, "Well, I don't feel that way about her, so it won't work." I'd write off the Wisconsinite, not knowing that two and a half years later I'd be ready to abandon everything just to be with her. I can't expect to fall in love overnight, and I can't act like if it doesn't happen immediately, it won't. Acting this way blinds me to those wonderful women who come into my life. I need to be patient. Love needs to grow, as it did with her, and as I didn't let it do with Mo.

Don't Expect a Fairy-Tale. I know that if things would've went the way I wanted in 2011, there wouldn't have been a fairy tale. Sure, we'd have a good story, and we have a connection, and we would've been quite all right. But we would've had our shitty days, the feelings would fade, and once the honeymoon phase passed, we'd be back at the daily grind, dealing with the same things we deal with now, only not dealing with them alone. Next time a wonderful woman wants to be with me and raise a family with me, I need to make sure I don't write it off for something stupid, i.e. fairy-tale-esque expectations. 

am i expecting too much? (II)

I remember back in May '11 a girl I was talking to and really wanted to date couldn't decide whether or not she wanted to date me. Her reasoning? She confessed it quite clearly: "I really like you. I like your personality, you're funny, we have a connection that I haven't felt with anyone in a long time, I know we'd be great together, but I don't want to jump your bones. I want someone who's tall and dark and strong." She was afraid she'd be settling by being with me, because settling, despite what we're told, is ending up with someone who doesn't make you all hot and bothered. Thus dating someone who doesn't respect you, treat you right, or even abuses you, but who makes you feel really horny, isn't settling; but being with someone who doesn't make you want to go at it like rabbits but who wants to provide for you, sacrifice for you, share life with you and love you, is settling.

It's dumb on so many levels, it really is. Chemistry isn't enough anymore: you need to be hot and sexy. That becomes the benchmark for deciding whether or not to date someone, regardless of the fact that in a good five years either one of you may have gained 200 pounds and be far from attractive. The preponderance of cheating and affairs within marriages testifies to this fact. It's not a good way to measure who you should be with, and it's no surprise that so many marriages end in failure. Chart a course through the past several decades, and what to do you see? Divorces and failed marriages on the increase as people base their decisions on things like physical attractiveness, material wealth, and fleeting feelings of fancy.

When the honeymoon phase is over, what matters? Life continues: the good, the bad, the ugly and the beautiful. What matters is having someone who won't leave your side, who will help you and encourage you through all of it, someone who will share your highs and lows, and someone who shares all their glories and shit-storms with you. Marriage is sharing life together, two lives rolling into one, and what matters then is the QUALITY of the person rather than how they make you FEEL. Not only are feelings circumstantial and fade, but there's no historical precedent for it. The very concept of romantic feelings is relatively new, an ideal born out of the Middle Ages and cemented by the Renaissance and Enlightenment. Mythical stories of knights in shining armor and damsels in distress excited the people, and we made the mistake of blurring the line between fiction and reality. We take these fairy tales, these fables and all their off-shoots, and we mold our lives around them, to the detriment of ourselves and our relationships. 

We're so obsessed with that feeling as a prerequisite to a relationship, of sharing life with someone, that we fail to see the obvious people whom God has put in our lives, people who want to share life with us. We measure everything against feeling a certain way, or we measure people against a certain ideal that, half the time, we can't even sketch out if we tried to ("I'll know it when it comes," we say; and, "When the right person for me comes along, I'll just know." How many have found such "right people" only to find themselves divorced ten years later?). Because we're waiting on something we can't even put into words, we blind ourselves to the wonderful people whom God has put before us. We push them away because they don't "measure up" and continue asking, "Why hasn't God brought me someone?"

And in all of this, I can't help but think of Mo. She would've been a good wife and a good mother. Sure, we had our differences, but nothing we couldn't get over. What bothered me most was that I didn't feel with Mo what I felt with the one who came and went before her. But my life had changed a lot by the time Mo came along, and though Mo and I dated off-and-on for about eight months total, the other girl and I knew each other for four years. When I first liked her in 2009, I didn't feel the way I felt in 2011. It was the evolution of the friendship, the steady getting to know her, the good and the bad, her strengths and weaknesses, her highs and lows, that I found my heart opening without restraint. I wanted to be vulnerable with her, share my life with her, serve her and sacrifice for her. But this feeling didn't come out-of-the-blue, but evolved over time, and it reached its pinnacle right as the axe fell. There was never an end to the honeymoon stage; all I knew was that with her I felt something different. When Mo came along, there wasn't time for love to grow. I didn't give us time. I don't fall in love fast; many of my girlfriends have told me they love me, but I've only told one girlfriend out of nine that I loved her. I take love seriously, and because I didn't feel right away for Mo what I felt after four years of knowing the other girl, I questioned everything with her. I expected too much, expected something illogical and irrational, and I couldn't see what I had.

She loved me and was devoted to me.

She accepted all my quirks and weirdness.

She knew my weaknesses and vulnerabilities and loved me anyways.

She was affectionate and sweet; she cared for me.

She wanted to spend the rest of her life with me.

She wanted to have beautiful children together.

And because I expected too much, because I was blinded by my own obsession for irrational and illogical fairy-tale feelings, I threw away the best I ever had: someone who loved me, wanted to be with me, and who wanted to build a family with me. An answer to so many prayers, and I didn't see it. 

Self-sabotage.

It's how I roll.

am i expecting too much? (I)

We're told not to settle, but that advice may leave us dying childless and alone. 

We're told "settling" means being with someone who's less than you deserve.

But, really, "settling" means marrying someone who doesn't make you all hot and bothered.

The quality of the person is peripheral; of prime importance is the way they make you feel.

What's important is how your brain chemicals react in the other's presence.

And that's how we make some of our most important decisions.

Really, we're acting like animals but pretending we're civilized.

We're so easily misled. There are moments when we're with someone and the world feels right, we feel like we're coming alive, finding ourselves again. There's a quick in our step and an exhilaration in our blood and we risk daring to hope that sometimes, just maybe, dreams come true. I held her hand in mine as we walked the quiet small town streets and I felt all these things, and I haven't felt them since. I keep asking myself Why I felt the way I did, and Why I just can't seem to find that again. Perhaps these feelings were circumstantial: it wasn't so much her as what she symbolized, a resurrection of my true self and the touch of God's favor in my life. I want to believe that, of course, because the alternative is that I felt the way I did because it was nothing short of love. If it's the former rather than the latter, then I can write it off to sleep deprivation and unpolluted country air. If it's the latter, well, that means something, and I have to try and make sense of it without going crazy at the same time. If there's meaning to it, and it was for nothing, then the meaning's lost, betrayed by history. 

Such connections are rare, like ships passing in the night. Am I to interpret what I felt as love? When Bo and I were talking back in late March, I was on the fence about dating her since she lived so far away (at least an hour). But with the other, I was ready to move 15 hours in a heartbeat to be with her. I've never felt that way about anyone: willing to leave friends and family to embark on an adventure with someone quite unlike anyone you've ever met before. It's almost been two years since we "talked," since I held her hand, but I still think of her quite often. I haven't felt that way about anyone since Courtney, and even then, there was something different about her. The perfect match, everything I've ever wanted, yearned for, prayed for in a woman. But it wasn't just that: with her, us, there was a wholeness. She made my world come alive, made me see things differently, beautifully. And since she's gone, a certain darkness has settled, broken only by brief flickers of bleak light. I don't know if I love her, or loved her, but I know it's the closest thing to it that I've known. If love isn't the giving and sharing of yourself, of sacrificing and serving for another, then what is it? Because that's precisely what I wanted with her. I haven't felt that, or wanted that, with anyone since her, and it's stained my relationships. 

I measure everything against that, everyone against her. When I go out on dates, I'm thinking, "Oh, she's like her in this way," or, "Oh, she's different in this way..." It's as if I'm trying to capture what I can't have. Measuring everything against the way I felt back then is ridiculous, because it's naive: I can't base what I think we would've been like off a three-day weekend when all felt right and real. If we ended up together we would've had shitty days, we would've fought, we would've gotten under each other's skin and irritated the hell out of one another. There would be times when we'd just want to not be around one another. Measuring everything against what I felt isn't just naive, it's also self-sabotage: I inadvertently blind myself to other women who would be great with me. On top of all this, if what I felt was more circumstantial than any "feeling from God," then I'm putting weight and meaning upon something that really has no weight and meaning, and I'm basically saying, "If my brain chemicals aren't working in such a way as to make me feel the things I felt up north, then there's no future here." That's pretty damned stupid. 

This "flash of love," this "feeling" that I'm striving for, it's just a feeling. Had we ended up together, that feeling wouldn't have lasted. Not at all. Life's still shitty, and I still have my down days. Perhaps it's unfortunate that the time I spent with her happened to circumstantially be some of the best times I've had in the past couple years: not just things with her, but getting out of the city for a while, going on a road trip, living life down in Cincinnati at the Claypole House with all those people who mean so much to me, I actually enjoyed working where I work and was (for some reason) proud of it. Life just happened to be going well, and she was part of that but not ALL of that. How many married couples, happy and in love, will tell you that they feel a sort of "coming alive" with their spouse, a freedom with their spouse (good luck with that one), that they're eyes are opened on a daily basis by the one they love, that those euphoric feelings better than drunkenness still underscore their interactions and conversations and life together? That's not what you find. Because those feelings fade.

Expecting a pie-in-the-sky, lovey-dovey, all the world's aright and my heart's afire kind of love is expecting too much. The feeling of love is biochemical, after all; and science has shown that people's  feelings of love for one another are rather dependent upon outside forces. Our feelings are circumstantial. Those feelings of infatuation, of love, whatever you want to call it, they fade and there are no exceptions. The honeymoon phase, when those feelings are alive and well, that's a pleasant stage. But it doesn't last. And if a relationship or marriage is based on feelings, it won't last, either. Waiting on that "flash of love," waiting to be smitten or swept off your feet, leaves you waiting for something fleeting, waiting for something that won't last, and you may be left waiting forever.

#photostakenthroughwindows

[ill with want]

I am sick with wanting, and it's evil and it's daunting,
how I let everything I cherish lay to waste.
I am lost in greed this time, it's definitely me.
I point fingers but there's no one there to blame.

I need for something, not let me break it down again.
I need for something, but not more medicine.
And everyday is worse than the one before.

The more I have the more I think, I'm almost where I need to be.
If only I could get a little more.

Something has me (something has me),
oh something has me (something has me)
acting like someone I don't want to be.
Something has me (something has me),
oh something has me (something has me)
acting like someone I know isn't me.

Ill with want and poisoned by this ugly greed.
Temporary is my time, ain't nothing on this world that's mine,
except the will I found to carry on.
Free is not your right to choose,
it's answering what's asked of you,
to give the love you find until it's gone.

I need for something, but not more medicine.
Oh something has me (something has me),
oh something has me (something has me)
acting like someone I know isn't me.
Ill with want and poisoned by this ugly greed.

the importance of being foolish (III)

Chapter Three: Diversions

In this chapter Brennan Manning looks at three desires that stifle movement towards Christlike transparency: the desires for security, pleasure, and power.

Security

"In trembling insecurity, the believer pleads for and even demands tangible reassurances from the Lord that his affection is returned. If he does not receive them, he is disheartened, frustrated, maybe even convinced that it's all over or that it never really existed. If he does receive them, he is reassured, but only for a time. He presses for further proofs--each one less convincing than the one that went before. In the end this false trust dies of pure frustration."

"Peace and joy go a-begging when the heart of a Christian longs for one sign after another of God's merciful love. Nothing is taken for granted and nothing is received with gratitude. The troubled eyes and furrowed brow of the anxious believer are the symptoms of a heart where trust has not found a home."

"Insecurity not only paralyzes our relationship with the living God but has a devastating effect on interpersonal relationships. It is the starting point of all social estrangement. It breaks down openness, which is the bridge to the existential world of the other. It undermines real communication and causes a kind of rupture in the evolution of authentic personality."

"The church of Jesus Christ is a place of promise and possibility, of adventure and discovery, a community of love on the move, strangers and exiles in a foreign land en route to the heavenly Jerusalem. But the security seekers are the enemies of openness."

"Living dependent on 'security' defeats carefree trust in God's wisdom and love, hurts interpersonal relationships, thwarts ongoing community renewal and Christian reunion, and handicaps the serious Christian who seeks to have the mind of Christ Jesus."

Pleasure

"When forms of pleasure, leisure, and recreation refresh mind and body and revitalize the spirit, they bring a sense of balance, rest, and wholeness. But sought after for themselves, they send us on a roller-coaster ride during which each sensation must be greater than the last one for the thrill to continue."

"[Many] Christians practice an ambivalent 'prudence of the flesh' that seeks a sort of gilded mediocrity: the self is carefully distributed between flesh and spirit, with a watchful eye on both. Paul calls this 'imperfect spiritual vision.' It is the vision of those who have received the Spirit but remain spiritual infants because they do not subject themselves fully to the domination of the Spirit; they yield to their passions, thus letting their drives confine them to an infantile spirituality. Paul compares them to babies unable to take food."

Manning quotes Jean Mouroux: "The perfect Christian is he who does not normally yield to the demands of the flesh, and who is normally docile to the impulses of the Spirit."

"We Christians are as prone to chemical dependency, affairs, self-serving friendships, and risky behavior as those who don't claim to hold Christ in their hearts. We seek and search for ways to fill up the gaping hole in our lives, yet come away from these experiences with little more than a temporary sense of completion."

Power

"[The] quest for power is not limited to material gains or the drive to rule a personal empire. The pull of power is the force behind the desire to acquire knowledge as a means of achieving recognition as an 'interesting' person."

"[Still] we persist in our efforts to contradict God, crazily choosing death over life, stasis over dynamism, domination over submission, power over surrender. But God refuses to let us have the last word in anything. And that is God's prerogative."

"Life driven by our desire for security, pleasure, and power dims the Light within us and introduces unnecessary mental and emotional sufferings, which are misconstrued as spiritual trials or the inevitable growth pains of the Spirit. This is erroneous discernment."

"The anxious striving for security, the vehement pursuit of physical and spiritual pleasure, and the desperate bid for power banish peace and joy, serenity and self-possession, gentleness, patience, and the other fruits of the Spirit. The gospel of Jesus Christ promises no relief, deliverance, or fulfillment for these self-inflicted maladies apart from full submission to the mind of Christ. They must be surgically uprooted in their very center, and the power to perform the operation is ours. It is not the stuff of circumstances that steals our Promethean fire but our incessant addictions, needs, and desires."

the 22nd week

Brandy, me, and my hideous excuse for a beard

Monday. I dreamt that the Wisconsinite and I were drunk with love for one another. I fight these fantasies by day but am helpless against them at night. But even if I had control over my dreams, I don’t think I’d have it in me to end them when they came. I like them too much. A taste of what I want but can’t have. How can you miss what you never had? I’ve made out, fooled around, had sex; but nothing made me feel the way her hand in mine made me feel. Is that normal? Am I sane? I look back through my journals since 2009, and she’s there AGAIN and AGAIN. I’ve never been able to forget her; will an increased effort change anything? On that haunted trail with her in my arms, I thought God was FINALLY answering my prayers. It seems he wasn’t. Another disappointment, another scar; all I can do is keep hoping, praying, waiting. God says he answers our cries when we’re persistent. I’ll put that to the test. I’m going to badger him until it’s torturous to keep listening. My prayers is that God will crush all my love for her and bring me someone just as awesome as her (not better than her, because, come on, let’s be realistic).

Tuesday. I worked 6:30-1:00. On my way to The Anchor I stopped by UDF and ran into Ams. I handed her the house key and went on my way. They’d waxed the floor, so I couldn’t sit in “my” booth. I almost left! But the other room was empty, so I made do in the corner. When I got home I found Ams doing homework. We played Call of Duty and watched episodes of SVU and I made chicken and a baked potato for dinner.

Wednesday. I covered Sarah’s Food Prep shift, and we were crazy busy all day. I spent a hot minute at The Anchor after work, then headed over to Amos’. We played Mario-Kart and watched Doctor Who. Ferocious rains came, and I headed home in a dark and eerie downpour.

Thursday. Eric & I opened, and I spent the afternoon reading: finished both Stokesbury’s A Short History of World War One and Shaara’s To The Last Man. I went to The Anchor before picking up Amos for Small Group. Tiffany fixed a dinner of hot dogs and mac-&-cheese, and Amos and I contributed a veggie tray and a roasted chicken from Kroger.

Friday. I opened with Isaac. Sarah brought in some homemade oil to make the day easier. Bob’s truck was towed and Brandon scrambled with a catering order. We closed the shop at 2 PM and had a Store Meeting, talking about all the renovations happening this weekend. We were going to “volunteer,” but Bob wisely hired professionals to do all the work. Hammering rains swept downtown, and Amos and I retired to his place for a night of grilling out with John & Brandy, Andy & Ams, and Blake & Traci.

Saturday. I’m writing this in a crouched position not unlike that of a World War One soldier writing love letters on his last day alive. My day was spent deep-cleaning and doing laundry in Dayton. Driving around my old hometown, I was overcome with nostalgia for those days with Jessica and Carly. Jessica’s dating an Air Force guy now, and they’re pretty serious, cohabitation and all. Carly’s doing who-knows-what. It struck me that all those memories were two years ago. I sent Carly a message on Facebook to see if she wanted to hang out sometime. That was two weeks ago, and no reply. I don’t blame her: a lot has happened in the past two years, at least for them. My group of friends remains virtually the same (a testament to the durability and quality of such friendships), and I’m doing the same old thing. I can’t keep letting nostalgia get the best of me, and Facebook doesn’t help: it’s all too easy to ruminate, and rumination gets the best of me nine times out of ten. My life can’t be wrapped up in my past. It’s one of my biggest weaknesses.

Mother’s day. I went to The Anchor before grabbing lunch at Dusmesh with Amos. Ams joined us at his place for Mario-Kart, and then she followed me home. We hung out with Blake, did some grocery shopping at the Kroger down the street, and had baked potatoes, corn, and pasta for dinner while watching SVU. Mom cancelled our Mother’s Day plans.

on historical fiction (III)

The last time I had an historical fiction update was way back in October. I haven't done much fiction reading as of late, have been plowing through books on the French and Indian War. However, I've staked out some decent leisure time and have allowed myself to indulge reading without underlining or note-taking. I can actually get through a chapter a night instead of a chapter every week! I'm still running with the scheme from October, pairing historical fiction with historical nonfiction. I've been reading up on the Great War (a.k.a. World War One). It's a fascinating war for all sorts of reasons, and bloody, too. Although the death toll seems not-so-bad in comparison to the war that would come two decades later, it was still a damned bloody war with the death toll in the millions. World War One marks the beginning of submarine warfare and the use of aeroplanes in combat. 

The historical fiction I chose was Jeff Shaara's To the Last Man (the mystic monk Rasputin commented that if war were to break out in 1914, it'd be a war down "to the last man", which I'm positive Shaara's referencing). Shaara writes almost strictly from an American point-of-view, so the first half of the book follows the war through the exploits of the American fighter pilots in the Lafayette Escadrille. The second half of the book follows the exploits of the American soldiers on the western front; the war was almost over when the United States leapt onto the scene, and grudgingly-so; Wilson ran a presidential campaign based on the slogan "Too Proud to Fight" (whatever the hell that means) and with his achievement of keeping the United States out of war. Reelected, what does he go and do? Join the war. He's a lame duck, who can blame him?

The second book is Stokesbury's A Short History of World War One. Stokesbury's little book takes the wide sweep of the war and condenses it to a mere few hundred pages. He examines different aspects of the war in different chapters, zeroing in on things such as submarine warfare and the emergence of aerial combat, but overall he simply gives a chronology of the war through the biggest battles. It's a great starter, I'd say, for anyone interested in the war. The next few books I have on the lineup go into more detail, and I'm looking forward to reading them paired with fictional novels (and I may or may not read All Quiet on the Western Front, just because it's so damned cliche).

the importance of being foolish (II)

Chapter Two: Transparency

"To have the mind of Christ Jesus, to think his thoughts, share his ideals, dream his dreams, throb with his desires, replace our natural responses to persons and situations with the concern of Jesus, and make the mind-set of Christ so completely our own that 'the life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me' (Galatians 2:20), is not the secret of or the shortcut to transparency. It is transparency."

"The endless struggle for enough money, good feelings, and prestige yields a rich harvest of worry, frustration, suspicion, anger, jealousy, anxiety, fear, resentment. These powerful, emotion-backed desires cause 99 percent of the self-inflicted and unnecessary suffering in our lives. They continually focus our attention on self and keep us from being transparent, dimming the light and obscuring 'the glory of God in the face of Christ' (2 Corinthians 4.6)."

"It is the ego-dominated self that keeps us locked in a series of competitive moves and countermoves, that induces us to manipulate people and control situations, that for most of us destroys inner peace and serenity in our lives. Trapped in the quest for security, pleasure, and power, our moment-to-moment thoughts are concentrated on the dark pursuit of illusory happiness, and we are thus inattentive to the Lord of Light. Our eyes are not fixed on Christ Jesus but on ourselves. We settle for a roller-coaster ride of exhilarating peaks and vertiginous valleys, interspersed with long periods of driving, pushing, and suffering in various degrees."

"The anxious, darting, filmy eyes of many Christians are the manifestations of a heart beclouded by the worries of the world. The translucent eyes of others radiate the simplicity and joy of a heart fixed on Jesus Christ, the Light of the World."

"[Jesus] pours out the Holy Spirit to form the holy People of God, a community of prophets and lovers who will surrender to the mystery of the fire of the Spirit that burns within, who will live in ever greater fidelity to the shattering, omnipresent Word, who will enter into the center of all that is, into the very heart and mystery of God, into the center of that flame that consumes and purifies and sets all aglow with peace, joy, boldness, and extravagant love."

"The church-at-large still scans the horizon awaiting the fiery glow of the new Pentecost. The Communist who accepts Karl Marx but not his doctrine is scarcely different from the Christian who accepts Jesus Christ but refuses to shape his life according to Christ's teaching... Paul's cheeks are still streaked because of the tepidity, rank insincerity, spiritual adultery, indifference to prayer, and apostolic sloth that dapple the Christian life in America today."

"[Jesus'] message is not a reassurance to keep right on doing what we've been doing, but, writes Edward O'Connor, 'a summons to the labor of eliminating from our lives, faithfully and perseveringly, everything in us that is opposed to the work and the will of his Holy Spirit for us... Whenever faith is accepted merely as a closed system of well-defined doctrines, we lost contact with the living God. The faith that saves is a surrender to God."

"The gospel presses us to painful honesty. If nothing else, we ought to be sincere. Get out and pant with the moneymaking street, become hedonists, and 'eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we will die,' or repent and turn to the spirit of the gospel."

"'What the gospel of Jesus Christ offers us,' Thomas Merton observes, 'is not a false peace which enables us to avoid the implacable light of judgment, but the grace to courageously accept the bitter truth that is revealed to us; to abandon our inertia, our egoism, and submit entirely to the demands of the Spirit, praying earnestly for help, and giving ourselves generously to every effort asked of us by God.'"

"Saint Augustine complained, 'Many who had already come close on the way to believing are frightened away by the bad lives of evil and false Christians. How many, my brothers, do you think there are who want to become Christians but are put off by the evil ways of Christians?' If the searcher after truth finds Christians to be just as self-absorbed, guilt-ridden, hopeless, unsure of their foundations, and haunted by the same fears as he is, just as much at sea in an alien environment, and just as perplexed generally, it is small wonder that he feels no attraction to the church."

Manning quotes a 23-year-old woman doing graduate work in Paris: "To me a Christian is either a man who lives in Christ or a phony. You Christians do not appreciate that it is on this--the almost external testimony that you give of God--that we judge you. You ought to radiate Christ. Your faith ought to flow out to us like a river of life. You ought to infect us with a love for him. It is then that God who was impossible becomes possible for the atheist and for those of us whose faith is wavering. We cannot help being struck, upset, and confused by a Christian who is truly Christlike. And we do not forgive him when he fails to be."

"We will never move people to Jesus Christ and the gospel merely by making speeches about them. Edward Schillebeeckx is blunt: 'People, to put it bluntly, have had their bellyful of sermonizing. They want a source of strength for their lives. We can only recommend this strength by making it actively present in our own lives.' Contact with Christians should be an experience that proves to people that the gospel is a power that transforms the whole of life. Instead, our presence in the world is often marked by rank insincerity, a dilution of grace, and a failure to act on the Word."

"'It is not uncommon,' as Ralph Martin notes, 'for many Christians to have a seriously incomplete idea of what the Scriptures say about Jesus Christ. Many have a vague idea of Jesus as 'a good guy' who helped the poor and told people to love one another. They operated with a fuzzy, almost symbolic notion of Jesus as the symbol for a liberal's idea of goodness.' Those who say, 'Jesus would never hurt anyone,' often mean to rule out the possibility that he would ever ask someone to repent or go through the pain of recognizing his brokenness. To believe that all Jesus calls us to is to be nice to each other is to substitute the Christ of Christian humanism for the Christ of Saint Paul..."

"[The Christ we see in Hebrews] is no Christ the humanitarian, Christ the master of interpersonal relationships, or Christ the buddy. It is Christ the Lord and Savior who calls us to repent, change our lives, and strike out in a new direction... [When we see Christ as Christ the humanitarian, a] loose goodwill toward the world replaces the radical conversion and explicit death to self that the gospel demands... The tone of the Christ of God is not always sweet and consoling. The gospel is the Good News of gratuitous salvation, but it does not promise a picnic on a green lawn."

"There is nobody in the Christian community who is not called to continual conversion. There is no one who does not still have before him the labor of building up the image of Jesus Christ in his life by the steady practice, day by day, of Christian virtues."

"[Christianity] comprises more than involvement in human rights struggles, environmental causes, or peace programs. Fullness of life in the Spirit is more than finding Christ in others and serving him there. It is a summons to personal holiness, ongoing conversion, and new creation through union with Christ Jesus."

"Jesus does not say, 'Come to a day of renewal, a retreat, a prayer meeting, a liturgy,' but 'come to me.' Is this the self-flattering superiority of a religious fanatic? Yes, if he is not the Savior of the world. He is either an egoist or the Risen Lord who must be proclaimed as the world's only hope."

"The Christ of Paul was not merely a great teacher, an example of a great man, or a symbol of man's noblest aspirations; he was Lord and Savior. To reinterpret Jesus any other way is to bleed Christianity of its point."